Spirit Day!

Do you know how rare it is that my kids are all up, ready, fed and on time - let alone downstairs, happy & together in the morning?!
R A R E.
Maybe it's their excitement for Spirit Day which wraps up Red Ribbon Week. I think it's Dedan's favorite week of school, because he wears his favorite color everyday. (Yes, he has enough red clothing to wear 5 different red outfits)
Happy. Pledged to be drug free. Love their schools. A little bit crazy.
It's a good life today.

Crazy Cute

Red Ribbon Week Crazy Hair Day

Double-Daring Book for Girls: Dye your hair (pink) with Kool-aid

Best Vegetable Ever

As we walked up to D-man's school with an armful of these fall veggies (teacher requested for an activity) we could see the kids eyes get as big as saucers and hear their excited whispers of, "Pumpkins!"

What other vegetable gets such a hallowed reaction?

We enjoy pumpkins so much that last Spring we planted our first garden. All pumpkins. 3 different kind of seeds. 15 square feet in Grandpa's backyard. A few months later we had this beautiful full vine with lots of blossoms on it. Our anticipation grew exponentially as the vines began to take over the side yard.

Fast forward to October. My dad brought the entire harvest from our pumpkin garden to our house on one of his weekly visits.

The white one is smaller than my fist. At least our one orange pumpkin has an interesting shape and a cool stem!

Do you know how hard it is to pay attention to General Conference* on TV at home when you're a kid? This year I had a plan, a knitting plan. Dedan loved making this cute little faux harvest guy on a loom. Emma used needles and started her own scarf (it's not finished yet). Something to do with their hands really helped my kids sit still. Probably the most peaceful Conference weekend we've had. Dedan was so proud of his crafty skills he took it to school and shared it with his class. Confidence building vegetable craft!

Come October who doesn't love pumpkin treats?....other than my husband, I mean. I found a couple of recipes for my Have To Try This file here and here. But my Chocolate Chip pumpkin bread is a must have in our house. I like you so I'll share my recipe.

2/3 c Butter flavored Crisco

2 2/3 c sugar

4 eggs

1 lb pumpkin, canned or freshly cooked (here's how)

2/3 c water

Mix it well!

Add:

3 1/3 c flour

2 t baking soda

1 1/2 t salt

1/2 t baking powder

1 t cinnamon

1 t ground cloves

Mix it up!

With a spoon stir in:

1 pkg semi-sweet chocolate chips

Divide into 2 greased bread pans. Bake @ 350 degrees for 70 minutes. Mmmmmmmmmmm.

Tomorrow Nash & I are headed for the pumpkin patch with our buddies. A whole activity planned around pumpkins! I haven't even mentioned jack-o-lanterns or my mom's famous Dinner In A Pumpkin....

______________________________

*that's Mormon for our bi-annual broadcast from church leadership in SLC. 4 different sessions. 2 hours each.

Headstrong...to say the least

My 3 year old, Nash, woke up this morning sick of his hair - like smacking himself in the head, angry at the world, sick of his hair. He wanted to go straight to the "hair cut place". I offered to cut his hair since it's Sunday and his "place" is closed. He immediately started riffling through the bathroom drawers looking for the "suitcase" that has my hair cutting tools.

We got him all set up in a chair with the drape around his neck and I pulled out the scissors. "NO! I want the big thing. I want a Hollywood haircut...like Emma said." Emma had no idea what he was talking about, but we figured out he wanted me to use the clippers. He wanted a H.A.I.R.C.U.T. Nash has beautiful curls and I didn't know if I had the strength to buzz them off, so I called Har for reinforcement. Har explained to Nash that his hair would be really short, shorter than Daddy's. "YES!" Alright.

Our favorite neighbors came over for Sunday dinner (again) and as after dinner entertainment pulled out their copy of Fortune-Telling Birthday Book. Every month/day has a description of the personality for people born that date. Nash's was pretty accurate:Your positive and headstrong ways will carry you over many obstacles to success. You expect others to step aside or be trampled on. You are influenced by praise and flattery, rather than by direct appeal or command. You have your family's respect and devotion.

As I type this Nash is chasing Har in circle around the kitchen island, screaming "I already ate my lasagna!" while Har carries his plate of untouched lasagna in one hand and the pan of brownies in the other and replying to Nash's screams with, "You can have a brownie if you eat your lasagna."

Respect and devotion.

Disneyland in {almost} October

I love having Disneyland passes. It's been great to run down on occassions when we can spare a day from school and life. Monday was one of those happy days!

