November happenings part I

It's already time to report on another month!  And I think I will just write a really long post...

We couldn't see the super moon the night of, because of cloud cover, but here it was the next morning:

November had the best weather, warm and enjoyable, clear up until after Thanksgiving! There were some beautiful sun sets:

And while we're on the subject of nature, I will mention this owl that was apparently turned around for most of the month, and sat in this tree in our yard for the better part of every DAY.  Fun to watch:

This was more of an end of October thing, but I thought it was cute.  And she had to leave it at school, so she made another one to leave at home just for me.  She's pretty sweet like that:)

There is a disabled girl, Gracie, that is in Isabelle's primary class.  All of the kids LOVE to help take care of her during primary.  One of my friends sent me this picture of Isabelle braiding her hair:)

Isabelle takes lots of selfies of herself and leaves them on my phone:

This girl is way busier than I would prefer:(  She is in an advanced class at school and always has plenty of homework.  She plays violin in orchestra and has to practice daily for that.  She takes piano lessons; again, daily practice. She's in ballroom - practice twice per week. She is going to a speech therapist once a week after school to try to work on her R's, which still need help, and needs to practice that as well.  It just feels way to busy for a 6th grader.  I have vowed to never let my kids take those advanced classes again, for one thing...

Kami sent me this picture from college:

Something caught her eye as she was studying on her bed in her apt.  Turns out it was a black widow spider sitting right beside her.  Yuck!  I told her to tell the management, and luckily she did and they said they would spray, because later she found three more!  They must have been trying to finda warm place to spend the winter. Makes me shudder and made her feel like she couldn't sleep in her bed for a night or two.

Eli had another birthday and we invited him over for some cake and ice cream:

I repainted the bonus room:

Lots of walls suddenly need patched and painted and I am going to slowly repaint the whole house - I need to keep up on things just in case we move!

Pace is Captain America for the better party of every day:

 On his way to speech:

...and during family prayer:

When he isn't captain America he is a tough cowboy...who carries a gun and brass knuckles while he watches the neighbor's dog...

I enjoy watching him all day long, but of course, there's just something beautiful about sleeping kids:

He also had his first x-ray in November.  Glad everything is okay with that:

He looked so long lying on that table - actually he is looking long all of the time these days:(

He and I had our last picnic and play time at the park in the middle of November. We ran around without coats on!:

Then we went to help in Abe's classroom and Pace got to participate in music time.  We go help in the classroom once a week and Abram LOVES when we come to his school.  These were pics from another day:

Abram lost his two front teeth!! He wears the look very well:

I overheard him telling Kami all about it on the phone. "One was really wiggly. I could point it up to the sky!  I look kind-of weird when I make my scary faces..."

Nolan really feels like it's important to rack up the AR points at school.  When I went to parent teacher conference, his picture was on the wall for having 250 points.

His mean parents have since slowed him down a bit because we will only let him read in the evenings now.  He was reading every second of every day, and we told him that we felt like it was important to live his own adventures once in awhile and not always be living in a fantasy world!

He really does have a great vocabulary, though, and keeps us laughing with the words he *accurately* uses. It's just funny because people really don't talk this way!  I do have a few examples, remembered because we have all quoted him so many times:)  "It smells acrid out here" "Caden has tufts of hair in his armpits" and "stop prodding the cheese sticks" - when one of the little boys was poking at them.

Maddie got braces!

Her teeth weren't even that crooked, but her jaw kept locking into place and the dentist told us that was the only way to cure it.  Luckily, since it's not just cosmetic reasons for getting them, insurance paid a big chunk of the money.

Also, I took these pics of her at a YW  in excellence because I thought she looked astoundingly beautiful:

Man I love her hair!

A Sunday afternoon pile-up when I couldn't resist having someone take this pic of Pace with his arm around Abram,who was reading to him:

Abram came home from school all excited about starting wrestling, and then his enthusiasm rubbed off on Nolan, so they both joined up!  It's been fun watching them at their tournaments!

Here we are watching Nolan:

Abram has taken first place at both of his tournaments!:

Nolan took last place his first tournament and second place his second tournament.  He had to wrestle a really good wrestler that Shawn said was doing moves they do in highschool.  We are super proud  of him because even though he was super scared to wrestle the kid at the second tournament, he did it and wrestled him better than he did the first time!

