Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving 2013 was truly a time to be thankful for!  What a great day we had!

We originally planned on spending it in Idaho because my parents were going to be in Chicago with my brother's family.  We would spend the holiday with David's parents, and Shawn and Jodi's families.  We were so excited!  The girls talked about it all the time.  I even heard Nicole explaining how awesome it was going to be to little Bronson.  However, a week or so before Thanksgiving, Jodi's poor family came down with Fifth's Disease.  Fifth's is like a cold or flu, accompanied by a red, patchy rash.  It's not a terribly horrible sickness, but it's easily spread and not easily gotten rid of.   If you're pregnant - and Jodi and I both are - it can pose dangers to the baby, especially in the first trimester.  After talking it over for a while, and consulting with my doctor, we decided that it probably wasn't too big of a deal, but we still didn't want to knowingly go into a place carrying sickness.  I've got enough on my plate right now without adding sick kids to the mix.

Once the decision to stay home was made, it actually felt good!  In spite of our excitement, there were a few things that weren't ideal.  For one, David was a bit worried about how to handle a whole weekend off his diet.  Alison had a choir performance on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, which meant we had to come home early.  I wasn't sure how to handle Black Friday away from home, etc.  Plus, once we looked into it, we learned that both of my sisters could come to our house!  Katie was so ridiculously busy that she couldn't do a whole T-Day dinner by herself - she was planning on taking her family to Chuck-A-Rama.  Kristin, who had a work injury and is probably going to have her third back surgery some time in the near future, got an epidural shot on the day before the holiday.  Even if she could have pulled off a big feast, her oven had died a week earlier and her kitchen was in the throes of a remodel.  So I was very excited to be able to host my first EVER Thanksgiving feast! I have always wanted to do this!  I got my first set of pots and pans for Christmas at the age of 15.  Cooking is my thing!  Granted, any other year would have been easier pregnancy-wise, but a little planning and a lot of help made things go super smoothly!

I happened to read one of David's cousin's blogs right when I was planning my dinner.  She had some great ideas for Thanksgiving entertaining, and I stole a few of them.  Thanks, Jen!  I was very blessed to feel good for the week leading up to the holiday.  I'd say that I felt less worn down and hurt than I have for weeks!  I think part of that was due to the fact that I didn't even try to exercise.  Maybe I've been overdoing it a bit, because I don't hurt as bad when I don't jump around as much.  I still move like a turtle in quick sand, but I just plugged away all week at little projects like paper piles that were getting out of control or dirty fingerprints all over the doors, etc.  By Wednesday, things looked pretty good.  I love having company because it forces me to clean the house a little better than I normally do.

The kids were out of school on Wednesday, and I put them to work.  We spent the morning planning our to-do list, then executing it together.  We worked hard, and like a well-oiled machine (more or less).  By lunch time, the house was pretty nearly perfect.  In the afternoon, I cooked.  And then I cooked.   Then I cooked some more.  The kids helped a little (mostly Bron, and mostly he just ate a lot).  I sent them outside to play as much as I could so that the house would stay clean.  We had pizza for dinner that night.  I hear the day before Thanksgiving is rivaled only by Super Bowl Sunday as the busiest pizza day of the year.

On Thanksgiving morning, I was awakened by a cheery little voice saying, "Mom!  It's Tanksdidding!  Can I eat a woll now?"  Poor Bronny was ready to eat all the food he'd helped with the day before.  I told him he had to wait a little while longer, but we did have a yummy breakfast of oatmeal with bananas and brown sugar.  Then, we got to work with all the last minute preparations.  With so many helpers, everything really did go very quickly and smoothly.  I even had time to sit and read for a while before the guests arrived.

The grown-ups' table

The kid's table - in the front room where we still have the old carpet.  I wasn't sure if I wanted to do a kids table, or mix everyone up.  But in the end, I decided that they'd be just as happy as we were to have their own place.

