lil' pumpkin baby shower - part 1

my friend Ryan is having a little baby girl, Olive, in February.  soooo...of course we needed to shower her with some love and decided November was the perfect time to throw a Lil' Pumpkin Baby Shower.  If you ever need to throw a shower might I suggest having wonderful helpers like these lovely ladies...

hellloooo fall boots!  but seriously, such fun women to work with (and fabulous cooks...more on the food later).

Here are some of the decorations we had at the shower...

pumpkins...naturally

diaper cake - duh! caitlin helped me put this one together! 

The top is always something I stress about but I love how this bow came together. 

happy girl!!! that means bows!

Lele made these adorable letters (seen in the group picture).  it was her idea to hang them from the mantle by a branch...super cute!  AND look at her sweet little fabric pumpkins.  lele, she's a keeper!

and for little "thank you" treats I made one of ryan's favorite treats, pumpkin chocolate chip muffins!

check back later for more of the food and highlights from the shower!

family photos

tis the season...for family photos!

This sweet family works at TBCH with me.  They, however, are the ones that actually do ALL.THE.WORK. and go out there, offer up their lives, homes, jobs, comforts, and schedules to be parents to children in need 24/7.  They...are houseparents.  What missionaries.  Talk about "looking after orphans in their distress" (James 1:27), these folks do it EVERY.DAY.  What a cool way for their sweet boy to be raised...seeing everyone as equals, learning to have an open heart and open home when it comes to helping others in need, and always having a house full of friends to play with :)

Besides showing you some recent pictures I took, I wanted to use this post to remind you (and first and foremost myself) that as the holidays grow closer and as we get excited to be with family and eat big meals...there are those who don't have that to look forward to...and there are those like that just down the street from you.  literally.  TBCH has campuses in 6 locations across the state, there are missions and shelters all over...plenty of ways for you to give to someone who needs it this year!

tis the season...to give back.

embrace fall

oh to be a kid again.

happy baby surprise!

remember this super cute family?!  well...since baby boy #2 will be joining us NEXT MONTH we decided to surprise them with some "Happy Baby!" gifts.  naturally for me...that means a diaper cake!  (I'm pretty sure new born diapers are the cutest little things).

Josh got his first lesson in diaper cakes.  He was a huge help - you just gotta have two sets of hand folks.  I decided to make a front and a back so that it's cute all the way around...

and baby cason's wardrobe would not be complete without a little commodore love:

Brian and Christine also joined in on the fun.  She made the cutest little cupcakes (sorry I failed to take a picture) and they looked JUST like the master's cupcakes too.  Christine used pumpkin cupcakes and they were delicious!!!

Happy Baby Whitehursts!  Hope you enjoy your treats!

pumpkin puppies

Oh dogs in costumes...it will always be funny.

I got Bauer a pumpkin t-shirt for Halloween...so his girlfriend got a pumpkin costume to match.

and for the record...they really do love each other...

Now, when Halloween rolled around we felt like Rosie Bell was maybe feeling a bit left out (this absolutely not how she felt, but our desire to have all the pups dressed up won out over her desire to never conform to what the other two are doing).  Luckily, Luna had a set of Halloween pajamas (naturally...what dog doesn't have an extra set of Halloween pajamas).  I know what you are thinking.  Luna is a SUPER small.  Rosie is fairly average...is this going to work?  well...why don't you be the judge of how it worked out...

ummm, hello adorable!!! (poor rosie...she was a trooper, it was a wee bit too small)

now...if you remember our HUGE pumpkin that we got at gentry's farm...Mom REALLY wanted to put Luna IN it.  HA!  maybe next year. We'll just settle for all around it. But putting her next to it does help you see just how big it really is.

hope you all had a happy Halloween! 

next up is Thanksgiving and on to Christmas! 

What a wonderful time of year!

carving pumpkins

last year josh and I carved pumpkins AFTER Halloween...so the fact that we did it ON Halloween this year was a big improvement.  Hopefully next year we can get our act together since we'll be all married and such...WEIRD!

anyway....we carved our pumpkins with these kids...always a good time when large knives are involved.

between our HUGE pumpkin from gentry's farm and scait's pumpkin, caitlin got busy cooking batches of pumpkin seeds...(one batch salted, the other with cinnamon!)

scott set the bar high while he whittled away at Frankenstein...

while josh and I kept it pretty traditional with ours...

check back tomorrow...the dogs want to show you their costumes!!!

oh...and just because certain people get upset when they don't have a picture on the blog...here is a picture of me and Josh from downtown Franklin's Pumpkin Festival!

because he's too cute