Summer's field trip to Landrum's Country.

The day after Story's field trip to Mitchell Farms, Summer and I headed to Landrum's Country with her first grade class.  Meanwhile, David is still in Montana, and I have officially lost my voice at this point.  Sunday night, right after David left (literally), my voice started fading.  By Wednesday, I could not talk at all.  The Lord, He really has quite the sense of humor! I figure He didn't want me hollering at the children too much while their daddy was away.  Turns out, I couldn't yell, even if I wanted to, ha! Back to Summer. . .

Summer's class, along with the other first grade classes, met at the Hattiesburg train station and rode the train to Laurel before going to Landrum's Country. 

Me with my Summer girl.  We didn't get a picture together on the day of her field trip, but this was taken just the week before when our church visited Mitchell Farms with the children from Homes of Hope. 

Summer waiting to board the train.  Such a neat experience at such a young age! The first grade classes rode the train from Hattiesburg to Laurel, and all of the parents picked them up from the train station before making our way over to Landrum's Country. 

Summer's class first went to try their hands at shooting! Her daddy would've been so proud.  Check out that stance!



They also got to mine for gems.  Summer found so many pretty stones. 



Needless to say, we did survive the week at home with Daddy gone to Montana.  Thursday after school, we drove to New Orleans to pick him up from the airport. 

We ate the famous pancakes at City Diner in New Orleans.  So fun!  As you can see, we are just a little happy to have our main man home! 



Story's first ever class field trip.

The very week David traveled to Montana, Story and Summer had field trips with their classes.  Thankfully, with the help of some sweet college girls, I managed to be able to attend both trips, whew.  Story's class traveled to Mitchell Farms, and we had the best time.  The weather could not have been more perfect. 



Story's precious preK class at PCS preschool. 



Story and one of her favorite friends, Lacey. 

My girl.  We had the best day together.  Such a treat to be her momma. 

Story's favorite thing to do at Mitchell Farms.  She loved it!  We may or may not have almost taken out a very pregnant lady with the swing! I felt terrible!

I don't know who was more excited about her first field trip, Story or me!  I still cannot wrap my head around her being big enough to go on a field trip in the first place.  Whew!

Go west, young man!

The first week of November, David headed west with some of our church members to visit Montana with the hopes of scouting out some sites for future mission trips. 

It goes without saying that our party of six is quite tight knit, and David is totally the glue that holds us all together.  So, I don't let him leave very often, ha!  Seriously, we are working on it.  This trip to Montana was a big step for us, and totally survived, and he had a great time.  On the way there, we used this cool app to track his airplane rides over.  So cool! 

He sent us pictures throughout the week of some beautiful sights he saw along the way.  So beautiful!

Taken in honor of our Carter :)

David totally hearts cold weather, so he was loving the snow.  In fact, he missed a big ole blizzard by a week, and he was super bummed, but we were so thankful, ha! 

Our sweet friends, the Nicholases, who took David to Montana treated him to a delicious steak dinner on one of the nights he was there.  Mrs. Gay definitely ordered him a 48 oz. rib eye, and David definitely ate every big of it, yikes!

Our daughter, Summer, is quite smitten with horses, so David sent these pictures for her.  So pretty!

Speaking of Summer, she lost her very first molar while David was away!  Somehow the tooth fairy managed to pay her a visit during this wild week!  Thankfully, David made it home safely, and we all survived back at home, barely, ha!

Halloween fun!

Eeekkk!  I am so far behind once again with blogging.  Not even sure where the blame should lie.  Life with the family of six.  Strep.  Holiday travel.  Sore throats and colds.  It just happens, and life passes by so quickly! At any rate, I am going to do by best to play catch up over the next few weeks.  I left off with Halloween.  It was such a fun week for us, and the festivities really did last the whole week.  The littles were able to wear their costumes from Papa and Gigi many times!

First, on the Sunday night before Halloween, we spent the evening with two of our favorites, Mr.  Landon and Miss Katie.  They invited us over for a Halloween themed supper, complete with pumpkins, mummies, and candy corn.  So fun!  Oh, how we love these two!

Then, we participated in the annual Halloween parade in our neighborhood.  This year, the girls and I actually got to ride on a float with the Sweet Teas of Hattiesburg.  They loved it! 

Who am I kidding, I so loved it, too! Right before the parade, I decided I should dress up, too.  So, I grabbed some hunter's clothes and camo, and headed off with my princesses from Arendale and Darth Vader. 

After the parade the girls were lucky enough to meet Mary Poppins and Bert.  So fun!