The girls helped make these cute place cards.  The flowers in the background were a steal!  I got them at Hobby Lobby for 80% off.  The fish bowl and pine cones from the neighborhood were free, so that whole beautiful thing cost me $4.00!

 

Kristin's family came first.  They came about a half hour early so that they could get the slush served and help with anything else.  Katie's family arrived at 2:00.  After a few minutes of preparation, we were ready for the feast to begin!  And what a feast it was!  We had more food than twice as many people could have eaten.  Everything was made from scratch (even the cranberry sauce - and I LOVED it!) and everything tasted great - of course, nearly everything had butter or cream in it, so what did I expect?  Do you want the menu?  Probably not, but I'm gonna give it to you anyway:  Turkey - very moist!  Mashed potatoes and gravy - the potatoes were whipped with half and half and a lot of butter, and the gravy was 100% from the pan drippings - totally delicious, but a little fatty!  Sweet potato casserole from Amy's recipe - my all-time favorite sweet potato recipe.  Ruby red Jell-O with cranberries and pomegranates - the BEST!  Two different kinds of rolls - Parker house and a heavier, more dense kind that David loves.  Creamed peas and pearl onions - delicious!  Green bean casserole - yum.  Home made cranberry sauce - unbelievable!  I may make it year-round for sandwiches, meatballs, ice cream, whatever!  And a relish tray in the shape of a turkey - perhaps a new tradition.

Finishing up the preparations.  Bad lighting in this picture, but it's the only one I have of the food.  I wish you could see Katie because she has her hand on her hip just like Kristin and I.  

The turkey tray.

By the time David came to take a picture of the kids' table, they were long gone.  

One of our biggest concerns was how Adam was going to handle the noise and newness of my house.  We  really had to think about how to keep him from escaping out one of our many doors and bolting into our neighborhood.  We all prayed that he'd be happy and that Katie's family could stay for a while.  Just in case, Katie and Scot drove separate cars so that some of them could stay if Adam hated it and needed to go home.  In the days leading up to Thanksgiving, he stopped eating.  Anything.  At all.  So we were praying that he'd eat when he came too.  I was so thrilled when he came because he did so well!  Katie said he did much better than she'd hoped for!  We had a couch blocking one door, a hope chest blocking another, and a sliding lock on our garage door (plus, we unplugged the garage door opener just in case), so we didn't have to worry about him leaving.  He wandered around a little bit, but he wasn't upset or anything.  In fact, he ate!  He ate a whole bunch of Cheerios and a bag of Doritos!  Hooray!  What a blessing to be thankful for!  I think he was at our house for two hours or more before he started to act concerned.  Scot took him home early, but Katie and Megan stayed a while longer.  I was so happy that he ate here - I hope they bring him back again if he won't eat at their house!

Adam's Thanksgiving feast!

After dinner, the kids ran off and played while the rest of us relaxed on the couches and read the Black Friday ads.  We visited and filled out our "So Blessed" wall hanging.  Then, we busted out the desserts.  We had four types of pies and a pumpkin roll.  YUM!  Josh ate a slice of ALL FIVE KINDS!!!  What a kid!  It's pretty impressive how much he can eat.

Just relaxing.  The couch Kristin is laying on is usually in the other room, but we moved it in here so that we'd have plenty of room for the kids' table.  Plus, we could block the back door. 

In this picture, Bronson is trying to pick up Uncle Brian.  Payton's helping.

I made a sign (pathetic!  I'll do better next time)

And over the course of the day, everyone filled it up with the things they are thankful for.

From the bottom, clockwise:  Pumpkin, Chocolate Silk, Brown-bag-apple, coconut cream, and pumpkin roll.

Everyone left around 5:30 or 6:00.  Katie took some pie to Scot, and also dropped some dessert off at Grandma Church's house.  I wish she would have come too, but she ate at Uncle Mike's house.  If I'd have known how early she got home, I would have BEGGED her to come just to be with us, even if she wouldn't eat.  Anyway, Katie and Megan left, followed by Kristin's family.  I loved Bronson - as we were saying goodbye to Kris and Bri (for the third time - they kept remembering things they'd forgotten like boxes or their children.  Hee hee) Bronson said, "Bye!  It was so fun when you came to our house!"  How cute!  It really was, though.

