Thanksgiving in Knoxville

The Falk Family

Waiting patiently for dinner

Lincoln entertains himself

Dad reads from the Bible before we eat.

There was lots of good food.

lots of cute babies to hold and cuddle.

and lots of games

Vitali shows off his missing tooth.

Zachary Falk, my brother Daniel's newest.


It's not often I can get Jude to look at the camera and smile. His yummy breakfast must have put him in a generous mood.

You'd never think Claire was such a big eater as much as she weighs, but here she is stuffing her face with egg casserole.

These are the days you question why you wanted kids:)

"Aren't I pretty mommy?"

When all else fails.....

Fall Party

Pumpkin cupcakes, yummy!

John and I were Dr. Seuss' Thing 1 and Thing 2, but I just realized John and I are out of order in this picture. We should have switched signs or switched places. The kids were Care bears.


Me and my Claire bear:)


Our costume winner this year was Ashley Castle as "Annie".



Jude enjoys a caramel apple.


We took two group pics since some came late and some left early. This way we were sure to get everyone in a picture.

Jude's cut

A picture frame fell off the wall and onto Jude leaving a pretty deep cut on his forehead. I had to keep it pinched together while my friend ran to the store to get some butterfly bandages. I didn't want to take him to the ER for stitches if I could avoid it. Meanwhile Claire destroyed my kitchen. I guess she could tell that I was a bit preoccupied because she got into the pantry cupboard and dumped out cereal, flour, goldfish and oats all over the floor. Ugh, is was not a good morning.

Just some random pics of the kids

A big kiss from little sister.

Jude in his dinosaur pajamas with his two dinosaurs. He's been kind of on a dinosaur kick lately.



Claire's first ponytail. It's not much, but it's taken 17 months to be able to do even this, so I'm happy:)

Claire with Jude's T-Rex. It's almost as big as she is.

Jude and Claire enjoy watching cartoons from the ottoman.

This is how Claire wears backpacks. They're more of a neck pack:)

Claire and Jude watching Daddy play Angry Birds. Jude loves to watch people play it even more than he enjoys playing it himself.

Peek a boo

New Backsplash

Here was my solution to the problem of my stand mixer not matching. I put up a backsplash so the greens aren't right next to each other. Now the difference in color is not very noticeable. The best part of it is that it only took me a few hours to put up and only cost me $17. I used peel and stick floor tiles. It's been something I've been thinking about doing anyway so the mixer was a good excuse to finally get it done. I think it turned out really well and I love the way it makes my kitchen look.