October Happenings

Just a few "happenings" this month...

At school we had Red Ribbon Week where the kids got a little prize each day and they got to wear fun clothes during the week.  Monday was "turn your back on drugs" and wear your shirt backwards.

Tuesday was "sock it to drugs" with crazy socks. (They all have on cute Halloween socks; Bree's socks have candy, Tess's are glow-in-the-dark bones, and Miles's have skulls.)

(I didn't get pictures of Wednesday, which was just our normal school spirit day so they wore their Freedom Elementary shirts, and then I spaced Thursday too, which was "say 'Peace-out!' to drugs" by wearing peace signs or tie-dye shirts.  But they looked cute.)

And, Miles is continuing to advance in his Cub Scouts.  Here he is receiving an award at pack meeting.

He is almost done with his Wolf Badge and then he moves on to Bears on his birthday.  I am lucky enough to be his Bear Den Leader!  I was so sad to be released from Young Women, but I was really excited to work with Miles in Cub Scouts (I'm not gonna lie...I have some serious issues with scouting in the church--it's ridiculously expensive and so much more emphasized than the girls' Activity Days/Young Women activities which ticks me off.  But I won't go too nuts complaining here on the blog.  However, despite all my issues with scouts, I am super excited to hang out with Miles and his 9 year old buddies each week!    

Halloween 2016

Yesterday after church we carved our Jack-O-Lanterns for the year.  Bryan is usually very generous and scoops out all the guts and seeds for the kids, but this year I told him not to.  That's such a big part of the experience--feeling the cold slimy guts!  They thought it was gross, but I think it's important to get the full experience. Ha!

Tess did a cool wolf howling at the moon, Bree did a friendly face sticking its tongue out, and Miles did the always classic Superman logo.

Today the kids got to wear their costumes to school for the school parade.  There was some debate as to whether they'd do it this year or not since Halloween fell on a Monday.  Our principal said her original policy was only to do it if it fell on a Friday so it wouldn't disrupt the school day too much.  But in the end, they got to do it and everyone enjoyed it.  After the parade I helped in Bree's class for the party (with both Kindergarten classes all at once; 44 kiddos all in costumes & on a sugar rush=fun chaos!)  Miles & Tess did not have parties in their classes...

Here are the kids in their costumes:

Darth Vader, a little Devil, and Cleopatra.  Happy Halloween!

Mini Vacay in Salt Lake

We thought it would be fun to get away for a day or two, so we talked about going camping one last time.  But the weather wasn't super warm this weekend, so in the end we decided to get a hotel in SLC.  You know how it is for kids--a hotel swimming pool is about as exciting as anything!  We played in the pool all evening and then we told the kids we could go out to eat, or, even better-- we could order pizza to be delivered and eat in our beds, in our jammies!  That was the coolest option, right?!  We never get delivery, so they thought it was pretty cool when Domino's came right to our hotel room door.  And there was even a Brain Games marathon on cable so we all had a great time watching that.

This morning we swam some more and then went on a hike to Cecret Lake (why don't they just spell it Secret Lake?  That's how it's pronounced!  Whatever.)  Anyway, our hike to Cecret Lake was very nice.  It was actually very cold today though so our little Bree was pretty pitiful much of the way.  She finally snapped out of it at the lake and was happy and sweet the whole way back.

(We stopped and got sunglasses yesterday, so these two are matchy-squatchy.)

The kids (and husband sometimes too) love yelling "parkour!" and doing little tricks and turns off the rocks as we hike.  It makes it more exciting. :)

We went to the Old Spaghetti Factory for dinner and bought pumpkins to carve tomorrow.  A fun weekend!

Corn Maize

While the guys were deer hunting/camping, the girls and I went to the Corn Maize in West Haven.  They had all sorts of fun little activities in addition to the maze.  Here they are at a Frankenstein music machine (thing-a-ma-jig...?)

..and going down the big hay bale slides.

...riding the trikes down the hill...