Well, this bird's done.  Guess the party's over.

After everyone left, I loaded the girls up in the van and we ran over to Shoe Carnival to get a great deal on boots.  We were home by 7:00.  And that, my friends, is ALL the Black Friday shopping I did.  I didn't even miss it this time.  I was too stuffed and content (and a bit tired and sick) to even care!

More Outdoor Fun

Last week, we had a huge windstorm.  Actually, our neighborhood had it pretty easy.  The news forecast was for terrible winds. Everyone to the north and south of us was feeling it, but we were in the eye of the storm.  Not a single leaf stirred all day!  Then the sun went down, and the winds picked up.  Boy!  It was a doozy!  One of our quaking aspen trees in the front yard blew over (luckily away from the house, but it was a  little bit on the road).  Dave and our neighbor/home teacher braved the winds to get it out of the road and off of the sidewalk. While they were out there, another tree started to fall over, but it stopped at a forty five degree angle.  They decided to get it over with and pushed it the rest of the way down.  Then they had to cut it in half to get it out of the road, too.  After all that, they took the rails off of the fence in case any more trees came down.  Dave said it was kind of fun in the dark with the wind blowing at 70 miles per hour.

The next morning, I surveyed the damage.  It wasn't too bad.  We were the only ones with downed trees.  I think Dave's "good winter soaking" backfired a little bit.  If only the storm had knocked out all of the aspens!  They send out little trees all over our lawn!  I don't think I'd miss them.

Saturday morning Dave went out to cut up the trees, but all the kids playing on the trunks begged him not to do it.  He waited until the afternoon and then put the kids to work stacking the logs for firewood, and the branches and twigs for...something...  I don't know what.  Alison wants to keep them for snowman arms, although it would take an army of snowmen to use up all the twigs we've got.  We're set for snowman arms, magic wands, swords, and anything else you can do with sticks for quite a while.

Later that afternoon, many of the neighborhood kids put our twigs to use by building a HUGE birds nest under the Hughes' pine tree.  I'm sure they were thrilled!  We made the kids clean up when they were done, but for a while there, it was pretty impressive.

Dave's Contest

David's work had a weight loss contest this past autumn and Dave entered it.  He had done really well earlier in the year, losing about 40 pounds.  But as the summer kicked in, so did the parties, cook outs, vacations, etc. and his weight crept back up about 20 pounds.  This contest was exactly what he needed to get motivated.

The entry fee to join the contest was $50 (in and of itself, that's good motivation for Dave).  The fees were combined to be divvied up between the top 15 losers.  At the end of 12 weeks, the winner would receive $1000, and the prizes went down from there to $100 for number 15.  On top of that, Dave's work supplied $25 gift cards for the biggest loser at each weekly weigh in and small prizes to be raffled off each week.

Dave did amazingly well!  For the first 8 weeks or so, he didn't even crave junk food at all.  If he came to the end of the day and had a few calories left, he'd eat a bowl of Wheat Chex or something.  It was impressive!  It was exciting watching the scales move again!  The last month got really hard, though.  He felt like he was starving!  He missed food!  Every time he drove past a Wendy's, he wanted to quit!  But Dave never quits, so he stuck it out.

It went about the same for me.  I wasn't dieting with him, but I was the person who prepared ALL of his meals, and entered most of his food into the computer program he was using to track his calories.  For the first 8 weeks, I didn't mind.  It was even fun watching him lose weight and seeing the weekly email that came out with the results each Saturday.  Somewhere along the way, however, I got burned out.  I was tired of measuring and weighing and tracking every single ingredient I put into every single dish at every single meal!  But, I'm not a quitter either, so I stuck with it as well.

