Halloween Week 2009

Wednesday-

We watched The Nightmare Before Christmas..... (we were supposed to do a craft, but the kids were tired from school and Luke had a flag football game after school, so we bagged the craft and vegged out instead)

Thursday-

We read all of the Halloween stories we own...in the dark with a flashlight! Spooky!

Friday-

We got our Halloween costumes out and ready.

Saturday-

Emry attended a Halloween Birthday/Costume Party in the morning.
Luke attended a Halloween Birthday/Costume Party in the afternoon.
We are getting together with friends in our old neighborhood later tonight for trick-o-treat. Luke is a zombie cowboy, Emry is Repunzel & Carley is Cinderella.

Happy Halloween Everyone!!

Halloween Week 2009-Tuesday

HALLOWEEN WEEK

Tonight we carved pumpkins!

The kids drew on paper what they wanted their jack-o-lanterns to look like.
It took some serious time to get them just right.

Luke gutted his own pumpkin for the first time this year.
He didn't like getting messy, but in the end he had a good time.

Here are the finished products...ready for candles.

Halloween Week 2009-Monday

Ok, so I haven't posted anything about Halloween, my most favorite holiday!!!
Usually my house is decorated on October 1st...this year, I have shirked my duty.
Half the month had passed before I'd even pulled the boxes out of the garage.
Anyway, I was a little behind so I decided to declare this week,
HALLOWEEN WEEK at our house.
We are doing a fun Halloween centered activity each night after dinner.
So be sure to check back for spooks & tricks!!

Monday-

Tonight we made, frosted, decorated and ate Gingerbread Bats! eeeeEEk!

While Luke did dishes (his new favorite job!) the girls and I made gingerbread dough. Then we rolled them out and cut our bats. While they were cooking & cooling, we watched Ichabod Crane & The Legend of Sleepy Hallow.

Then we got out the goods...red hots, sprinkles, m&m's, resees pieces, you know the works!

Everyone got in on the fun!

Our finished products.

You can't see her fingers, but they're just as black as her mouth. That stuff doesn't come off either...so she went to school with black finger tips the next day, she didn't minded though.

Grandpa May Was Here-part 2

Tuesday morning, we dropped the kids off at school. When Trent got home we went out to the restaurant, Ruby's, at the end of the pier at Oceanside City Beach for breakfast. It was the perfect place to take my dad. He is famous in our family for sniffing out mom & pop type eateries. The weather was awesome too, about 74 degrees, no clouds, a slight breeze...just perfect!

We let Trent and Carley get some much needed shut eye and then packed up the car for an afternoon at the beach. The tide is super low between 3-7pm right now, so it was a good time to head to the jetty to see what we could find. Here are our treasures for the day:

Starfish. We found orange, red & brown ones today.

Sea Slug.
he's kind of hard to see, I couldn't get the glare off...please share any photoshop tips!

Mussels & Clams a plenty.
As always we were able to see tons of these that were empty & full.

Emry decided to drag that huge piece of kelp or seaweed root our entire walk along the beach. She got tired, but didn't give it up. Finally, we had to ask her to let it go.

Thanks for visiting Dad! It was so great to have you around!

Grandpa May Was Here-part 1

We had a visit from Grandpa May this past week, and we really enjoyed having him around! We didn't go anywhere especially cool or do anything outrageously fun...we just hung out, relaxed and played at the beach. He arrived on Sunday late afternoon, in time for dinner. We went for a walk around the grove. The kids showed Grandpa all the fruit trees. Everyone headed to bed pretty early since the big kids had school in the morning, and the adults were tired too.

Monday morning, after getting the kids off to school, we hopped into the car to run some errands that my dad and I needed to get done. I took him on a tour of Oceanside, mostly showed him the beaches and some houses I think are pretty cool. We stopped for ice cream and Carley was very excited to share a banana split with Grandpa...she only ate the whipped cream, but she was in heaven.

Trent was on call, so my dad and I decided to take the big kids down to the beach for a picnic dinner. We got finger food at the store and my dad dished it out while I drove. We played at the beach for a while and looked for treasures. The kids really had fun playing with Grandpa!

