Party Month!!!

We decided to make all of November a party since Hannah's birthday is the 4th and Owen's is the 20th. We had a total of 4 parties. But it's okay because I love birthday parties!!! Especially first birthdays. I had so much fun making cakes, cupcakes, blowing up balloons and singing 'Happy Birthday' (especially to Hannah who always got a huge smile on her face). Things were a little tricky with Jeff's busy schedule so we decided to hold an extended family party on the 10th to celebrate both birthdays. But then I felt like we couldn't do nothing on their real birthdays.

Now the fourth party was a little surprise. I had talked about doing a friend party for Owen, but never really got around to it. Jeff was on-call working all day and night on Owen's real birthday, and since things had been crazy that day I decided to scrap it. Then when Owen went up to ask the neighbour boy to play I heard him telling him and his mom that he was having a party later on, and he asked them if they could come. They quickly accepted and so I went up and told them we had sort of been planning on one, but that I wasn't sure..... but the look on Owen's face helped me say maybe. All day I tried to talk him out of it, but he really really really wanted it. So at 4:30 we rounded up all the kids we could and had a party. Luckily there were leftover cupcakes from the night before and I had tons of fruit snacks which I wrapped up a bunch of times and we played the wrapping game. Owen also had fun showing his friends his new train.

Anyway here are some pictures from all the parties.

Hannah on her real birthday.

Family party:

"sea of balloons"
Highly recommended. Lizzy seemed to like it more that Owen and Hannah.
(I know these are blurry)

Owen on they eve of his birthday since Jeff was working the 20th.


And last but not least: the improv friend party!

Soap box

Do you think people would by upset if suddenly Women couldn't vote? Or maybe we decided anyone with blue eyes couldn't vote? Salt Lake City had a good turnout for voting today. 35% I think that's pathetic. Now that everyone in this country can vote everyone takes it for granted, and 2/3 of the people sit at home and watch Dancing with the Stars instead of taking 10 minutes to vote. And then we all complain when someone like Rocky Anderson tries to ruin Salt Lake City. Another thing that is really bothering me? Referendum 1. Let's just say the state of Utah failed it's I.Q. test. All the opposition to this was a bunch of garbage and I can't believe so many people were misled. The fact that we won't have vouchers isn't as big of a deal to me as how uninformed people can be. I went to a debate on this issue and anyone with a High School education could see that the opposition's arguments were unfounded and untrue. So I hope you voted today.

Happy Halloween

Corn Maze fun!

Engineer. We had so much fun making this train!!

Nittany lion and Fireman.

Hannah was so happy about this sucker. I haven't seen her smile so much in a long time.

The other morning Owen was really begging me to do all sorts of stuff (play with me, let's go to the library, can we ride TRAX?, help me build a fort....) I was feeling bad because I wanted to hang out with him but had so much to do. So I said "If you can think of something that takes less than ten minutes and doesn't involve going anywhere I'll do it." I thought maybe a puzzle or a story was what he would ask for. But he thought about it and decided on making a peach smoothie and watching a "mommie movie" (A home-video from when I was little. I don't think piano recitals and family vacations would be that interesting to him but he LOVES them.) So here he is so happy with his peach smoothie. And I was happy I could now sort laundry in peace.

I wanted to get a video of Hannah walking, but she was only interested in eating the acorns. When she first started doing this about a month ago I would take them out of her mouth, but there was really no way of stopping her so I finally gave in. She has never choked or even made me think she was going to. The only trouble we run into is when other moms are around. "Do you know she has an acorn in there?" "ha ha... yes, she might even have two or three."

She is walking so much now I think she might be classified as a walker. It is only when she is in a hurry that she crawls. I can't believe she is so big!

Something New

Well it's not a jaguar (like one of the residents) but it's ours! We all agree it is a "Brad car." Any suggestions for a name? It is a 1991 but only has 135K so there is a lot of life left (we hope). It's stuffed with all the extras-A.C., power windows and locks, seatbelts, and even a radio/cassette player. As Napoleon would say "Lucky!"

Cabin

We had an awesome trip to the cabin last weekend. We were worried we wouldn't be able to get General Conference on the radio but Saturday morning we got the signal loud and clear...well somewhat clear. I was glad we didn't have to get the kids dressed up to go listen and the church. It pretty much snowed the whole time we were up there, but it was really wet and slushy.

Saturday night we had a campfire.

Sunday afternoon we went for a walk. Here we are at the mom's creek.
On Monday while Jeff and I were cleaning the cabin Owen came running inside and said "Dad, there is an animal out there." We went and looked and there was a moose with her calf.