Dave's final weigh in was last Saturday.  Dave lost 13.74% of his body weight in 12 weeks!  He took 5th place out of 101 people in the competition, winning $325!  We were thrilled!  We knew he'd be in the top 15, but we weren't expecting anything higher than 10th or so.  Dave, being the kind of man he is, split his winnings with me, since I did half the work.  Hooray for new maternity clothes!

January 2013

November 2013

In the first week of January, there is another weigh in.  Anyone within 2 pounds of their final weight gets a raffle ticket - plus, another ticket for every pound they lose over the holidays.  They will raffle off three $250 cash prizes for people who maintain their weight.   I have no doubt Dave will be one of the people who maintains.  He's given himself a lot more calories to eat each day.  This will help him feel like he's not starving and give him a cushion for holiday parties, etc., without totally going off the wagon.  He'll still track everything he eats (but he's doing a lot more of his own tracking so I don't have to do as much).  Around the beginning of the year, he'll be ready for another push.  I think this may be a good pattern for him - push it for 8 weeks or so, then maintain for a while, then give it another push.  Way to go Dave!  I'm so proud of you!

Hungry for Hunger Games

Last night, I went on a super fun sibling date with Kristin, Scott and Katie S.  We went to Jordan Commons to watch a special pre-screening event of "The Hunger Games: Catching Fire."

I heard about the event from a deal-catching blogger that I get updates from occasionally (coupons4utah).  I thought it sounded like fun, but I didn't see myself going.  But, when I mentioned it to Kristin, she was totally interested.  In fact, she was pumped!  I called my other siblings, and bought tickets for the ones who could attend. 

The drive down to South Salt Lake was very entertaining.  Of course, we talked about super heroes and movies most of the way. I'm not even sure how two grown adults like Kristin and Scott can possibly know so much information about super heroes.  It's amazing!  They spent most of the time talking about the TV series that Joshua loves, so I was able to put my two cents in. 

We arrived at the theater and had plenty of time to find a bite to eat.  I've never been to Jordan Commons before, but it's HUGE!   They have many restaurants with a variety of food types - along with traditional movie fare - that you can bring into the theater with you.  Scott and Katie ate at Pizza Hut, and Kris and I shared an order of sweet potato fries in the food court.  Then, we went on the hunt for theater #16.  (It's a big place!)

When we found our theater, we were given our assigned tickets, along with swag bags with coupons, gift certificates, samples, and raffle tickets.  LOVE!!!  I'm a HUGE sucker for "free" things.  One of the reasons I love to run in races is for the "free" T-shirt.  Hee hee.  Kristin was the only one in our group who won anything in the raffle - she got a $15 gift card to Cafe Zupas and a cookbook.  Way to go Kris!

The movie stared right after the raffle.  They didn't show previews or anything.  Let me tell you a couple of things about the movie.  First of all.  It was great!  I haven't read the book in a very long time.  I had forgotten a lot of stuff, but Kristin has an incredible memory for things she reads so she knew when we should get ready to jump or when something big was about to happen.  I had to keep asking her, "Was that in the book?"  and she'd be like, "Yes!"   According to Kris, the movie stayed VERY close to the book. 

Kristin, Katie, and a blurry sliver of Scott's head.  I should have taken a better picture, but they were just saying, "No cameras or cell phones in the theater."

Secondly, we were sitting pretty close (13th row) and the movie is very action-y.  I actually got motion sick.  I had to look down quite a bit to keep my sweet potato fries in my stomach.  There was a time or two when I prepared to bolt for the bathroom, and I had to borrow Kristin's empty Icee cup just in case I didn't make it.  I don't think anyone else had a problem.  I'm incredibly wimpy about the way things are filmed.  I have always had a hard time watching home videos, etc.  In my defense, I am pregnant and it was REALLY hot in that theater!  I took my little sweater off and rolled my pant legs up. I even considered taking off my socks and shoes, but I didn't. 