The kid that always beats him:

Nolan after a win:

And lastly, I am posting some of my weight lifting pics.  I LOVE lifting weights and a girl at the gym took some pics of me while I lifted. Those little muscles are coming along.  And oh my- what determined faces!:)

a whole lot of Halloween

Kami set me all up with instagram before she left for college, because she wanted to see more of what is going on at home.  I haven't been as good about blogging since then... Here's a quick catch up:

I set aside the 22nd for Halloween parties.  I like to throw parties, but I don't like having a lot of them hanging over my head, so I had all of the kids party in one day.  First Abe had a party from 1:30-4:00 with his friends.

l-R: Dallas, Trey, Abram, Maddox and Connor:

Then Nolan got home from scouts and had a party from 4:15-6:15.
l-r: Bryce Wilson, Burke Neville, Nick Roberts, Nolan, Adam Peterson and Peyton Sharp

For the boy's parties they decorated sugar cookies and made lollipop ghosts, and ate a lot of food. Then I took them downstairs and had them feel eyeballs, cat's teeth, a witch's tongue, brains, shriveled up ears, and bony fingers.  I told them spooky stories to go with it all.  Then Nolan or Abe, depending on who wasn't having a party at the time, jumped out and scared everyone.  They boys also had made a small haunted house in the basement:) I've already forgotten what else we did, but they also spent a lot of time running around and playing.

At 6:00, Isabelle and Maddie's friends showed up.
l-r: Grace Griffith, Ella Bjorn, Emma Gilbert, Isabelle, and Brinley Stewart:

Maddie's friends l-r: Maddie Fryar, Madi McNair, Paige Nielson, Emma Nelson, Emilee Cheney, Kamri Stevenson, Mariah Rigby and Maddie Gee:

I had plans for the girls to watch Halloween movies and paint pumpkins and nails, but they kept themselves so entertained that all they did that I had planned was eat lots of food!  Although, Maddie's group DID end up watching an old movie, 'Wait Until Dark' with Audrey Hepburn in it, and it scared them to death.  Good times.  I loved having all of the friends over!

Some days I am so pampered

Any time my kids want to prolong bedtime by massaging my feet I am IN:) One of my very favorite things!!

Star Valley Wyoming

During Fall break, I kept hoping that we could take the kids and go over to the Star Valley Wyoming temple open house, but it didn't look like it was going to happen.  Then, when Shawn came home from work on Friday he said, "let's go tomorrow!"  I was SOOOO excited!!!!....Until we remembered that Maddie had a soccer tournament and wouldn't be able to come:(  It's so hard to work around everyone's schedules.  We finally decided to take all the other kids and go, since we've been to almost all of Maddie's games and it was the last day for the open house, but I was really bummed out that we couldn't ALL go. 

Just as we were getting ready to pull out of town, Maddie texted and said that they were almost home.  They had lost there second game of the tournament and were therefore out.  She was actually just as excited as we were!!! I can't explain how much this meant to me!  We haven't been able to go somewhere together for such a long time. 

We had a great day - the drive was incredibly beautiful with all of the vibrant fall colors.  And the temple was very small, but very beautiful!

We took our time getting home -and got home LATE -  Caden stopped and took pictures of all the beautiful scenery all along the way.  It was really nice.

Senior pictures

I can't believe that we are going through all of this again already!!!!

Kami got some good pics of Caden just in time to turn them in to the yearbook.  I love them.  I love that my kids have been talented enough to do this for each other!

This was the favorite that went into the yearbook:

We liked this one quite a bit too.  Especially Caden, because he claims that it is more in focus - which I can actually see here, but I think it's because I took a picture of the pictures...anyways, Caden really pays attention to details like that, while the rest of us don't even notice...

I gotta say, he is a very handsome fella!!

But.... idk...Don't you think my pictures of him as a beekeeper could have been good as well?  Maybe we shouldn't have put Kami to the trouble of taking those professional-looking ones.  These tell more about his inquisitive mind and hobbies;)

I caught up to him as he was heading out to see what we could do to get the hives ready for next year:

Walking across the yard in his "space suit".  I should have taken one with the veil on:)