Catching up

Evil minions . . . 

A quick catch-up post. Yikes! So much has been going on!

October was a busy, busy month! After returning from NYC and enjoying some down time in Pelahatchie, Halloween was practically upon us! Every year, the whole Bradshaw clan dresses up for trick or treating. Clay usually picks what he wants to be first, then hubs and I coordinate around him.

After a few years as superheroes, he was a policeman last year. This year, though, he went old school. He wanted to be a vampire. That left lots of options for us! I chose to be a witch. (Not much of a stretch, eh? I wore my green-striped tights to work on Halloween, and no one batted an eye. Should I be worried?) Hubs picked out an awesome werewolf costume!

Yikes! Scary!

We had bad weather Halloween week, but luckily, our neighborhood is pretty organized. We shifted our trick or treat night, and it worked out beautifully! The neighborhood was out in full force! I'm thinking of perhaps using our neighborhood message board to do something even BIGGER for next year's Halloween. Maybe coordinate somehow? Have some houses open for games, warming up, bobbing for apples, cider, etc? Any ideas, guys?

Near the end of October, Clay was student of the week! We had tons of fun making up stories that incorporated his favorite things, sending letters and family photo albums to class, and popping in to lunch with he and his friends. (Wow, school lunch has come a ways since I was in grade school. This stuff was actually good!) When you're student of the week, you get to choose a few friends to have lunch with outside, at a picnic table. This is apparently a big deal. Clay picked four little dudes, and off we went. I had THE BEST time eating with them. I got to see Clay in his little social environment, hear what they talk about, learn about the things they think are funny. It was just completely refreshing, and I'm going to make time to do it again in the future. It made my whole day!

PRAM Fall Social at Hal and Mal's

That, and a very positive parent-teacher conference (The word "genius" was used, folks, and not by me.) made October GREAT!!

During November, I pitched in with a lot of events. We had our PRAM Central Fall Social at Hal and Mal's (Fun!), and I chaired the hospitality committee for one of Millsaps' Arts and Lecture events, a fascinating discussion about Jackson's past and future with Malcolm White, Leland Speed and Charles Evers. I also had the opportunity to enjoy a trolley tour of downtown development with Ben Allen of Downtown Jackson Partners. Lots to see!

Before I knew it, it was Thanksgiving! We all gathered and mom and dad's house for our annual feast. I made my traditional turkey with white wine shallot gravy and toted along the customary homemade cranberry sauce. We ate, we laughed, we ate some more! (I don't know why we still make dessert. We never get to it anymore!)

More to come . . .