After the show, we headed home.  We hadn't gotten very far when suddenly, there was a loud thump-thump-thump and something flew over the windshield.  I asked what it was, and Scott said, "My windshield wiper just fell off!"  WHAT?!?!  Does that even happen?  I guess so because it did.  Anyway, we probably should have pulled over and gone back for it, but we didn't.  It was raining at the time, so we had no choice but to try to find a store that was open at 11:45 on a Wednesday night.  We finally found a Walgreen's.  They didn't have any wiper blades, but a nice man there gave me directions to the nearest Wal Mart.  As we started driving towards the store, we realized that it was SEVERAL city blocks in exactly the opposite direction from home.  Kristin suggested that we try moving the blade on the passenger side over to the drivers side.  So we pulled over into an empty parking lot to give it a try.  Kristin and Katie stayed in the car while Scott and I tried to figure out how to remove the blade by the light of a green H&R Block sign.  Scott figured it out.  Then, we tried to get it back on the other side, except it broke into a couple of pieces.  urgh.  It took a while, and all four of us were out of the car by the end, but we finally got it figured out.  The rest of the drive home was smooth and I actually loved our little adventure.  The cool air and sprinkling rain helped me feel a LOT better.

I'd say that I was home and in bed before 1:00 in the morning.  Pretty good!    What a fun, adventurous night!

Yaowza!

The day after Halloween was a Friday and the kids had it off.  Very early in the morning, I realized that it was going to be a long day for me.  The excitement from the night before, the piles of candy, and the desire to eat it ALL in one sitting were overwhelming my kids, especially the little ones.  I decided we needed a break.

Just a mile or so down the road from our house is a cute little park.  Last summer, they built a splash pad there.  This autumn, they put in really cool playground equipment.  The park was barely open to the public for the first time, so I decided to take them there.

The equipment was designed to be used by 5-12 year olds.  There are several climbing ropes and twisting, spinning poles.  There's a climbing wall and a few obstacle course type things.  There is also one slide.  The three older kids had a blast!  Bronson liked the slide, but needed help with just about everything else.  Pretty soon, he resorted to chasing other kids around.

It was not too crowded when we first arrived at about 10:30 in the morning, but by about 11:00, it was getting full.  I was thinking about heading home when my mom showed up. We were glad to see her.  Each of the kids wanted to show her the cool new park equipment.  There was a symphony of  "Grandma!  Watch this!"  and "Grandma!  Look at me!" as she tried to give each kid her attention.  One of my neighbors was there, so we were chatting about the previous night events.  Suddenly, Josh came running over screaming.  It's sometimes hard to tell if Josh is really hurt or just angry because he cries at the same intensity for everything.  However, when I saw blood dripping out of his mouth, I knew it was pretty bad.  I looked in his mouth and all I could see was a large, black gash that was oozing a lot of blood.  My neighbor offered to get a first aid kit out of her car, but I said, "I think I've got one in mine," and quickly whisked him away to the van.    There, I laid him down on the front seat, gave him a sweater to hold to his mouth to slow down the blood, and went looking for the first aid kit.  I couldn't find it.  I found out later it was stowed under the seats.  Meanwhile, my mom and my neighbor helped round up the other kids and all of our jackets, etc. from the playground.  Thank HEAVEN they were there!  I'm not sure what I would have done without my mom!  I called Dave on his cell phone, probably interrupting a therapy session, and told him what happened.  I asked whether I should go to the doctor or the ER.  We decided to try the doctor first, because it it across the street from the hospital and we could easily go there if we needed to.

My mom already had shopping and lunch plans with my little sister, Katie, and she couldn't get a hold of her to change them.  Still, she offered to take Bronson with her.  That was perfect!  I could keep the older girls with me, no problem.  We quickly loaded up in the van and headed for urgent care.

The drive to the doctor's office was pretty intense.  Josh had gone from screaming and crying to silence and occasional moaning.  I think he was in shock and may or may not have passed out once or twice.  That was almost more worrisome to me than the screaming.  Nicole was worried for her brother, and chattering away at 100 miles per hour. She was just processing it in her own way, but it was making me a bit more tense.  Alison was freaking out a little bit.  In fact, I spent about as much time trying to keep her from passing out as I did Joshua.  I kept telling her, "Just go into emergency mode, Al.  Tell yourself you can think about it later. Right now, let's just do what needs to be done."  It reminded me of something my older sister, the nurse would say.  In any case - it worked.  She didn't pass out, but she also stayed as far away from the excitement as she could.

