Trick-or-Treating

Rebecca was excited about going with the kids trick-or-treating. She didn't want to dress up until her friend, Miranda, showed up in her super girl outfit. They walked around for a little bit with Eric and the kids and then decided they were ready to join their friends.

Before the change into the costume

Rebecca and her pumpkins

A great group of teens

Rebecca's Loot

Carving Pumpkins

Halloween with 4 children is quite an adventure. We started out today with carving pumpkins. I bought each of the children their own pumpkin to carve. They each had a small and large pumpkin. They told me what they wanted on their pumpkin and I drew it out for them. They each had their own carving kit and got busy cleaning out their pumpkins and carving the faces. They went from working on them on the counter top to sitting in the middle of the floor working on them. My kitchen floor had pumpkin seeds and pulp all over it when it was all over. It was well worth it when I saw the smiles on their faces.

Rebecca found a pumpkin plant growing inside of her pumpkin.

Trying hard to get the top off

Starting to carve the face

The mess on my kitchen floor

The front porch

Pumpkin Jars

I love to browse craft sites online. I have been scouring them lately for new halloween ideas. I came across one that looked like fun for the entire family to do. The kids absolutely loved doing it and then seeing them all lit up. Here are a few pictures of our new pumpkins.

Rebecca and Mir Mir making their pumpkins

All lit up on the mantle

What's Happening at the Liles' House

We recently took a trip to Lenoir City, TN to celebrate my dad's 70th birthday. He informed me that I need to update my blog because he doesn't do facebook. Here's to you, Dad.

Life with 4 kids is amazing, a whirlwind, busy, crazy, and so many other words I can't describe. We are enjoying the children. They have definitely changed our world-for the good!! They pretty much go to school, go to after school care, do homework, and attend Rebecca's cheerleading events. We are signing them up for the Upward Bound basketball/cheerleading program at a local church. I think they are excited to get to participate in something.

Rebecca had her first cheer competition this past weekend. It was a very small competition (2 squads in her division). They came in 2nd. It was a great opportunity for the 7th graders to see what a competition is like on a very small scale. It also gave us a chance to see what kinds of improvements we can make. We have 5 more to go. We hope to increase our score each time.

Eric is doing a great job playing Mr. Mom. He picks up the kids most nights and gets them started on homework. I don't know what we would do without him.

I think everything finally caught up with me yesterday. I came down with strep throat. NOT FUN!!

Cheerleading, homework, and kids about sums up our life right now. Sorry there's nothing more exciting to post.

Life Is Good

It has been too long since my last post. A lot has happened in the Liles' house. On August 5th, we were blessed with 3 beautiful foster children. We had been working since March to get them in our home. Doubling our family size has been quite an experience. One that I wouldn't trade for the world.

We were blessed by friends and co-workers that showered us with the necessitates for everyday living with 6 people: laundry detergent, food, toilet paper, paper towels, napkins, games, and gift cards. They helped make our financial transition much easier. Thank you to everyone!!

School started on August 19th. Eric was a trooper taking each of them to their Meet the Teacher night. Because I had to be in my classroom to meet my new little ones, he took one of them at a time to meet their teacher. Everyone at the school was so impressed with Eric. The kids are in 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade. They have adjusted nicely and love their teachers. We are having to learn how to balance the homework, but life is good.Rebecca is in the 8th grade this year. I can't believe it. She was excited about school starting and being "The Big Dog" at the school. She and her friends couldn't wait to be able to stay in the cafeteria in the mornings instead of having to wait in the hallway for school to begin. Oh the things that excited them. : )Here she is on her first day of middle school.

Rebecca has been an amazing big sister. She really helps us out with the night time baths and bed time. She loves to play the Wii with them and straighten the girl's hair. The hardest part for her has been having to share dinner "talk" time with them. We still manage to take her and do small little things with just her. I think(know) she likes that special attention.

Rebecca and I have also been VERY busy with cheerleading. We practice 4 days a week. It is

very time consuming for me. I love coaching and the girls. I can't wait to see what this year holds for us as a squad.

Eric's office is doing a management class. He goes in early on Wednesday mornings to learn how to become a better manager. He even has to study at night. It's kind of cute.

We aren't allowed to post photos of the kids on the internet. Sorry about that. Trust me when I say that they are beautiful children and we are enjoying them very much!!

That's it for now. Hopefully it won't be so long between posts next time.

Vacation

Eric had a SC Poultry Federation conference in Hilton Head this past weekend. We were all excited about the chance to go to the beach, especially since it was paid for!! We had hoped we would have our foster children by this time so they could go with us. It didn't work out as planned, but Rebecca's best friend did go with us.

Here are the girls ready to go out to eat with some of Eric's salesmen.

Mark and Mitchell took us to eat at The Bonefish Grill. After enjoying yummy appetizers and an entree, we ordered dessert. Eric ordered the brownie with ice cream. It was the largest brownie I have ever seen in my life. With the exception of a few bites, Eric ate the whole thing.

The girls had been planning their adventures for weeks. They planned to go down to the beach at night and check things out. Let's just say it is VERY dark on the beach at night. Thank goodness for the illumination of a cell phone. They wrote in the sand and walked in the water.

After breakfast at IHop we ventured back to the beach. It was pretty crowded. I decided we should sit close to the water. Bad idea. The tide kept moving up on the sand. We must have moved our things back at least 10 times.

Oh to have these figures again!!

One of their plans was to build a sandcastle. They may have filled the bucket one time a piece. They didn't build a sandcastle. : (

We bought boogie boards from the resort gift shop. They took them out to the water, but brought them back to me because there weren't many waves.

Here they are posing for a facebook profile picture.

It's really hard to see, but there was a jellyfish that washed up on the sand. They decided it would be cool to touch it. Thank goodness it was dead. Lexi wanted to take it home with her, but decided to leave it in the ocean.

The S.C. Poultry Federation had a dinner at the resort. Here we are "dressed up" for the event. The dinner wasn't my favorite. Dessert was great. After dinner, a hypnotist did a show. Eric was a participant and the life of the show. He really did go "under". He was hilarious. Unfortunately, there are no pictures because they said no flash photography.

We actually found sand dollars in the water. We used our feet to find them. We found a ton of them. Some of them even had teeny tine crabs on them. It was pretty amazing. I have never found sand dollars at the beach before.

Rebecca and Lexi talked Eric into letting them bury him in sand. He is one crazy man.

I was fortunate to get to visit with a former student. His family moved to Nashville the year after we moved back to North Carolina. I saw the mom's status on Facebook that they were headed to Hilton Head on vacation. We chatted back and forth and decided to meet up. Seth has gotten much taller and has a really deep voice. It was great to see the entire family.

Before we went out to eat on Saturday night, the girls started horsing around with Eric. They were popping each other with towels and climbing all over him. Here is Lexi on top of Eric's shoulders.

The complex manager for Columbia Farms took all of the Columbia Farm employees and their families out to eat on Saturday night. We enjoyed seafood at Scott's Fish Market. The best part of the meal was dessert. They had my all time favorite dessert: Kentucky Derby pie. Oh my. I haven't had it in a long time. I enjoyed every drop of it.

It was a great long weekend mini-vacation. I hope we'll get to go again. Thanks, Columbia Farms.

The Nation's Birthday

We enjoyed a quiet Fourth of July. My parents came down to spend a few days with us since we couldn't go up there. We did made the All-American meal for dinner-hamburgers, corn on the cob, and home made salsa from our garden tomatoes. We enjoyed home made ice cream for dessert. A local church put on a great fireworks display.

I am so lucky to live in a free country. Thank you to the men, women, and their families that fight for my freedom.

God Bless America.