It's Just Good Music: Carolina Story

Hey A Bushel and a Peck readers!
I want to give a quick shout out to Carolina Story and their new album, which released yesterday.  This is seriously some of my favorite music ever.  You can listen to it through over and over, singing along and enjoying every second of it. The lyrics, all written by Ben and Emily, are a work of art and will shoot straight through to your heart.  They are like a soundtrack to life...and the songs can be enjoyed by the entire family, which is kind of hard to come by these days!!  Shelby and Coleman ask to hear Carolina Story every time we get in the car (which sure beats popping in a movie to zombie them out- I'd rather have my kids singing and dancing any day!)

Yesterday when the album released, it quickly shot to the top of the singer/songwriter chart on iTunes and rose to #2 by afternoon, right behind the Civil Wars! It's still holding there & they're trying to give it one more big push to try and take that #1 spot! How cool would that be for these independent artists who just love to make music to top an iTunes chart in it's first couple of release days??  And we are sure to have a chance to see them live in the upcoming months, as they are devoted to hitting the road (the traveling life!) and playing for their fans all over, but especially their beloved DFW friends :)

It's only $7.92 on iTunes here: www.iTunes.com/CarolinaStory

This album, along with their first album, are our family's favorites to queue up when we're hanging or lounging at the house or on the back patio with a fire.  It's perfect camping music, great out-by-the-pool musice, and perfect to have on for company, too...it plays right along with our Ray Lamontagne and James Taylor. :)  My favorites are Carry Me Home, In the End, and If I Could Hold You.

So give it a listen and help support great music!  Can't wait to hear what you think!

Sister’s 1st Grade Thanksgiving Feast

The 1st grade has been doing this for 20 years (since the doors opened) at GVE.  Jeff and I attended Shelby’s feast last Friday and were just astonished at all the food.  Enough to feed all the 1st graders and all the parents (and there were probably just as many parents as there were children…that’s how GVE rolls.)  All homemade.  All good.  We helped the kids down the line and it was just sad and pathetic all the things they skipped.  Most kids got turkey and macaroni & cheese, maybe some pieces of strawberry or apple…skipped the potatoes, green been casseroles, stuffing/dressing, sweet potato casseroles, broccoli rice casseroles, rolls, and everything else!  One day they will learn…

Not pictured:  HUGE dessert tables full of pumpkin pies, pumpkin cheesecake rolls, cookies, cupcakes, etc.

Shelby’s contribution to the hallway art:

 

The children got to choose which 1st grade classroom to eat in, “so that they could eat with their friends.”  They do this kind of often.  I don’t really love this because I didn’t know which kids/parents were really in Shelby’s class and who weren’t.  I’m the room parent and I still don’t know any of the kids/parents except for those that I knew before the year began.   Plus, do the kids in other classes really get together before and plan where their friends will be, or is it more of just a guess or a popularity contest among teachers?  I don’t get it.  Anyway, Shelby chose to stay in her own classroom, and sat with her friend Camryn (also from her class.)

I helped her through the line as daddy took a picture, and sister posed. :

 

Then we all enjoyed the meal together on teeny little chairs in the room where our girl spends most of her waking hours.  It was fun and we are glad we were both able to go!

Friday Night Jones-Peck-Matthews Date: Dinner and Bowling

Friday night we had no plans, so we ended up at Nonnie & Poppy’s house after school/work.  We decided to go eat once all the working boys got home (somehow in our family, it is usually all the girls at home waiting on boys to get home from working later and crappy commutes.)  We ended up at a little Italian place near home, called Jerry’s.  It’s in an old Braums but seriously good!  I have had several recommendations for it, and loved it.  (And it’s BYOB, which is always a plus.)

I’m saving this picture of the nose-pick-smile for his first girlfriend.

We had to get a picture of Anna’s new dark hair.

And another one of Buddy (this time, licking his mommy)

and Kissing…

and finally a smile!

I love these- rare photos with my babies!!

At some point during dinner someone suggested bowling.  Checks quickly paid, we headed down the street to use up some groupons and have some more fun.  My kids have the best aunts and uncles in the world.

 

And Nonnie too, of course!

 

The kids made a visit to the arcade, and I mustache you, don’t you think the rest of the night looked fun?

(Like father, like daughter?)

 

This morning Coleman asked if we could go bowling again.  He said it was because he lost his mustache!

Shelby found some kind of tickets in the arcade and we found her trying to redeem them at the bowling counter, haha!

 

It was a fun night for sure!!!

Christmas Shopping

I have been trying to get Coleman to tell me what he wants for Christmas.
M: “So what are you going to ask Santa for?
C: “I’m not telling!”
M: “You can tell me!”
C: “Nope, Santa will know.”
M: “Oh no you can tell me!!!” (tickle tickle tickle)
C: “Okay!  Stop!  It’s a B B Gun!”
M: “A bb gun?!  Where did you hear about that?”
C: “From Janson at school!  He knows all about them.”
M: “Ok well keep thinking, I don’t think Santa will bring you a bb gun.”
C: “Yes he will, he can hear me right now!”





(fast forward a couple of days, I am talking to Coleman on the phone)

M: “So what are you going to ask Santa for for Christmas?  You can’t have a gun!”
C: “Well when I’m like one hundred I can get one….but then my thumb will be too big to pull the trigger.”
M: “Okay so think of something else.”
C: “Santa will just pick.” 
M: “No you can think of something.  Some toy you want?”
C: “I want a REAL T-Rex dinosaur.”
M: “You have a big t-rex that Shelby got you.”
C: “No I mean a REAL one!”
M: “Coleman dinosaurs aren’t real anymore, so you can’t have that.”
C: “No, I mean the BONES of a REAL dinosaur!”

