For Grandpa and Grandma

Fisher and I were both quietly sitting in "the study" tonight working on various projects on the computers, when Fisher suggested that we are turning into my grandparents (to be like my grandparents is a good thing), so we took a picture - Here we are in the study, wearing sweaters, and playing freecell.

I wore a wool coat...

...and a wool sweater and my feet still froze! Why didn't I bring my winter boots with me to Arizona?! This week we had the amazing new experience of actually feeling cold in Arizona. I felt like I was back in Idaho at a high school football game.

On Friday night my cousin was performing at a nearby outdoor Holiday Festival, so we decided to check out the action. It is unseasonably cold here right now (by cold I mean in the low 40s at night), so we put a few layers of our warmest things on (most of our winter clothes are in Utah) and headed to the festival. We arrived just in time to watch these very fit 70+ women do some dancing, it was actually very impressive - particularly the 76 year old lady who did the splits! I hope I am as active and half as shapely at that age - just not wearing those costumes :)

My cousin Alli's group was the final show and they were extremely talented! My aunt told me that Alli has practices 20 hours a week! We saw Jazz, lyrical, hip hop, and a kick-line. Even though Curly was tired and freezing, she insisted that we stay and keep watching.

Nice Aunt Kim shared her blanket with the girls

Lou entertained us all with her hip hop dancing. At least she stayed warm.

When the show ended, the thermometer measure 42 degrees - not even freezing! I think my thick Idaho blood has thinned because I was so cold!

Give Thanks...

For family that would drive 14 hours to come and visit us and happily sleep on air mattresses and futons only to be woken before the crack of dawn by happy children' voices!

For late night games and treats!

For a home to share!

For our family that is far away (and cute packages they send)! We love you!

For aunts and uncles who love to play with their nieces.
For books and the ability to read!
For a peaceful evening out, without the kids.
For beautiful weather and playgrounds!

For healthy bodies and good competition! (It was a tie)

For warm weather (just not quite warm enough for the pool)
For dog piles and tickle tortures
For simple backyard games that bring peals of laughter! Did we mention the beautiful weather?
For good food and family to share it with!
For Grandma! Oh how we love her!
For giant cactus slides (Only in arizona :)
For cousins!!!
For sweet little girls!
For moms and sisters!
For my dad and his great ideas!
For a very fun trip to the zoo!
For knowledge that our family is forever!
For a Thanksgiving holiday that brings family together and reminds us of the bounteous blessings we enjoy!

Let the Festivities Begin!

We have had so much fun the past week and so much more lies in store! I love this time of year. Even though the beautiful Arizona weather does not feel like Thanksgiving to me - having family visit and anticipating the fun season puts me in the Holiday spirit.

Where to begin - I guess we could say the official "start" of the holiday was going to see the Capitol Christmas Tree. It comes from Arizona this year. We heard about a party to see the tree and wish it well on its journey across the country. By "see" the tree, they meant see the semi that is carrying the huge tree. There was the option of waiting in a rather long line to peek in a door at the front of the truck and look down the dark interior at the tree laying horizontally. We opted for decorating sugar cookies and signing the plastic signage covering the truck. Curly and Lou and are expecting that their Aunt in Washington DC sees their name on that truck! Gook luck K-Rae!

Lou's cookie art

The famous tree in the truck

Curly signing her name

Definitely more exciting than seeing the Christmas Tree, was the arrival of our cousins later that evening! Fisher's sisters braved the long drive to bring their children and themselves for an extended weekend visit. It was endless fun, noise, playing, eating, and not much sleeping. We all loved having family here.

We visited the Mesa Temple one day and had a picnic. Our 80 degree weather ended with their arrival and we all donned jackets for our outings, except Curly - she put on a spring dress.

Curly's budding photography skills...

On Saturday we checked out a Hot Air Balloon Festival. This is all the ballooning we saw. The wind prevented any balloon from launching, but it was a beautiful day!