I carried Josh into the doctors office.  He's heavy!  There wasn't anyone at the front desk - it was lunch time.  I saw a girl in another office and asked if we could see anyone.  She said, "Urgent care doesn't start until 3:00."  I said, "Well, he almost bit his tongue off - do you think we can see someone now?"  Of course, that was an exaggeration, but it worked.  She got on the phone right away, looking for any doctor that wasn't at lunch yet who would see our little boy.  I clarified - told her it wasn't dangling, but he might have bitten clear through.  She was very kind, as was Josh's regular physician, Dr. Morris, who said to send him right back.

They rushed him right back and started taking care of him while I went back to the desk to sign him in (Alison stayed with me, trying to get away form the blood. Nicole was glued to Josh's side).  It wasn't until I tried to sign something that I noticed how bad I was shaking.  I guess my adrenaline was pumping.  Anyway, the nurse measured him (my barely 5 year old is 4'1") and took a look in his mouth.  This was the first time I'd seen it in a while and the bleeding had stopped.  I could tell that the cut wasn't all the way through his tongue.  I started to wonder if I should have come at all.  Right then, another nurse stuck her head in the door and said to me, "Your mother's here.  She said she can take your other kids."  We went out to the waiting room, and there was Mom and Bronson.  She'd gotten a hold of Katie and told her what was going on.  She and Katie rescheduled their meeting for later in the day.  I told my mom that I didn't think we'd be very long and I could take Bronson back, but she said, "Of course not!  Your kids have to eat.  I'll take them to lunch while you finish up with Josh."  What a Godsend she was!  The kids were thrilled, and I could focus on Joshy.

The doctor took a good look at Josh's tongue.  The cut didn't go all the way through, and the muscles in his tongue were still working, but it was a large and gaping hole.  He decided that he wanted to discuss it with an ENT (Ear Nose and Throat specialist), so he took a picture of the tongue and took it to another doctor in the building.

When he came back, he said, there's not much to do.  Stitches on the tongue (and the shot to make it numb) are often worse than the actual injury.  Also, mouths heal amazingly fast and are practically immune to infection due to the blood flow and saliva flow in there.  He said Josh could eat anything he felt like eating (salty things might sting a bit), as long as he rinsed out the hole afterwards (eww) and to medicate the pain with over the counter stuff.

So, we brought him home and spent the rest of day on the couch, watching DVD's and cuddling.  That was a pretty mellow day.  I stopped at a fast food joint and bought him some nuggets, a small burger, and a pop on the way home.  Grandma dropped the kids off and brought an ice cream shake for the little guy.  He tried to eat a few bites, but decided it was NOT happening!  He didn't eat anything for the rest of the day.  He had ibuprofen and acetaminophen in him, but he still whimpered every few minutes for a while.  One thing's for sure.  A crisis like that is a good way to forget about Halloween candy.  Nobody even mentioned it for practically the whole day.

I worried how things would go that night.  I made sure Josh was dosed up when I put him in bed, bracing myself for frequent trips to the basement to comfort and re-medicate him.  To my surprise, he never made a sound. The next day, his tongue looked AMAZINGLY, almost freakishly, better.  He wasn't sure if he dared eat yet, but by about 10:00 in the morning, he had eaten all the fast food/ice cream from the day before, as well as a fried egg and some toast.  I can't believe how fast the mouth heals!  The wound was sealed by day two! There's still a hole in his mouth and he'll always have a scar to go along with his story, but he was very blessed that it wasn't worse.

Halloween

Ah, Halloween.   What a day!  I liked it, but it sure makes me tired to remember it.