Shelby, on the other hand, will not stop asking for a puppy.  They did a book at school about what they want for Christmas. 
Hers said:
Page 1: "I want a puppy."
Page 2: "But my mom said no."
Page 3: "So I want a hamster." 
Page 4: "The End."

(In case anyone forgot, we've been through 2 hamsters at the Peck house already.)

Ok so my Christmas shopping list should include:
- a bb gun for my 4 year old.
- real dinosaur fossils (put together into a whole dinosaur, presumably)
- a puppy and a hamster for Shelby

And there are only 38 days left to shop!!

I'm gonna be Blunt

Facts:
-Yesterday, we had a huge stinky foot debacle in the car after school. Cute mary jane-style shoes with no socks and a first grader don't mix.
-I wear glasses, daily.

Story:

I was going over spelling words with Shelby tonight.

One word was "Blunt" so I explained to her what blunt meant. "It can be when a knife isn't sharp...or it can be when you just say what you're thinking, like, 'I'm gonna be blunt. Your feet stink." We giggled.
She quickly understood, looking at me with a smirk and replying, "I'm gonna be blunt. YOU HAVE TO GET RID OF THOSE GLASSES."

REALLY?!?! I feigned heartbreak and left the room for a while.

Upon return, we started back on the spelling list. The next word was UGLY. I squinted at her and dared her to use it in a sentence. She smiled and giggled and thought hard and finally, eventually replied, (spelling it all out) "Y-O-U A-R-E N-O-T U-G-L-Y."

Redeemed! I told her she better be glad for that "N-O-T."

I love my clever girl!

Colemanista

You will probably only appreciate this if you know Coleman, and can picture how serious he was in these conversations! :)
Coleman picks out his clothes every night. (He never picks jeans.) Tonight, he laid out a great outfit: black shirt, red (CARS) hoodie, black pants with red stripes, and a black hat...except the pants had holes in them, so I told him that was great but we would put jeans with it instead. He did not like that suggestion, and was seriously distraught, staring at ground, hands out, when he said, "No Mommy! Blue and black do not go together!" "Yes they do!" I said. "NO! Only red goes with black!"
He seemed to believe me when I explained to him that blue JEANS are the one thing that goes with everything.  So I laid the jeans out with the rest of the outfit and held up my hand for a high five.  He looked at my hand, took his own hand and gave me a huge thumbs-down signal, and walked away.  Diss.

The other day I took him to Kohl's to look for a shirt for family pictures. As I browsed through the plaid button downs and sweaters, he went on and on about how "I do not like those picture shirts! I want one of these awesome shirts!" When I picked a couple of shirts, he was very upset, "But those are not awesome!!" This stuff makes me kinda remember when my bro Tyler was a little boy and was oh-so-picky about clothes. I remember Mom and I going around looking for Hurley shirts and JNCO jeans, and even before that, when he had to have some type of character on everything he wore (which is kind of where Coleman is right now, with the matching thrown in.)

Shelby has a shirt that says "Fashionista" but I think I bought that shirt for the wrong kid! Too bad it's pink and has bows on it!

A trip to Nana & Papa G’s house

We love Nana’s house in the fall!  We try to go every year (or more!) to enjoy the nice weather and open air, and the great company and cooking too, of course!  (Breakfast at Nana’s is drool-worthy!)

A week or so ago the Peck fam headed out to Powderly, Texas with Nonnie and Anna for a weekend away.

 

There was football,

shiny pajamas:

And wine.  (Shiny pajamas + wine = slippery Anna = laughs for all!)

There were games of Uno

And as ALWAYS, tractor rides.  This time the kids did all the driving!

(Obviously, Daddy will be the patient one to teach them to drive!)

The kids even got to pick pears from the pear tree

…and eat them!

We spent most of Saturday morning looking for the keys to Nonnie’s car, which Jeff had had last.  (I know no one is surprised…poor Jeff!)  We looked EVERYWHERE- to no avail.  We starting worrying about how to get the spare from home in NRH (2.5 hours away.)  To our surprise and joy, Millie called to say that she would bring them to us, and spend the rest of the weekend with us!  I call that divine intervention- lost keys providing some special girl/family time!  Later that day, way after Millie arrived, Jeff found the keys.  They were on top of Nana’s chest of drawers in her bedroom.  After he found them, Nana says she remembered him saying, “I’m putting the keys here.”  Somehow none of us remember that the next day.  What a mess (though turned into a blessing!!)

On Sunday we went home refreshed and ready for a great week!

End of Year Soccer Party

We had our soccer party at Pizza Garden, where the girls each got a trophy.  Most of the Lions:

Here is Shelby with Coach Matt:

We got a couple of sweet pictures of the 4 TCC Children’s Center girls, with another teammate thrown in the background

Natalia, Linnea, Ryann, Shelby, (back) Ari

I love Shelby’s smile in this one, you can really see her changing teeth smile:

Our party was combined with the coach’s other team (one year older) and Coleman was very excited and giggly to see his friend from school Reagan there.  Could they be any cuter, with his arm around her and his pizza-stained chin!??

We are going to be playing indoor winter soccer with our team in Southlake, and Coleman may even play in the spring (with Reagan’s coed team) so there will be more soccer tales to come!