Story got to wear her costume to school on Freaky Friday, which was also Halloween!  She was so excited.  Have you ever seen a more beautiful Princess Anna?  I think not!

Story with some of her sweet classmates at school. 

Friday night, we were invited to a neighborhood party hosted by some friends from school.  It was the most fun.  We ate supper, and then the children went through the neighborhood trick or treating and had the most fun! And as you can tell from the picture below, there were just a few children there! Can you spot four little O'Dell's?

UGA v. ARK

It's taken me way too long to blog about this awesome weekend our family enjoyed just a couple of weeks ago.  Two Fridays ago, we took the little people out of school just after lunch and headed north to Arkansas. 



On the way up, we always stop at this rest area and take a picture of the fab four with the Arkansas sign.  We have been doing this for the last three years since we have lived in Mississippi, and it is so amazing to see how much they have grown in just such a short time!



Of course, I had to jump in and have my picture taken with the little loves, too! David's parents live just south of Little Rock, so we arrived at their house just in time for supper and a celebration of Papa's birthday. 

Saturday morning, we donned our red and black and headed out to War Memorial Stadium for the match-up between the dawgs and the hogs.  Thankfully, these two teams don't see each other very often.  It is no fun being a divided family.  However, lucky for me, our party of six all agrees to call the dawgs.  For now.  We did not have tickets for the children to the game, but we wanted them to experience game day and the dawg walk, so David's dad graciously drove the children down and took them back home while we enjoyed the game.  Here we are all ready to call the dawgs!

And this is the crowd at the dawg walk just as the team is pulling up on their buses.

Coach Richt was the first one off and was so gracious to greet the crowd! Too bad for us that we were on the wrong side of the line-up, ha!

Coach Bobo, the offensive coordinator greeting the fans. 

Coach Pruitt, the newest defensive coordinator for the dawgs. 

This Michael Bennett, wide receiver for the dawgs.  David and I actually got to meet him after the game because his father is a pastor is ATL, and he and David have become friends at a leadership conference they have been attending together over the last year. 

Carter was front and center as the players were walking through, and he got a couple of high fives and hand shakes from them! He thought it was so cool!

So exciting!  Carter has been to a few Georgia games with David while we were living in Atlanta.  I love that he is growing up watching the dawgs, too!

After the dawg walk, Papa came back to get the children, so David and I could head into the stadium to find our seats.  We sat with the Kelly family, JK, Jennifer, Eli and Colt.  They graciously gave us our tickets to the game, and we had the most fun being with them, even if they are hog fans!

This is Jennifer, JK's wife.  I always enjoy being with her and her sweet family.  JK and David were in each other's weddings and have been friends for a long time.  I am so thankful to have gained her for a sweet friend, too!


Love that big G waving across the field.  Going to the game wasn't quite like being in Athens, but is sure was nice to call the dawgs in person!



He's pretty much my favorite in all the land.  It was such a treat to go to the game with him.  We are definitely taking a selfiie while the rest of the people in our section were calling the hogs!



Before the game, we got to see one of David's greatest and oldest friends, Stephen and his family.  We just happened to run into them at the dawg walk, so fun!



Here we are after the game! It was so much fun to see the dawgs pull out a W!



David's sister, Cari, and her husband, Cory, were at the game too.  They joined us after the third quarter when a lot of people had cleared out. 



Sunday, we went to church with Papa and Gigi and the Calhoun cousins before heading back home to Mississippi.  Look at all those sweet faces!

And before we knew it, we were crossing over the mighty Mississippi heading back home after a great weekend in Arkansas!

Field trip with Carter to Mitchell Farms.

About a week ago, I had the privilege of going with Carter and the entire second grade at PCS on a field trip to Mitchell Farms.  It was my first time to visit this fun place, and it did not disappoint.  

 Me with my favorite little fella before all the fun began.  

 Carter's second grade class.  

 Carter and one of his classmates having fun on the playground at the farm.  There were so many fun things to do.  

 Next, we took a tractor ride around the farm.  How stunning are these sunflowers!  

 Carter's class is lined up ready for the train ride.  

 Sweet friends. 

 Carter's amazing teacher, Mrs. Newman.  He adores her! 

 This year, I have been an assistant in a second grade class at PCS and am privileged to work with this pretty lady every day.  She has become such a precious friend to me! 

And so has this sweet lady, another assistant at PCS and fellow lover of all things Georgia Bulldogs! We had such a great day at Mitchell Farms.  Lucky me, I get to go back two more times before the season is over!