Autumn and Jim's Birthday

This baby is always on the go; it's quite difficult to take a picture of here.

 

I love the fall colors around here.  Our maple tree in the front yard is beautiful!

The kids made decorations for Jim's birthday.   They were super excited for him to come home from work that day.

To celebrate we went out to eat the night before, and then had presents and treats the evening of his birthday.

I think chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwiches are becoming a birthday tradition for Jim.  Mmm...

Happy birthday Jim!

Kids Say

Alex has been volunteering to wash the dishes almost every meal lately.  One evening he started washing before everyone was done eating.  Every time he finished a dish he called out, "More please!" and "Thank you!" when someone brought him another dirty dish.  What a guy.

Alex, after going to the bathroom comes out pointing to his tummy, "Mom, there is a little water tank right here and it has a little hole that shuts and unshuts."

Kids speak in body language sometimes too.  One afternoon I looked up from my book to see Abby's bare bum.  Upon inspection, we discovered she'd removed her wet diaper and given it to Jim who was asleep.  He was quite surprised when we woke him up.  Ha ha!

Logan was expressing his anticipation for General Conference just before it started, "I've been excited since 1907!!"

Alex, "Mom, can we go to a dinosaur zoo when we're resurrected?"

Logan's Published Story

A year and a half ago, Logan wanted to submit a true story to the Friend magazine, a children's magazine published by our church.  Today we discovered that his story has been published!  Below is a picture of the page he is on.  The above link directs to the story.

Logan's Baptism and Birthday Party

In our church, when a child turns 8, he or she can choose to be baptized.  Logan has been preparing for and anticipating this important decision for a couple of years.  We are so pleased he has taken this step.

He was baptized on September 20, 2014 by Jim

My mom and Alan made a trip out so they could be at his baptism.  Jim's parents, Grandma, and sister, Elisa also joined us that day. 

After the baptism the family came back to our house for a meal and a visit.  We also had a few baptism gifts for him, and Jim's parents brought birthday gifts.

He was super excited to receive his own nice set of scriptures.

My mom gave him this baptism pillowcase that he could color.

Audrey brought Halloween buckets for the kids and Abby thought they were neat.

Annie loves to pose for my mom.

While my mom and Alan were here we visited a state park nearby and fed the bison.

I love this baby!

We also had a fire one night they were here.

 When Logan boarded the train to go to Colorado, his one concern was that he didn't want to miss out on having a birthday party.  (We'd already sent invitations, which had to be cancelled because he was out of town.)  So we rescheduled it for a month later.

He requested chocolate cupcakes with white frosting.  Easy peasy!

He also requested a 'space' party and even planned his own activities.  This is space ball (AKA dodgeball with wadded up newspaper).

After running around, we came inside to make aliens.

Last, they made UFOs and had a flying contest.

Early Fall

I haven't been taking many pictures lately, but we've been soaking in the fall weather, settling into our school routine, and just enjoying our time at home.

Abby has become a little tornado lately.  She especially loves to unroll the paper towels.

Logan has wanted to be Wall-E for Halloween the last few years, but I hadn't felt up to making a costume.  I came across a picture of a homemade costume recently, and I just so happened to be feeling creative (unusual for me!) at that moment.  So I dove in and made it.  Inspiration for Eve coincided, so two boxes later we had costumes!

I gave Abby her first pigtails last Sunday.  She blinked for every picture, but she's still the cutest thing ever.

Colorado Trip: Part One

After missing our boy for 2 1/2 weeks, we finally headed to Colorado for our own visit.  Initially we were more eager to see Logan than anyone else.  In fact, Jim was so eager that he talked me into driving overnight just so we could arrive sooner.  Our family felt so incomplete without Logan.

We arrived on Labor Day weekend, so we were able to attend the balloon glow.  Fun fun.

The kids immediately fell in love with Josh's girlfriend, Melissa.

Josh couldn't wait to see Annie in particular.

Logan turned eight while we were on our trip, so we had a family party for him that evening.

Sometime in the last few years it has become a tradition to play 'Heavy, Heavy, Hangover' for all family parties.

I made Logan an ugly, but delicious, cake.  Cake failures have to happen every so often, right?

I'm not sure what day this was, but we thoroughly exhausted Abby during our fun.

We also threw my mom a bridal shower.  Sarah hosted it at her house and provided the yummy food, and Melissa brought these gourmet cupcakes...mmm!  I was in charge of decorations and games (so I would have to do all the talking as Sarah informed me...LOL).

No visit would be complete if I didn't go shopping with my mom at least once.  We found several treasures at Goodwill including a bunch of tutus for Abby.

Sarah took my older three kids to visit Dave at the fire station one day.  They think it's so neat that their uncle is a fireman!