It started bright and early, getting everyone fed a healthy breakfast and ready for the elementary school costume parade.  We had a fun time watching all the creative costumes go by.  The boys raved about every super hero like they hadn't already seen 100 of them.  I didn't volunteer with either girl's class party this year (I did send drink to Ali's class, but that's it), and I didn't even feel too terribly guilty about it.

Alison was spaghetti and meatballs.  Thank heaven we're related to such creative people! (Thanks, Megan)

Nicole was a tired, cranky housewife.  The orange thing in the air is a pencil that she threw to Joshua as she walked past us.

 For lunch, I took the boys to the local IHOP.  They were giving away free "Spooky Face" pancakes to kids for Halloween.  The boys loved them!  They came with the strawberry nose and whipped cream eyes and mouth already situated.  Then, there was a cup with two mini Oreos for eyes and some candy corn for teeth.

The boys worked hard to get them just right.

Here's Bronson's masterpiece.

And Josh's creation.  They ate every bite of their pancakes.  They thought it was awesome to have four different kinds of syrup right at the table to choose from!

When we got the girls home from school, we were busy, busy, busy!  I was cooking and listening to stories about school, and getting the trick-or-treat candy ready. Dave sent me out to buy more just in case, because we have a lot of trick-or-treaters in our neighborhood.  It's a good thing we did. We went through almost all of it. I also helped Alison carve a pumpkin.  She'd already carved her little baby one that we got at the patch the Saturday before, and by Halloween, it looked like this:

That evening we ate our traditional "Dinner In A Pumpkin."  I think it's yummy, but the kids don't love it.  That's okay, though.  Halloween is the one day of the year that I can say, "Kids, eat this healthy food before you get candy!"  and they happily say, "Okay."

 After dinner, we got everyone in their costumes.

Bronson was a darling skunk!  This costume was originally Payton's.  So cute!  Adam wore it for years as well.   

When Josh requested Spaghetti and meatballs for his birthday dinner, he said, "You know, like Alison's costume."

Look out!  Cranky lady needs candy!

Josh wanted to be Batman again.  Far be it from me to discourage repeat costume wearing!  I do have to admit, it was a little small - he won't get away with it again next year.

Our Halloween crew.

I didn't dress up, but the baby did.

Our pumpkins.  A little wrinkly, but that just makes them spookier.

 Dave took the kids trick-or-treating around our neighborhood for about 45 minutes, while I manned our door.  When they came home, I took all four little munchkins to Grandma and Grandpa Smith's house.  Uncle Scott and Aunt Katie, Grandma Church, and the Holt's with their Grandpa Holt were all there as well.  We trick-or-treated around their circle, which is a pretty fun, fancy place.

This was a pretty fun, decked out house in Grandma's neighborhood.

For the first few houses, we tried to keep all the kids together in one group, but that was tough because of the huge spread in ages and paces.  At some point, we split up.  Aunt Katie went with Payton and Joshua, who ran ahead, Grandpa stayed with McKenna and Nicole, and Grandma and I brought up the rear with Bronson.  Poor Alison got lost in the shuffle - she was trying to catch up to the boys because she thought that's were everyone was, so she went all alone.  When she got done, she discovered that she'd beaten most of the rest of us.  She felt a little bit embarrassed, but no one can be down for long on Halloween!  Especially when Payton and Joshua discovered a wild raccoon in Grandma and Grandpa's back yard!  They all watched it for a quite a while, but he was gone before I got back with Bronson.  Too bad.

Kristin took this picture of Bronny making his James Bond face and showing off his loot.  He took off his skunk jacket and was instantly transformed into Bruce Lee.  It was like having two costumes in one!

Boy did my kids get a lot of candy!  I offered to buy anything they didn't want.  And I was proud that they took me up on it to a degree - they still kept a ton of stuff.  That's okay - we'll all survive.  We got home and put them to bed at a decent hour.  Luckily (for their teachers, anyway) they didn't have school the next day, so we didn't feel too stressed.