Oh how we love to dress up!

And as all good things must come to an end - the family headed home Monday morning. All the kids were exhausted from endless playing and I heard it was a quiet ride home. We also caught up on some sleep and now we are gearing up for the next party!

Confession

Actually - Three confessions -

1 - I have eaten more of my kids Halloween candy than they have. I have been digging to find the Butterfinger and Twix bars, but I am sad to say they are gone - and they have all gone in my tummy. YUM!

2 - I adore my little Lou! She is so hilarious. I with I could capture on video the funny faces she makes, the funny voices she uses, and the funny things she says! Her two favorite words right now are "actually" which sounds so strange coming from a little two year old mouth (even though I remember Curly doing the same thing) and "never!". The latter she pronounces with a flourish whenever I ask her to do something...
"Lou, it's time to put on your panties."
"NEVERrrr!"
"It's time to eat lunch."
"NEVERrrrr!"
She sounds like a pirate!

3 - I am so ecstatic that my family is coming to visit! We spent yesterday trying to finish up the cleaning (that still hadn't been finished since moving) and the projects (that will never be done). Fisher's sisters and their children are coming this week and most of my immediate family is coming for Thanksgiving a week later!!! I can't stop thinking about it! I am so excited!

One of those days...

or at least lunchtimes. Lou managed to knock her bowl of tomato soup on the floor. I had not idea how far soup can travel. Even after I thought I had cleaned it all up, I found red splatter on the ceiling and walls nowhere near the table. Not five minutes later, Curly managed to knock her bowl into her lap. Not a good day for tomato soup.

Pumpkins, Potatoes, and Projects

Halloween is big here! I don't know if it just our neighborhood, but people go all out! Decorations, haunted houses, tons of trick-or-treaters, and tons of candy. It was Curly and Lou's first experience trick-or-treating at houses and we all had a blast. People pull their freestanding fire pits onto their driveway, put out a buffet of food, pull up the camp chairs and chill. There were lots of "three for one" houses. Three neighbors "chillin" at one house, but each with their own bucket of candy and they aren't shy about giving it out either. When I was little you took once piece and said thank you, but two is the new one, and a handful is pretty normal. Curly and Lou came home with plenty of booty for the whole family...

Hmm...which one do I eat first?!?!

This pumpkin took about five minutes to carve, speedy compared to our monster pumpkins of the past. It's so cute and little.

This is our huge Halloween sweet potato that my Phoenician uncle grew. That is a large butcher knife stuck in it! Impressive eh - We made fries and a lot of potato soup out of that baby! Three meals from one potato.

And here we have our Date night/Halloween project. We painted Curly and Lou's room. Two walls were blue and the other two still had the nasty, grayish, dull paint that the contractor put on. Curly REALLY wanted pink, so we compromised on pink and green (which we put on the lower third). When we first finished it looked like an easter egg and we went to bed hoping it would look better in the morning - fortunately it did. Finished project pictures to come shortly.

Nintendo and Disney

Happy Halloween! We have had parties and more than enough candy this week to call it good and get ready for Thanksgiving. Friday night was our ward Trunk or Treat and on Saturday we went to my cousin's Halloween party. Both evenings were very fun and Curly and Lou loved prancing around as Snow White and Tinkerbell! We were informed that a costume was required for the party, so we threw together these Mario and Luigi disguises.


Can't you just hear the Super Mario theme playing - Do-do-doo ---da-da-da-doooo- da-do---da-do---da-do-do--da-do-doo....
It was especially fun to go to the party with Krista and her hubby and cute baby. We have been friends since highschool and I haven't seen her for a few years. They were decked out as Alice and Tweedle-Dee and put all the adults who didn't come costumed to shame! The weather was beautiful, the company even better...Arizona is a great place for Halloween.

