September 2016

Welcome September! I love when the weather starts to cool off and school is in full swing! I was asked to teach a class on visiting teaching at church one night. I got sent the above picture. Even Daddy likes Tommy's new Captain America costume. Lily's photo bomb in the background cracks me up too.

I just love our little Joey. He makes all of us so happy. We took the kids out on a family date night. They chose Cafe Rio for dinner, play time and hide and seek in the gardens on campus, and then Kari Anne's custard and Italian ice for dessert. It was a really fun night together.

Everyone but Tommy was happy to be there. He was having trouble keeping up with the girls and felt a little left behind.

We tried a new flavor of Italian ice - POG! It was amazing. Plus there was a seasonal flavor of custard - coconut. We were pretty much in gelati heaven. Even Tommy's frown turned upside-down after trying it. Hooray for family date nights. Sometimes we all need to just get out together and have some fun.

Jeremy's new Toastmasters Club accomplished 5 of 10 goals in their first year as an official club. That's a big deal because it is often hard to do with a new group. He got an award in the mail celebrating his club's achievement. Great job!

We spent Labor Day weekend with Grammy and Grampy, but first we stopped in Kuna to attend Elijah and Emren's baptism. Danielle and I were so close growing up, it is fun now to have kids who are close in age and love each other so much.

It felt great to be at the cabin with Grammy and Grampy. The weather was rather chilly and the water was too low to play in, but that meant we had lots of beach to explore. We were digging and treasure hunting all over the place.

So beautiful and peaceful. There was hardly anyone else on the lake.

Just a lot of pelicans!

We found a bunch of tiny snail shells. It became Annie's pet project to find and keep as many as she could. Thankfully, she has forgotten all about them now. They were everywhere, in pockets, in shoes, in the car, in our luggage....everywhere. Mommy slowly disposed of them once we got home. Annie didn't even notice.

On Sunday afternoon, Grammy and Grampy took us to Charlie's Gardens in McCall. It is a lovely place with gardens maintained by volunteers. There are interesting plants from all over and beautiful theme areas.

One of the kids' favorite spots was the Gnome Garden.

It smelled to lush and vibrant. We got a little bit wet from the rain, but we're so glad we stopped for a visit.

The red plant on the right is called "Birds in a Tree". Can you tell why? I loved this one.

Grammy stayed in the car with Joey while he napped, but she took a little break and got some cute pictures with the girls.

Thank you Grammy and Grampy for showing us this beautiful place. We are excited to see how it will look next year.

Grammy helped the kids make slime. Oh boy was it fun! Tommy liked looking at it, but wouldn't touch it for a long time. Once he did, I was worried we'd be finding slime in places it didn't belong. He was stretching it and whipping it around even more than the girls.

Monday morning we took rides in Grampy's side-by-side. All the kids loved it!

Tommy wasn't sure if he wanted a ride at first, so we passed some time bowling on the deck of the cabin.

Joey got to ride the swing with Grampy.

Look at that tiny hummingbird nest. It is the same width as a clothespin. Nature is incredible. Grammy and Grampy won a local award for some photographs of the nest with birds in it.

Eventually Tommy got brave enough to try a ride - and he loved it!

Joey was feeling a little left out and tried to follow on foot.

He was easily distracted by a bottle and snuggles with Mommy.

For lunch we built a fire and roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. It was a fun way to end the trip. We wanted to stay longer, but school and work were calling. Bye beautiful cabin. Back to reality.

The raspberries are keeping the neighbor kids busy this year. Tommy loves to get friends together to pick berries. I love seeing all the kiddos out there.

The kids' school had a fundraiser night at Wendy's. We went to get kids meals for them. The lines were long but the service was fast. We hardly ever get fast food so the kids were thrilled to eat it for dinner.

Joey had his one year check up. He's in the 78th percentile for weight, 35th for height. He is practically perfect in every way - all healthy and strong. His shots went well and he didn't have much of a fever afterward. Great job Joey!

Because the big kids were so good during Joey's appointment, they got to choose stickers too.

JoJo is busy as ever. He spilled a whole container of cherry tomatoes on the floor and squished a bunch of them. Dried tomato seeds and juice are really hard to scrub off of tile. He is keeping me on my toes to be sure.

Daddy is slowly but surely making progress on the play house. We're hoping to get it done before the girls' birthday in October.

Busy Joey always wants to do what Daddy is doing.

Brady came to celebrate his birthday with us. The kids were excited to throw him a party.

I think Tommy was just excited to have chocolate cake again!

Annie made this cute frog puppet at school. And she helped me make this paper shield for Tommy, because Captain America is nothing without his shield. Tommy loves it. We even put a handle on the back so he can wear it on his arm to keep both of his hands free.

