Thank you....

Casper Conrad Nicoll

Don Carlos Nicoll Jr.

Guy Alma Nicoll

One mother's sacrifice: three sons sent to serve in WWII.
One army, two navy, later one served with the marines as a medical corpsman.
(And although not pictured, one son-in-law as well: J.T. Hunter)


Kenneth Naegle Nicoll

Later, after his mother's death, another son (my handsome father) served in the Air Force during the Korean War.

The ultimate sacrifice, as her second son was killed in action on Iwo Jima.



Thank you
to all our veterans who have served us and our country.
May the Lord bless you and your families.

B&W Challenge

Hope and Believe is having another fun photo challenge I thought I'd participate in. It is to take a photo(new or old) and make it B&W....I can do that! So here you go:


Funny bit of trivia with this shot: it's another self-timer deal!

Goodbye Autumn

This is almost pretty enough to not mind that this is what it looked like around here today...almost.

**photo stolen from my husbands iPhone!**

Check THIS out!

Recognize these kids?!

He, he, he, he! The kids had a blast! Thanks, Nicole, and Rubberball, for letting us come play!

Go to THIS POST on THIS BLOG for more smashy face fun.

And thanks to onehm for the heads up that it was posted! ;)

Month of Gratitude

I was just over at my cousin's blog, and she had a great idea that I'm borrowing, but tweaking a bit so I'll actually do it! She pointed out that November is the month that we celebrate Thanksgiving and remember the things we are grateful for. So this month, I'm adding a list to my side bar where I will list one thing a day for the 30 days of November that I am grateful for. Absolutely feel free to join in if you'd like to, leave me a comment so I can come visit your list too!

Family picture out-take...

Since the leaves are great right now, and this is possibly the last day of warmish weather to get a new family picture with an "Autumn" look, we fit it in! Here is one of many out-takes. It is near (if not totally) impossible to get all six of us looking good in a picture. (This is pretty close, except for J!) It doesn't help that I am doing this with the self-timer!

The rest of Halloween...

Pumpkins all lit and kids ready to go. (Off-topic, what is with the 5 year old and his forced smiles?! Ugh!) Riley and some friends stayed home and handed out candy while Ron and I took the kids around. They were die-hards and went farther than ever! Therefore, they now have so much candy it is sickening. Add into that all our leftovers, and I think we're set for a few months of treats....not kidding...we have a 5 lb. bag we never even opened! We thought we'd have more kids due to the good weather and it being Friday night, but we over calculated...oops! We did have a little bit of rain, as the sunrise predicted, but it was just on and off sprinkles, not enough to stop our little goblins.

Nicole kept trying to take off and leave us behind....she had candy to collect! But Jared was pretty good about being the "helper" big brother that I'd asked him to be and stuck with Ellie. Here he's making sure she doesn't walk in front of the car pulling into the driveway. Ahhhh, sweet!

Here's the "trick" Jared received. One of the homes was giving the kids potatoes as their treat, but then telling them they could trade it for a real treat. Most of the kids traded their spud back in. Not Jared! He thought it was very cool to have a potato. Of course two houses later he decided it was too heavy to haul around in his bag, so I got to carry it the rest of the night. ( I kept trying to let him carry some of his candy but he didn't fall for that!) I asked him what he wants to do with his tater, and he told me he wants to make soup.

Halloween Morning....

We woke up this morning to this:
Wow! What do they say about "red sky in the morning" though.....I hope we aren't in for rain tonight! ;)

Princess Nicole on her way to the royal school:

Officer Jared gave out a few tickets and beat up a few criminals with his billy club....
he's a tough guy!

Pictures of Princess Ellie coming....I've got to fix her hair before we head to the school Halloween parade!


**Edited** Here is princess Ellie.....I tried to get her to be a witch....nope! She HAD to be a princess, and she and Nicole chose the same dress, so we have twinner princesses at our house...and a cop...and a teenager running around in a scarf and neon pink WordPerfect hat and calling that her costume(?)!

For a look at Riley this morning, go here and scroll down about a page...this was before the hat...

Wilson-World

My husband was able to get our name in a domain-name....so he had to do something with it! So.....without further adieu....let me introduce:

To check it out, click on the above picture! As you'll see, it has links for you to our blog's (my husband even has one now, while my link just brings you back here.) A photo page, as well as links we enjoy.....many of my blogger buddies will even find links to themselves. Eventually we will upload videos there as well. It will be fun (at least for us) to watch the evolution of my hubby's work. I now need to figure out how to make a clickable button for my side-bar.....anyone know how?! ;)

***Edited: Got the side button.....thanks to the hubster!***

Soccer

Jared was our only soccer player this season...Nicole has moved on to dance instead. These pics are a little late, being that the Fall season is now over, but oh well...better late than never? :)

Jared once again had fun, and is improving. He still isn't afraid to get in the thick of things and be aggressive.....we actually need to work on him not taking the ball from his teammates. :) So here is a look at his season, and you'll see the "Green Lightning" again in the spring!

GOOOOOOOOOAL!

GOOOOOOOOOAL!

Not sure if the frown is because he's sad about soccer season ending, or because he missed a goal!

Thanks again Coach Thomas! You're the best!