Fall Fun and the Farm

Now we are having fun. It's nice to be settled and doing fun things with my family. We made Halloween cookies for family home evening. Curly and Lou loved decorating them, though I am sure that more of the candies ended up in Lou's mouth than on cookies. Curly loved delivering the cookies. Someone "spooked" us and so we were required to pass the "spook" along by leaving a treat for other people anonymously. Curly thought it was so great to sneak up to a door, leave cookies, ring the bell and run away before they caught us. She couldn't help giggling as we ran.
Curly's preschool class took a trip to Tolmachoff farms. I decided I had to see an Arizona farm so Lou and I tagged along. It was so much fun. We picked vegetables, including a pumpkin (that I found out was not grown at the farm), the kids went on a train ride which Lou is still talking about, we found our way through a corn maze, "swam" in a corn pit (like a ball pit), pet ponies, piglets, goats, and baby chicks, and ate ice cream. What a day!

Lou is thrilled to be picking radishes!

The train ride. I though the little lady bug cars very cute.

Curly's preschool class

And the BIG news of the week is that Lou is a "BIG" girl now! Potty training started out rocky, but Lou has steadily been improving. Yay for Lou!

One more must for fun. Curly and Lou think it is fall and love these darling hats that my talented cousin made for them. Unfortunately 100 degree weather is not conducive to sporting knit hats, so they wear them in the house. Oh how we miss the fall!

Curly's Request

Curly's final plea in her prayer tonight - "Please bless that when we move again, we can move somewhere that it snows!"

Come on down, the weather's fine!

Now I see why people choose to live here.

The weather cooled down this week to low 90s during the day and mid 70s at night. It is beautiful. It was cool enough to walk to the library with Lindsay Woolsey, a new friend from the ward, for book hour. Our family enjoyed a few evening walks and noted that there are at least 5 homes in our neighborhood for sale or rent... so consider this your personal invitation to move to our neighborhood :)

I also found a group of families with children close to ours in age and we arranged a babysitting group rotation. Fisher and I are looking forward to it's start next week!

The weekend was a wonderful end to the week. Fisher was home! It was General Conference! And the beautiful weather continues!

Pictures and Projects

A few before and after pictures-

The "den" and kitchen after we first unloaded

The kitchen now! The one room that is completely unpacked and somewhat decorated (and my favorite room in the house). The den unfortunatly looks about the same, save for the computer that is hooked up and tucked between the stacks of boxes.

Curly and Lou on the first day of preschool. Lou was just as excited as Curly and very disappointed to discover that just Curly went to preschool
Fisher has had continuing education classes last Saturday and Sunday and this weekend too. So, we have been doing lots of projects on Saturday and Sunday to keep busy... Last week we made these "Princess Pumpkins" then put on pajamas, made popcorn, and looked at pictures (which did not help with homesickness)
Yesterday, we found this cute craft idea on Family Fun. They are little pumpkins made from egg cartons. The girls loved painting them and choosing the face.
We also went to IKEA yesterday morning to get a book shelf and a few other things to get organized. I should have known better than to go there on a Saturday with two kids... it was crazy, but I ended up with most things on our list and it even fit in the car. I was so excited to put the shelf together when we got home and finish unpacking the living room. I opened the box AND it was the wrong color! I was so annoyed because I had double checked the pile I was getting it from several times (the boxes aren't labeled). I should have opened it before driving 45 minutes back home!

The highlight of the day was attending the Relief Society Broadcast. I feel so grateful to my friend's husband (The Shepards) who watched the girls until Fisher came home so that I could attend the whole meeting. I particularly felt inspired and motivated by President Eyring's words. After the conference, our stake had it's traditional "Fondue Frenzy". Oh so delicious and the company was equally great. I met several new sisters in our ward and stake.

Other highlights of the week - two playdates (one at a friends and the other at the fountain), a trip to the library, and A DATE WITH FISHER. We hadn't been out for months, so arranged for a babysitter and (thanks to the generous gift card from our realtor) had dinner at PF Changs then went to Home Depot to plan and price our garden.