The whole place was decorated for Halloween - gorgeously carved pumpkins everywhere, the Haunted Mansion was all Nightmare Before Christmas-ed out, the air was cool, Nash was dressed all in orange....great way to kick off my favorite month.It didn't hurt that our hour plus wait in line for Splash Mountain was rewarded with Mom in the front seat, taking the brunt of the water damage and screaming like a girl. (Nash is in the back with Har you just can't see him...he was screaming like a girl, too.)

Love Thy Neighbor

Mike & Dejah came over after church for dinner and stayed for raucous fun. Mike "supervised" Emma making his chocolate chip cookie recipe. Oh, so yummy. How could you not love neighbors that will wrestle with your kids like this? They take all sorts of abuse and keep coming back for more. I love my neighbors!

Ward Family Feud

Last week our fantastic ward activities committee planned a fun game night. Our neighbor/friend/committee member asked Har if he would head up putting together a big ole Family Feud board. He, Papa & Mike Kellerman took a whole day, but the end product totally rocked!Watching family members compete against each other...is it a reflection of their home life?
Dedan, our fantastic host Garrison, and KarlieWarning: If you take pictures of yourself with my camera it will show up on my blog.

Pizza Night

I love making pizza at home. The kids love putting their own toppings on the pizzas, literally watching it bake, and enjoying the food they made themselves. I've experimented with store bought crusts (pre-made dough at Trader Joe's is the best), but I wanted to learn to make it myself. Conveniently, a sister in our ward recently taught a pizza making class in her home (Thanks, Valerie)!

With a little forethought (you've got to make the dough the night before), pizza night was family fun, delicious and pretty easy...and I'm hoping it will get easier as the rest of my family learns to roll out/toss the dough so I'm not doing all the work.

Thanks to Aunt Kay who was visiting for taking all the pictures...except I didn't get any pictures of her during the short visit - dang it! (Pesto mushroom pizza - my fave. Nobody else will eat it either)

Sick Kid

This morning Nash woke up feeling icky. Then he puked. Then he puked again...and again...it went on for a couple of hours. But somehow...I think he's feeling better now. This is a different kind of sick.

We won!

Better than trick-or-treating click here to see how we won these delicious cupcakes from my friend, Allison. Do you think Dedan was hungry?

(She threatened that I'd better not blog this picture but... we already ate the cupcakes. Love you!)

3 Projects & A Baptism

Project 1

This week Har and Papa had to rip up 30% of the kitchen counter tiles because ants were living in the broken grout {Gross}. Of course they had to re-lay said tiles once the problem was fixed. Papa stayed up all night Friday to finish in time for all our Saturday afternoon guests. Thanks, Papa!!!

Project 2

Dedan got a K-Nex toy for his birthday from Grandpa Santa - similar to legos but way more parts plus this one has a motor. Har & I took turns helping him over a couple of days but it got finished in time to be the moving centerpiece at his party on Saturday.

Project 3

This was the first knitting piece I finished (I'm still working on a cabled scarf for myself): a white & silver tie for Dedan to wear on his baptism day. There were many late night knitting sessions in order to finish it in time, but my handsome boy was worth every minute of it.

DEDAN'S BAPTISM!

My fantastic 8-year old chose to get baptized. The sentence alone brings tears to my eyes. Partly, because several times during the weeks before his baptism I gave him an out "If you 'hate' church then you shouldn't get baptized", "You know, bud, this is your choice", "The Bishop wants to interview you for baptism. Would you like to go talk to him?" Maybe that sounds strange to my fellow church members, but I needed Dedan to know he wasn't doing this to please me or Har, but he was doing it for himself. We had a talk about what it means to get baptized, what it means to receive the Holy Ghost, and how important those decisions are. My boy decided for himself.

See his proud parents (Har & I aren't normally ones to be all matchy, but we dressed separately and Dedan even picked out Har's shamrock tie. At least it isn't super obvious,right?).

The day was a whirlwind of wonderful. The morning was spent in preparation for the after party (is was quite a party). Our Vista guests arrived early (good traffic - yippee!), so we all got to the stake center in plenty of time (because I padded the time frame when speaking to those in my immediate household), took some pictures, and staked out our seats.

They ask the families to participate (of course) for the services, but I refused to speak since I could barely choke out the words to my talk when Emma was baptized 4 years ago. Emma stepped up and volunteered to sing When I Am Baptized. She called her two BFFs, Caitlyn & Amber, and asked them to sing with her. They did a beautiful job of representing our family. Here's my handsome, freshly baptized boy with his super amazing handmade tie standing in front of his own illustration of his baptism which he drew earlier this year.

I {heart} Dedan.

Congratulations, son!

Nash meets Dr. Chris

Nash in the chair at his first dentist appointment. He was a GREAT patient. Side note: 3 kids, no cavities! That was a first for us.