Thanksgiving

This year we spent Thanksgiving with Nate's family. The kids and I drove down there and stayed for the day, eating and playing! Nate was on duty, but got to drive over and have some Thanksgiving lunch with us. After that he started a monster week, working everyday that weekend and now everyday this week. The kids enjoyed spending some time with their dad, even if he was answering the "bat" phone every 5 minutes! Unfortunately people find ways to hurt themselves or get sick on holidays. :) The kids had a blast playing with Sarah, Meagan, and Morgan. We found out there are 1001 ways to destroy brand new playdough! Poor Carolyn, I think I owe her a new supply! LOL Carolyn was so great and allowed all of us to leave with leftover Thanksgiving turkey, so we had our cusromary turkey sandwiches this past weekend. For me, it wouldn't be the holidays without those!
The week before, Nate and I had gone to Dallas and attended the 2009 Texas State EMS Conference. We got tons of CE hours and Nate shmoozed and networked like crazy for Pioneer. The kids stayed with Mom and Dad for the first part of the week, before we headed home. When we stopped by last Wednesday to get the babies, we got to help celebrate my Dad's birthday (the 26th). Seth had the idea for us to buy Dad a new flat screen HDTV. He picked it up on the way there and we were all present to see the look on Dad's face when he saw it! It was awesome! :D After he opened it, Amy had to go buy him a new entertainment center! LOL The TV wouldn't fit in Mom's cabinet.
I apologize for the lack of pics. When we left Palestine on Wednesday, I accidently left my purse there. No one discovered it until we were halfway home, so I went the weekend without my stuff. When we went down to Carolyn's I remembered I had left the camera in my bag, so there were no pics that day. A couple of days later, when I finally got around to kinda unpacking (still not totally done, lazy me!) I found the camera in my satchel! Sometimes I impress myself with my blondeness! LOL Even though I am a definite red head right now! I'll post pics of my new hairdo soon!

Renaissance Weekend 2009

This past weekend Amy, Sara, and Stacie came down to Houston for our annual Renaissance Festival trip! We go every year and have our favorite shows and attractions...yep! we admit we are a little nerdy! :) This year Amy's boyfriend Chris came along, also. Nathan, Hannah, and Micah dressed up in honor of the event, while myself, the girls, and Chris were sticks-in-the-mud and went in our regular attire. Hannah was a renaissance queen, Micah was a knight,and Nathan was a gladiator. They all looked great! :)
We were able to see our favorite band, Tartanic, again this year. We were very excited to see them there...there website said that the 2008 festival was their last, so we definitely weren't expecting to see them again! They are a Scottish band and have a ton of personality and energy to go with their kilts and Highland flings! LOL Last year Amy, Sara, Stacie, and their friend Abby took some great silly pics with the band after a walk-through performance. We also caught the joust (the kids love it!!) and a new act called Clan Tynker. Clan Tynker was a group of jugglers who performed some really awesome juggling tricks and sword swallowing and fire eating! Micah was mesmerized by the fire eating and terrified by the sword swallowing! LOL Hannah said they were her favorite act of the whole festival.
We did the dragon swings, the merry-go-round, the pony rides, and the fireworks show, as well as eating turkey legs, sausage-on-a-stick, chicken-on-a-stick, ice cream sandwiches, and candied roasted nuts! We spent the entire day at the festival and completely wore ourselves out. Nathan was sad though because his favorite store had changed. They no longer sold swords for 10 dollars! LOL I asked him how many swords he wanted...he has about 8! :) In fact, he wore one to the festival (legal as long as it's sheathed and "peace-tied") to complete his gladiator outfit.
Other than the festival, we partied this weekend with the Beatles, laughing ourselves silly at some of their lyrics! The girls, Chris, Nathan, and I played for a few hours Friday night, staying up way past out bedtimes and enjoying every minute of it. The whole weekend was really enjoyable and relaxing. Cutting lose and being silly is something we need to do more often! Here are a few pics of our weekend:

If you would like to see more of the 120 or so pics I took, check out my Facebook page! :)

Trick or Treat

This year we took the kids down to Philip and Kimi's house for trick-or-treat. The kids had so much fun trick-or-treating with their cousins! Hannah dressed as Pocahontas, Micah was High King Peter (The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe), Sarah was a Masquerade Princess, Meagan was Belle, and Morgan was Ariel. The kids had quite a haul, too, which they were extremely excited about! Micah's bucket got so heavy he "couldn't" carry it! LOL Here are some pics of our fun evening:

Spirit Week

This week was homecoming for TCS. In celebration, this whole week has been uniform-free and themed in fun and wacky ways. One day was "twin" day when you had to dress exactly like another student at the school. Hannah and Emily wore t-shirts decorated by Emily's mom (the girls were supposed to do it but ended up playing the whole time) and Micah was twin with his little friend Shane. Unfortunately the camera was completely dead, so I didn't get a pic of Hannah and Emily. I did get one of Micah and Shane with my phone. If you are interested in seeing the "twins" the pic is on Facebook under "mobile uploads". It's a cute photo!
Then they had "all navy day" and "sock it to 'em" day, etc. The end of the week was "spirit day". Today the kids got to wear tattoos, hair paint, face paint, etc, to advertise their school spirit. The homecoming game was today and the school hosted a hot-dog social, which we did not attend this year. I have some pictures below of the kids and their school spirit! When I picked the kids up from school today, their spirit had multiplied! Hannah had her whole face painted like a cat (their mascot is a tiger) and Micah had a kitty nose and whiskers. The whole week was fun, but I'm pretty sure the kids enjoyed today more than any other! :)

Family

Got the news yesterday that I'm going to be an aunt again! We are so excited to welcome new members to our little world. My sister, Angela, is expecting her third child, due next summer. Micah has already decided it is a boy! LOL Of course that brought up the discussion of whether or not there will be any more "babies" for our family. I have to admit I'm not totally against the idea!
But anyway, congratulations Angela, Jason, Sophia, and Olivia! We hope its a boy! :)


The Mapp Grandchildren (Jan. 2009)

Micah's New Hairstyle

Take a look at Micah's new 'do! He has decided he wants his hair spiked, like some of the other boys in his class. He definitely did not want me to cut his hair, LOL, so we went to Cool Cuts tonight and he put in his order. The finished results are cute! :)

Rock Stars

Today Nathan and I splurged and bought the Rockband Beatles game for the Wii! We decided that the kids had played with the demo unit in Best Buy enough! LOL Micah and Hannah have been drumming, singing, and strumming all day...well kind of. Micah can't drum or strum, but he LOVES to sing into the microphone. Hannah wants to do everything, but takes it very personally when the game fails her! She's sure she's the best at everything. LOL Here are some pics from today:

We are thinking that the Rockband will have to travel with us when we go gome this Christmas! :) I know my Mom and Dad will get a kick out of this!