Happy Hanukkah!

It is four days into Hanukkah (it is based on the Lunar calendar) BUT if you want a Christmas card from me and you know you moved...send me your address. [email protected]. Hope your holidays are off to a cheery start!

Thankful...

So much to be thankful for. Right now I am so thankful for my sisters, for the fun weekend we had together, for having enough food to eat, for a healthy body (to walk the freedom trail), for a wonderful husband and awesome father (willing to watch the kids), for truly GREAT friends (also willing to help), for freedom, for my parents for teaching me to love life and liberty, and for Thanksgiving and the time to reflect on ALL our blessings and realize how truly blessed we are!

Line upon Liney

The other day Caroline told me that someone called her a "fat lady". I asked her how that made her feel, and she said it "made me feel bad because I'm not a lady". I am still laughing!

Not Caroline but... I just found a book from Livi's school that said- Things you know about rocks... (they have been learning about rocks for a few weeks now) she wrote, I know that rocks hurt people when you throw them. Sounds more like a lesson from the playground than the classroom to me.

PARTY!

Rigdon wanted an ALL boy SCARY party... complete with a giant pizza, scary stories, flashlight tag which was a TOTAL favorite and a spook alley of which two boys never dared to enter!
my personal fave...the truth serum which made it impossible to lie on your deepest darkest secrets...
Do you dare take a drink ?
The spook alley was a big hit and as you can see here many of the boys never made it out!

Sneak Preview

Here we are on our way to the annual fall social at school. This gives us a chance to work out the glitches on our costumes.
Caroline's crew...
Rig's skeleton posse...
Livi winning big at the booths...
Livi's bunch...

Honey Bee

Utah in fall

We got to go to Utah for my nieces baptism and to see my darling new nephew blessed. (of course I forgot my camera for the main event) but we loved all the leaves changing and spending time with Rangi's family is always the high light of our trips.
Roman and Michelle came with us to the corn maze. Rig and Livi were dying to do a corn maze and since Utah has more than Ca. we went for it. We made it through so easily the first time that we thought there were no wrong turns...so Livi and I decided to go through again. YIKES! We hit a lot of dead ends and started to get nervous, we did make it out...but it was the entrance not the EXIT!

Puppy dog tails...

he is all boy and I am so glad to have him!

Sugar and Spice

... and everything nice! These girls really do add the sugar and spice to my life.

What-a-melon!

Olivia got this little seed from her teacher last year and came home and planted it by herself (like kids do in the backyard) and lo and behold it grew into this! I was amazed, and am even more amazed by great teachers who help my kids to GROW!

Lovin' Life

Well can you believe what is at the end of the rainbow? It's not a pot of gold after all it's a VW bus!
These rainbows were in front of our house the other day and it was gorgeous!!! My photography skills do not do it justice!
Drive-in movies with Lola. SO much fun... every family needs to do this more often!
My sister Jessica came to visit, we had a lot of fun going to the beach and Disneyland with her and our family is thrilled to have a red headed cousin. Jessica and I had a little modeling shoot on the beach... even though I am her older sister and could provide you with LOADS of entertainment, I will just post this picture of my beautiful sister with her darling baby. Love you Jess! (Dave- I can get you those pics :)
This is what you get for having a stranger take your picture.

Sonic

What better way to end the first day of school than happy hour at Sonic with all your friends from school in the bus!

First Day of School !

I think we are closer to report cards than the first day of school... but here they are the big 4th and 2nd graders!
The walking crew... I love that these kids walk together and I am thrilled that two new kids moved onto our street and were added to the crew!
Caroline and I were both excited for our first day of pre-school...and can I say that I LOVE watching my daughter interact and learn at pre-school!
The first day of school is always exciting and tiring...Caroline tucked herself in for a nap after pre-school...and P.S. my dentist is going to be thrilled to see this picture!

Sweet Livi!

Our sweet Olivia turned seven this year! She is growing up and although it can be sad at times, it is also so fun to see her growing... she is SO responsible and takes things like watching Jillian in the tub so serious (don't worry I do too) and if anyone in the family is sick she gets really worried. She is very responsible about homework and A.R. and helping around the house. She is always very concerned about the feelings of others and she loves crafts! She is such a blessing to our family. We love you, Livi!
For her birthday we went to the American Girl Cafe with her best friends and grandma and grandpa. It was a lot of fun!

BOO!

Did I scare you jumping back into the blogging world without warning? Here are some of our family's ideas of fun in the summer... playing with cousins...
taking a picture of three toddlers? (it must be because I try to do it so often!)
feeding the ducks...
taking the kids to BYU and eating at the creamery is a tradition...
watching beautiful Utah summer skies...
spending time with dad all summer...
sleeping out in grandma and grandpa's backyard after a midnight weenie roast...
eating strawberries and cream at the rodeo...
chasing a cow for cash... who doesn't want to do that for fun! (even Caroline got in the mix this year... and just today she told me she wasn't that fast of a runner, but pretty fast because she almost got a cash off of the cow's tail.)
watching your kids CHASE a cow all over the arena...
mutton bustin' is definitely these girls idea of fun (too bad dad missed the sign-up)
Rangi's idea of fun is trying to fit his dad's foot into a boot, and Ricker seems to think it is fun too!
swimming is at the top of Caroline's summer fun list...

wrestling and taking third at a tournament is on Rigdon's fun list...
getting WORKED by a wave on her first day surfing and coming out laughing... fun for Livi
mom's idea of fun is having an awesome garden !!!
Summer fun for Rangi also includes working on Lola... (his beloved VW bus)
and growing a white T version of Nacho Libres mustache ( this entails NO fun for me at all)...
Rigdon officially grew up this summer by putting ALL the carnival rides including the zipper on his summer fun list!
Jillian's summer fun mostly entails looking cute and eating candy. She did get entered into a baby beauty contest but all of the judges were apparently blind because she didn't win.