Aunt Maggie's Silly Face Challenge

My sister Maggie challenged all the cousins to a silly face competition...with a prize going to the best face! Here are our entries....



(disclaimer: we tried and tried to get her to sit still while giving us her best silly face, but what you see is what you get!)

GO COUGARS!

Rise and Shout the Cougars are out!

Trent took Luke & Emry down to the BYU vs. SDSU football game on Saturday. The kids had an early morning practice for the primary program today (it went off without a hitch) and Trent went shopping...can you guess what he purchased??? you got it, face paint.

The kids were very excited to have their hair and faces painted. Emry made it the first 20 minutes of the game and wanted to come home. Trent had to bribe her with ice cream and drinks. After she got the goods, she calmed down and made it through the rest of the game. They had fun cheering and clapping when everyone else got up. A few times Luke got carried away and started cheering for SDSU...we'll have to work on that.

It was a great game. BYU came out on top, 38-28.....Go Cougs!

He's Back!!!

Trent got home from his week long fishing & hunting trip with his brother late last night. I tell you what, I haven't ever been more glad to see him. Usually when he's been away for a few days it's no big deal and life goes on as normal. That's not really how things went this time. We just had one thing after another happen and it was really stressful almost the entire week he was gone! Here's my list of the major happenings:

• I got asked to speak in church, which i get very very very anxious about, not my comfort zone at all. i had to get one of the young women to sit with my kids, she had to take Carley out screaming, during my talk.
• I'm in the primary presidency and it was my turn to attend ward council, so I had to have one of the young women on stand by to help out. If you're wondering why I didn't swap it's b/c the other mtg is on wed and I can't go to that one b/c of schedule conflicts.
  
• The power went out as i was getting ready for church, leaving me with a head full of sopping wet hair. i WAS planning on actually doing my hair. luckily my talk was already done and printed out.
• I found mouse droppings under the sink.
• I set a mouse trap with peanut butter for the first time...totally grossed me out.
• No luck the first night.
• The mouse freaked me out the next night...in my room at 2:56am....at this point i wanted to cry b/c if you have a husband, and I do, this is one of those things that they are supposed to take care of....NOT ME!!!
• Luke got sick.
• I found a dead mouse in my trap, even more gross than setting it. I ended up picking it up with a pliers and throwing the entire thing trap & mouse out by the garbage cans...again, if you have a husband, and I do, this is one of those things that they are supposed to take care of....NOT ME!!!
• I had to get a sitter for my kids so I could go to my photo class. She'd forgotten, so I had to wait for her to get ready, which forced me to really rush and I was almost late. It didn't cross my mind until I was driving home that I wouldn't be able to take her home without waking my kids up... it was 10pm on a school night, my kids are in bed by 7:30pm.
  

So needless to say, I for one am very glad that Trent is home safe. I hope next time he's gone things go a little smoother for me.

Our House In Real Time

This is what is happening at our house....
in real time...aka, right now!

While I was doing this:


I thought Carley was playing, but actually she was doing this:

Let's hear those oohs and aahs! She's so precious!
I wish I could curl up beside her for a nap, but I have to work in a few minutes......

A Funny Parenting Moment

This is one of those "you know you're a parent when..." type of stories. Trent and I were sitting on the couch after the kids had gone to bed watching Family Feud. I'd forgotten how fun that game show can be. It was at the end you know when two team members try to beat the clock and answer the survey questions to win. Anyhew, the question was "Name something you spread on a sandwich." Trent and I thought we had it in the bag, and laughed b/c the first person said mustard??? and the second person said mayonnaise??? we were totally thinking, you dorks, that's not going to get you many points b/c you left out the most obvious answers on the planet, peanut butter and jelly! We really thought they would be the top answers on the survey............WELL.........they weren't even ON the survey!!! We both looked at each other completely dumbfounded and then burst out laughing b/c we both realized how far we've come out of the realm of the real world and their NORMAL sandwiches....when was the last time either of us ate a sandwich that had something other than peanut butter and jelly on it????? Go ahead and laugh at us...we did!