We were all ready to leave at 1pm when Jeff went to turn the valve to drain the water out of the cabin. He took off the cap to find the pipe full of rocks, dirt, sticks, and pine cones. The pipe is about 5 feet long and it was shoved to the top. We tried vacuuming up the stuff, but only made it about 2 feet and then nothing else would come up. If anyone was going to be able to come up during the winter we had to dig it out so the pipes won't freeze and break inside the cabin. So here is Jeff digging it out. It took both of us digging for about two hours. I helped the kids on and off but the ground was really hard and we kept having to go wider. There was a point when we wondered if we were ever going to reach the water line, but we finally did. This picture doesn't do the hole justice. And here he is removing the rocks and pine cones. The grand finalie was a two foot stick. Just for the record we're not going through that again so Dad you better child-proof the pipe. We finally left at 4:30 and made it home with only one stop. We're sure happy to be within driving distance of the cabin:)

September

At the request of Laurissa and Dad I am going to put up some pictures. The truth is that we haven't taken very many pictures the past few months, but I did fins some.A p.j. shot.



Sunday at Dad and Mom's it started pouring rain. Everyone just ran outside. Owen of course went straight for the hose...he is so obsessed with water. And the case of the missing pajama bottom: While staying at my parent's house (when they were in Europe) Owen lost his pajama bottoms. I found the tops in the basement by the toys but could not find the bottoms anywhere. He had woken up before me and started playing and I guess decided to get undressed. Well a week later when Kanien was there she found them. They were hung up nicely on the side of the old play kitchen. Guess I should have looked harder.

Living my dream

I have always wished I could do cool flips on a tramp. Here are Jeff and Owen showing off their tricks.

Help

This picture made me laugh out loud. Better pick up your pants Kristin.

Curious George

A few weeks ago we went to the University's health and safety fair. The theme was centered around Curious George and Owen was SO excited to meet him. After he got his picture taken with him he said to me "I think it was just a guy in a big soft George costume." There was also a really cool doctor dog. Plus lots of free food, a train ride, and clowns making balloon animals. The lady who made Owen a dog had some physical problem that made her shake. But she was so happy and you could tell she enjoyed what she was doing even though her disability made it hard:)

Miss Potter

I Loved this movie:)

Every once in a while

I think the mountains are so beautiful when they change to Fall colors. I also love it when they are frosted with snow. Well the other day we got both at once. Plus crisp Fall air. It was awe-inspiring!

Also my friend Alexis came to Salt Lake and stopped by. It was so fun to see her and her family. She is still hilarious as ever and makes me miss living 100 yards from her.

Mountain bike crazy

Jeff had a day off so I decided to surprise him by getting someone to watch the kids so we could go ride the wasatch crest mountain bike trail. It starts off of guardmans pass up Big Cottonwood Canyon. It is completely up hill for the first two miles. And it was no gradual uphill. It was steep and rocky and the worst part was the elevation. At the top it is 9,900 feet. So here I am at the top of "puke hill". I was so tired the only thing that kept me from turning back was the thought of having to ride down that steep rocky trail. Jeff assured me the worst was over although there were a few times I wondered if we were embarking on "puke hill 2". It was really beautiful and the rain from the night before made the trail perfect with no dust. I would definitely not call myself a true mountain biker. I get so freaked out when I see a bunch of huge rocks or the trail narrows. But Jeff did teach me a bunch of tricks to make it more fun. After the first big hill you traverse the ridge for 13 miles then end up at the top of Millcreek canyon. It was a lot of fun riding down the canyon but when we got to the bottom we quickly realized we were going to have to bike home because there wasn't anyone to come pick us up and we were penniless so we couldn't take the bus. So we biked the 12 miles home. It was a lot easier riding than up puke hill, but by the time we made it I couldn't feel my legs. I thought all those walks with the kids through Research Park would have done something to build up some muscle, but I guess not because my legs were... jello. Now that it is over I can say it was a lot of fun. And I love my bike. My Trek 4300 WSD:) I highly recommend it to any woman who finds male mountain bikes uncomfortable.

Hannah's new thing and Owen's old time favorite

This cute little girl found out what is behind those mysterious doors. It is actually a relief to me that she found something that easily entertains her:)

It may look like Owen is doing the dishes but really he is just enjoying something he has been doing for about three years. Playing in the sink.



Here he is at about 18 months.

p.s. We're all feeling better. The last post was mostly dedicated to Hannah's refusal to nap the past few days. Her grumpiness made us all a little on the edge. But thankfully she surrendered and slept all afternoon.

All of us

Are a little grumpy.

The only way to suck a binki. Upside-down hanging half-way out.

Happy Birthday Cowboy!

Well I just had to say Happy Birthday to the greatest brother ever! These brownies Greg made were amazing!!! I honestly think about them all the time. They had mint frosting and they were so good it is unbelievable. But the brownies are nothing compared to how awesome Greg is. I really miss him now that he has turned cowboy and lives in Wyoming.

Happy Birthday Greg!!!