Introducing our newest family member... Cleatus Bartholomew Jenkins, III. Cleatus is a purebred, tri-color, Basset Hound. We lost Moses a couple years ago, who was Todd's best bud. It took him a while to get over that. Meanwhile, Kaiden and I adopted Gilly

. Gilly loves Todd. Todd pets her and plays with her and hangs with her... but she is not loyal to Todd like she is to Kaiden and I. It is funny... it's like she KNOWS it was Kaiden and I that picked her out in the shelter. If Todd goes to bed and says "Come on Gilly!" she will look over at me, see that I am not moving and will stay put. She will not head up, until I do.

Well, Todd was finally ready to find a new best bud and he chose Cleatus. We had been looking at dogs out there on Craigslist, in the paper, online, etc. and he found a Basset Hound, that we ended up not getting, as someone beat us to it. But it stuck, and he wanted a Basset, so we found a breeder, took a drive to NC and picked out Cleatus. He was born on September the 8th and was 6 weeks old when we picked him up. The name suits him and he is definitely a perfect example of the breed - a stubborn, goofy bastard of a dog. We love him.

Kaiden wanted to celebrate her birthday this year with a party at the Trav-L-Park campground. We rented a cabin and invited her bestest buds - all her soccer pals, plus family, The Gilkes Family and Clavier Family. This particular campground goes all out during October for Halloween, so there were lots of activities going on for the kids to take part in. We almost were not able to get a cabin, because they fill up and are always booked, but there was a cancellation and we were able to slide in. Kaiden was SO HAPPY.

The first thing that the group did was take a hayride all around the campground to see how all the campsites and trailers had decorated for Halloween. The weather was absolutely perfect for being outside and the girls all had a lot of fun.

After the hayride, the girls played at the park and ran around the campground acting crazy while they waited for the scheduled dog costume contest and parade. I was able to get them all together for about 30 seconds to be able to snap some group photos.

Then it was time for presents. Kaiden loved all the great and thoughtful presents that she received. Her friends did a great job of picking out everything she would love. After presents, we cooked all the kids hot dogs and hamburgers. As a general FYI... a soccer team of 11 year old girls can put down some damn hamburgers and hot dogs - like it is their jobs!

From there, we moved on to cake and ice cream! Her cake turned out great, with a real looking campfire and edible rocks. Everyone loved it... except some of the rocks were a really hot cinnamon flavor so the kids did not like that so much. BUT I DID, man their faces were priceless when they expected a delicious fruity flavor, then realized their mouths were on fire.

Once we were done with all the eating and presents, the campground hosted trick-or-treating, so the girls grabbed bags and walked the entire campground stopping at each campsite and collecting candy. They made out like bandits. I bet they got more candy then they get on a typical Halloween night.

Of course EATING is what comes after COLLECTING. They hung out in the cabin trading, eating and throwing candy EVERYWHERE. I have never had to spend 30 minutes sweeping up candy before... I can now say that is something I have done. This was all done while we were killing time waiting for the 8pm Halloween Dance Party at the campground pavilion, complete with disco lights and DJ. This is when the girls went absolutely crazy, dancing and jumping around. It was fun to watch and made me think of how happy I was that we were outside at a campground and NOT inside my house.

Kaiden and all of her friends had such a good time. I am so glad we were able to do this for her. I have a feeling I should go ahead and rent a cabin for next year to do this again, because it was so much fun for them! HAPPY 11TH BIRTHDAY PEANUT!!!

Today Kaiden broke her right wrist after taking a fall on her bike, while cruising the neighborhood with her friends.  Two years ago, she broke the left wrist, so now we have a beautiful matching set!  I got a call from Nadine's daughter, Brianna, that Kaiden had fallen and "would not stop crying and embarrassing her by making people look at her" - So I hopped in the truck and headed out to pick her  and her bike up.  After getting her home, and her continuing to cry without an end in sight, Todd was nice enough to remind me about the last broken wrist and how I did not believe her when it was broken, so I took her on up to the Doc in the Box, where x-rays revealed it was in fact broken.  HOORAY!

 

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My sister sent me some photos that she swore up and down she had caught ghost activity in. She had been in St. Augustine, FL., which she stated is the 2nd most haunted place in the US, behind Savannah. She wanted me to look them over and give my opinion before she sent them to Ghost Hunters.

I did not see any ghosts and told her that I thought that it looked like the pics had been taken through a window. She got a little upset SWEARING she was on the street when she took the photos. She then wanted me to forward the photos to Todd to get his opinion. So I promised her that I would. Todd looked at them and completely agreed and then pointed out that he could SEE the side of a car mirror and the door lock. I was about to text her with his response, when he said "we should send her a ghost picture back!" So we sent her a photo and a text that stated "Hey, so weird that you sent us ghost photos... we took a photo inside the new house and we think that we caught some sort of paranormal activity in the photo. Do you see anything in our pic? Should we consider also sending to Ghost Hunters?"

Apparently Todd and I are assholes now.