I love this picture because Bree worked SO hard to get that trike up the ramp onto the hay bale.  I didn't help her because I think I baby her too much already and I want her to be tough like her big sis.  Then, when she got up there, she was pretty nervous about going down.  She was determined though, after all her hard work.  Tess stood right by her in case she wrecked.  Sweet sisters.

The Corn Maize had a whole bunch of little photo-op places.  We did most of them.

They had a cute little petting zoo too.

Here we are, finally going into the maze.  They had 10 little checkpoints along the path, with different shaped hole punches that you used to punch your ticket and if you got all 10 you were entered into a drawing.  We did all 10, but alas I don't think we won.  Shucks.

...bouncy house...

...barrel train ride...

...AND we just happened to go there on a day that Disney princesses were coming for a meet & greet.  Lucky Bree!

...and finally the corn pit.  Bree had corn everywhere...all in her clothes, hair, socks, etc.  She sure had fun though.

What a fun time with my girlies!

Deer Hunt

Bryan went deer hunting again this year.  He went with his dad, our brother-in-law Burke, and Miles.  He was packing his stuff the night before and stuck his camo hat on his head, way up on top, like an old man would wear it.  I couldn't stop laughing because he looked exactly like Elmer Fudd.

They didn't see any big bucks, so they just had a fun camping trip instead.  (We don't love the deer meat, so Bryan has decided that he's not going to shoot one unless it's a really big buck, for the antlers.)

So they had a great time camping!  Sitting around a fire is always good fun.

Miles loves to go with the guys...

...and he loves shooting Bryan's guns.  Especially the non-deer-hunting guns.  Here he is shooting at a can of Sprite.  He hit it right on the first shot and blew the can into tiny pieces that went everywhere.  Miles thought that was awwwwesome.

GoPro Rush

Bryan got a new toy.  It's a knock-off of a Go-Pro camera.  It is going to be really fun I think.  He took it, and the kids, swimming today at The Rush to try it out.  (I, unfortunately, was home sick sick sick in bed.  Boo.)  

The pictures are pretty fun!  And it takes video too.  I think we will love it!

Fun Run 2016

Fun Run 2016 was a success!  Wahoo!  

When we did it last year in May, I fretted and stewed about it from about December to May.  I was regularly losing sleep and worrying about it being a giant flop.  We had never done anything like this before and it was our biggest PTA fundraiser of the year, so I was s-t-r-e-s-s-e-d out!  Then, when it finally came, the day was rainy with thunder and lightning so that added another layer of stress on me.  Boy was I glad when it was over!

This year, however, has been another story entirely!  First of all, we did it in October, much less time to worry and stew.  We had done it once before and the students and parents had loved it so I wasn't worried about that part either!  I had an amazing Fun Run chairman who was super enthusiastic and on the ball (my chairman last year was fabulous as well, but it's just always nice to have wonderful help!)  And the weather was beautiful--what more could I ask for!

Here's cute Miles, rocking the sunglasses and headband.

During most of the runs (we had 5 different runs throughout the day), I was marking laps on the backs of shirts.  Bryan caught me marking Miles's shirt here.

There's one part in the music where they tell the students to freeze and go take a selfie with their parents.  I was glad Bryan was there to cheer our kiddos on!

And it was wonderful to have Gramma and Grampa Terry there to cheer too!  We are so glad they live close enough to attend these fun things!

6th Grade and Kindergarten ran at the same time (2 different tracks), so that was lucky to see both girls at once.  Here's cute Tess.

She carried her class flag for part of the time...

And little Miss Bree, also rocking the sunglasses.  She ran her heart out!  (I'll be honest, I didn't know how she would do, stamina wise.  She's the least active of our kids.  She loves to sit and do all sorts of fun crafts or play house, those kinds of things; while the other 2 kids are more bounce-off-the-walls type of kids.)  But she did fantastic!  All 3 kids ran well over the 35 laps (the goal for every kid in school was 30-35 laps around the track.)

Whew, I'm happy to be done!  (And I'm not going to lie...now that this biggest-event-of-the-year is done for PTA, I'm beginning to feel a little bit trunky.  I am excited to pass the job onto someone else next year.  Now the only problem is finding a person crazy enough to say yes..... hmmmm.)