I finally pulled out one of my Christmas gifts-a spiral cutter-and gave it a try. I made zoodles (zucchini noodles) with spaghetti sauce. It was delicious. I will definitely grow more zucchini next year.
I have started babysitting for a sister I visit teach so she can go to therapy to help her work through grief of losing a baby. Her kids play great with my kids and it has been a blessing to serve her this way. The girls love to dress up together and play Barbies.

My ward put on an excellent Relief Society activity about visiting teaching. It was school themed with different classes on how to be a better visiting teacher. The board dressed up like lunch ladies to serve dinner cafeteria style. It was a great night!

Jeremy won a humorous speech contest in Toastmasters. He got to go compete at the next level. I went to support him. It was a fun night. Some of the speeches were excellent. One was terrible. Jeremy did a great job, but he rushed things a little bit and was very nervous.

Jeremy won! That means he gets to compete again at a higher level. He's not sure if he happy about that or not. Good job honey!

I love it when the girls want to go exercise with me. Annie and I had some one on one time at Zumba. she is really good. Dancing is definitely one of her talents. The instructor had me come up on stage to dance two of the songs. Annie thought I was so cool. Thank goodness it is easy to impress her at this age.

Tommy got invited to his first friend birthday party. It was train themed. His favorite prizes were tootsie rolls and a new tub of play dough. This boy loves play dough!

Jeremy got the trusses built for the house. It is looking so cute now that it really looks like a house. The girls are so excited!

Tommy made this cute monster with his friend Kamden. It goes with us everywhere. I have had to rescue it from pockets before doing the laundry. I wonder how long this cute little guy will survive.

Finally apple picking day arrived! We packed a picnic dinner to eat at Daddy's office and then we got to work.

We didn't want a whole lot this year. Mommy just didn't have the energy to make applesauce. So we relaxed and picked for fun.

I love Lily's look of concentration in the above picture.

We always seem to have some kind of hiccup when we go pick apples. This year it was the sprinklers. They went off in the row we were picking, so we moved over, then a few minutes later, they started in that row. We were running from sprinklers for about 10 minutes before we just decided to call it a night.

We were a little wet, but the kids loved it. They look forward to our apple trip every year.

These are the outfits the girls chose for picture day. Lily is starting to look so grown up. Neither of them wore what I was hoping they would. It is hard not being able to choose their clothes or hair styles for them. But I know it's important for them to make those choices on their own.

The boys are constantly on the move. I remember being able to sit down and read when the girls were little. I can't do that with the boys. Something is being destroyed or devoured if the house is quiet and still.

Our friend Dave came to visit. While he was here, he fixed our front door. Joey had to be in the middle of the action. Sorry about the drool on your tools Dave!

Dave also put in this trim to help the downstairs shelves look like built-ins. We still need to paint it, but it looks great. We're happy to have that project finally done.

September 24th was free National parks day. Daddy had to compete in a speech contest, so Mommy packed up the kids, picked up Uncle Brady, and we had a little adventure on our own.

It was COLD. We packed jackets, hats, and gloves, but not our heavy coats. We needed them. The wind was strong and chilly.

We used our blankets to stay warm at some of the stops.

Joey didn't let the cold get him down. He was all smiles!

Later in the day I asked all the kids what their favorite animals in Yellowstone were. Tommy said, "Uncle Brady!"

They were pals all day long.

To escape the cold we spent a lot of time at the visitor's center near Old Faithful. There are so many fun exhibits for kids in there and we didn't see it when we went during the summer with the Halls.

After some lunch, hot chocolate, and about an hour indoors, we braved the cold wind to see the geyser blow.

Then we played teeter-totter on the logs with Uncle Brady. He gave all the kids a ride. It's nice when all his weight lifting pays off! I could not do that many squats in a row!

This was definitely the highlight of the day. We spent so long doing the teeter-totter rides that we didn't really have time to see anything else.

On the way out we did a quick stop at Firehole Falls. The girls love to see the waterfall.

We saw some amazing wildlife. Lots of bison and elk. My favorite was a swan swimming in the river.

When we got home, we were surprised to see that Daddy had put up some of the siding on the playhouse.

The kids played McDonald's drive through with the side window.

This was our strangest looking carrot this year. I love the spiral shape!

Annie is doing great with clogging. Lily doesn't seem to be enjoying it as much.

Now that we're used to the school routine, I am enjoying my time with just the boys. During Joey's naps, Tommy and like to play trains together.

We figured out that the spiralizer makes fun spiral apples too. One afternoon, we were busy making one fore each kid that came to play after school. I was officially the coolest mom on the block that day.

And just like that, September ended. It is starting to cool down and feel like Fall. Time passing quickly as we count down to the girls' birthdays and Halloween. October and November are my favorite months of the year. Happy Fall Y'all!