Neighborhood Leaf Fest

For a while there in October, there was only ONE tree in the whole neighborhood that had dropped it's leaves.  When it did, kids of all ages from the whole neighborhood converged upon it with their parents' leaf rakes.  They spent hours, several days in a row, raking up piles and jumping in them.  It was fun for me to see so many kids play together so happily for for such a long time.

Hard at work, er..I mean.."play."  Yes, Alison has balloons attached to her head.  It was crazy hair day at school and she wanted to leave them in all night.

Bronson's new shopping cart came in handy.

The crew.

Of course, I couldn't help but wish that it was MY tree they were raking the leaves from.  It would be nice to have my yard tidied up by a bunch of volunteer kiddos.  By the time our trees drop all their leaves, the novelty will have worn off and my kids will moan and complain when I ask them to rake.  Bummer.

Joshua's Birthday

After many days of waiting and watching other people have birthdays, Joshua finally got his turn on October 23rd.  He turned 5 years old!  What an exciting day for him!  It actually started a day early because my parents had to drop off their present the night before.  Josh was thrilled!

We started out Josh's big day in typical birthday fashion, with presents and sugary cereal.  He got his very own light saber, so he and Bronson can now have epic battles.  Yikes.  He also got his own pet - a red Beta fish, which he named Marlin!  (I'm writing this entry exactly two weeks after Josh's birthday, and the fish is still alive.  Amazing!)  He got a few other gifts, all of which he loved!  Then, we got him ready for Preschool.

He had a great day a preschool!  His class sang him a song, we wore a crown, and he passed out huge licorice ropes for his birthday treat.  He was feeling pretty special, with a pleased little grin on his face when I picked him up.  Then, we went to lunch at the Chinese restaurant, and shopping for his birthday cake.  Smith's was having some sort of regional or state-wide manager training, so everything was decked out for Christmas!  Even the cakes at the bakery were all Santa and snowflake-themed.   There were samples and handouts everywhere.  I think Josh felt like it was especially for him.  Every time we passed someone, he would say, "It's my birthday." Many people wished him a happy day and gave him treats, balloons, etc.    The lady at the bakery remembered Josh from Bronson's birthday.  She made him a special Batman cake.  It was fun.

In the afternoon, Josh played with his friends in the neighborhood while Bronson took a nap ad I cooked.  When Bronny woke up, we picked up the girls from school and went to Hill Air Force Base to visit the museum.  We got there at 3:30, and the museum closes at 4:00, so we literally ran from jet to jet without pausing, but that's about how fast the boys go through anyway...

I have to put his picture in even though its blurry because it makes me laugh.  We were hurrying so fast, that I was like, "Quick!  Stand by that jet!  Quickly!!!  Okay, say cheese..okay, go!go!go!"  I don't think I even stopped walking while I took it.  

They're sitting under the tail of a huge WWII plane that goes right over the sidewalk.  You should have seen me shimmy under that thing!  It wasn't pretty.

For dinner, Josh requested spaghetti  and meatballs, bread sticks, and a green salad.  Hooray!  It was delicious and nutritious.  I don't know if you know this, but David HATES spaghetti.  Hates.  I hope you can still respect him after hearing such a shocking and ridiculous character flaw, but alas, it's true.  I never get to make spaghetti, so I was thrilled that Josh requested it.  It was DELICIOUS!

The only family members who could come over that evening were my brother Scott and his wife Katie.  They probably felt a little overwhelmed by the chaos of our brood, but we were sure glad they came.  They are a lot of fun to be around.  They sure had us all laughing.  Scott told us about a fridge thief at his work, who repeatedly and blatantly steals other people's food out of the company fridge.  Alison spent the rest of the evening devising ways to lure and trap the thief.  Perhaps Scott will employ some of her tactics to bring the criminal to justice.

Gotta love this picture.  Don't we all look happy?  I think we were...I mean. Bronson was obviously ticked off at something...but the rest of us were happy.

After cake and chocolate or mud pie ice cream, it was time to usher the little birthday boy to bed.  I think he had a fun day.  We sure are glad to have busy, crazy, smart little Joshua in our family!