You can kiss your family good-bye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world, but a world lives in you.
~ Frederick Buechner

Allyssa Brynn

Kelsey Leigh

Andrew Lee

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

The Beginning of School Projects


Ally has officially started working on planning for projects and completing them in a specific time frame. Her first school project was a book report based on a setting. She had to choose between 3 projects...a diorama, decorating a t-shirt, or creating a book based on the story she chose to read for this report. Of course, Ally chose the diorama. She read the story The Little Mermaid from her big book of Disney stories and came up with the idea to do an underwater diorama. We went to Michael's and found paper to cover the shoe box, fish stickers, "jewels" to use as bubbles, and pipe cleaners for seaweed. She was quite creative. She spent the better part of 2 days working on covering the box, hot gluing the jewels and sewing on the seaweed so it would stand up...which I helped with for safety reasons ;). She added in the Ariel, Sebastian, Flounder, and Ursula figurines we had at the house and completed the project with some real seashells she found at the beach. She is VERY PROUD of her hard work.

A Fourth Hole in Ally's Head!!

Last night, Ally FINALLY lost the dangling tooth from the top row of her mouth. That poor thing has been hanging on by a thread for a week now and Ally was scared to pull it. But, after some convincing, Ally let me pull it. She didn't even know it was out because after I got it out, she asked to pull it herself. When she realized it wasn't there, she rinsed and smiled for the camera...with one less tooth!!

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Happy Halloween

It was a fantastic Halloween here in Georgia for the Jackson Five. Our weekend was filled with fun Halloween activities. We spent Friday night watching The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, a yearly tradition at our house. And then after dinner, we were in garage with the kids carving out our Jack-o-Lantern. When it was finished, we put on some music (just a little ZBB and some Kenny Chesney) and danced around the garage. On Saturday, we spent the morning celebrating a friend's first birthday and then headed out to Aunt Jackie and Uncle Stefan's house for the big Florida-Georgia game. It was a good win for the Gators and we were excited to celebrate in Gator fashion with the family. As soon as the game ended, we headed home to be with our friends and go trick or treating. It was a short outing compared to past years...we only did the 2 streets by our house because of the rain, but we hauled in tons of candy and the girls were excited to be with their friends. Ally and Kelsey were super cute as Glinda and Dorothy. They held hands the whole time they trick or treated...and that, for me, was the best part. People were running all over the place and there were my precious girls walking together, holding hands, big sister and little sister, taking care of each other. Warmed my heart on a cold rainy night...because that's what I look forward to most in their lives as sisters...a closeness no one will come between. Drew was a sweet Toto and sat in the stroller the whole time...taking in the sights, sounds and fun. We came home and had a few pieces of candy while we watched Charlie Brown one more time. And, then it was off to bed...an extra hour to boot!!
As always...all of the pictures are on the Shutterfly share site.
http://therealjacksonfive.shutterfly.com








Thursday, October 22, 2009

Preparing for the Big Night!!

So, we have officially started counting down until Trick or Treating...9 days to go. In order to get in to the spirit of things, we put on our costumes this weekend to make sure everything fit and looked good. This year, the Jackson Kiddos are going as Wizard of Oz characters. Ally has chosen to be Glinda, the Good Witch. Kelsey will be playing the role of Dorothy. And our newest addition will be perched on the ground as sweet little Toto. After getting dressed and seeing how cute they all looked together, we headed to the gazebo at the lake to snap a few pictures. It seems like getting a good picture on the actual night of Halloween is near impossible, so we do it early. And then everything else is bonus. Happy Halloween!!!


Sunday, October 18, 2009

Burt's Pumpkin Patch & Amicalola Falls

Today was our annual trek in to the North Georgia mountains for a visit to Burt's Farm and Amicalola Falls State Park. This year, Grandma and Grandpa Jackson joined us and it was so nice to have them along...even if it was only 40 degrees outside. We arrived at Burt's shortly after 9 and saw there were already people filing in. Apparently the extra cold fall weather wasn't keeping anyone away. We took a few pictures by the big pumpkins, huge pumpkins, and then headed to the hayride. We got to see the talking pumpkins and Amicalola Falls was super easy to see this year...it was so clear in the mountains. After the hayride, the girls quickly picked out a small pumpkin for themselves and then picked one out for Drew. We found the pumpkin we plan to turn in to a scary Jack-O-Lantern for Halloween and then high-tailed it to the car. We had been outside for close to an hour and the weather seemed to be getting colder. We went over to Amicalola Falls State Park so that Mom and Dad could see the lodge and look over the falls. There was no picnic this year...it was just too cold. We had a fun trip today and look forward to visiting Burt's farm again next year!!

Visit the shutterfly site for all the fun pictures we took. Here are a few to get you started.

http://therealjacksonfive.shutterfly.com/







Friday, October 16, 2009

Darby Rose Photos - October 2009

We had our pictures done again by my friend Darby. And, of course, I had to share them. You can find a slideshow of them at the link below or you can visit her website, also listed below, and find the slideshow there. It is only available for 2 months. Some of the pictures are posted here in this blog. All of them will be posted on the Shutterfly site. Don't be fooled...these are not the best ones. Just had to tempt you to go and visit her website and see the slideshow!!

Darby Rose Photography Website
http://www.darbyrosephotography.com/
Slideshow Link
http://www.photobiz.com/slideshowbiz/slideshow.cfm?slideshowID=90082&photographerID=3614
The Real Jackson Five
http://therealjacksonfive.shutterfly.com/


Thursday, October 15, 2009

Picture Day...Again!!

Kelsey's first set of school pictures came home today. Had to share them!!