Halloween Festivities

Here are a few things we did this Halloween season.  First, we went to the pumpkin patch and picked a nice, big pumpkin to carve.

(I'm not really sure why the kids have a fascination with covering their mouths when I take pictures of them, but it happens a lot lately).

The next morning started off great, so we decided to go ahead and carve it.

It was fun.  Especially the part when the kids refused to put their hands inside the pumpkin.  So they helped liked this:

I just love Ali's face - it says it all.  "Seriously?  That's gross."

But in the end, they really loved it.

We made some spooky eyeball treats out of donuts and gummy lifesavers that the kids loved, too.  (Again, with the mouth...?)

On Halloween we had dinner at our house with the cousins and made some fun food to eat.  We had mummy hot dogs and witch finger cookies.

After dinner, it was time to get dressed up and go trick-or-treating!  This was Ali's first year actually going up to the door and getting candy.  It was fun... all 10 houses she went to.  After that, Aunt Jana and Aunt Lorrie just carried her.  Thanks!

I was pretty happy with how their costumes turned out.  I ended up sewing the strips of fabric onto a white shirt and some pants, then letting them soak for about 10 minutes in black tea.  I think it did the job nicely!  Here's all the cousins and then a little trick-or-treating.

And to top it all off, the moon that night was a PERFECT Halloween moon!

Utah

Yikes.  Ok, so I've been home for 3 weeks now, but I've been spending every night working on the kids' Halloween costumes or stuff for my calling or other pressing matters.  So, here it is - our trip to Utah!

We spent a week with my mom and a week with my dad.  Both my parents took time off work and that was really nice.  Especially being pregnant and not being used to having help with the kids (that happens when your husband is gone 16 hours of the day), it was great to have someone else pitch in and then make dinner, too.  :)

So, with my mom we...

Froze.  We were actually cold pretty much the whole trip.  Cade was excited to be able to finally wear his "sock jammies" as Ali calls them.  Ali on the other hand... well... just refused to wear clothes.

Made suckers.  The flavors?  Bubble gum and "hushmellow."

Held "baby" Kenzie.  My sister's daughter is only 7 months younger than Ali, but Ali really loved to "mother" her the whole time we were there.

Went to Kangaroo Zoo.  The kids loved jumping on all the blow-up toys they had there.  Cade especially loved flying at the speed of light down the gigantic slide.

Spent the weekend at my grandparent's house.  Cade went with my grandpa out on the 4-wheeler to take their dog out one morning.  Again, it was cold.

Here's Cade with his favorite dog, Rebel.  Or as he says it, "Ravel."

We had a ton of fun that weekend.  Ali spent as much time as she could upstairs in the "princess" room having tea parties.  I was able to do our family pictures and was pretty excited with how well they turned out -- especially considering we had 23 people to all get to look at the camera and smile at the same time.  :)  But to see those, you'll have to check out my photo blog.  When I get them up.

Here's my wonderful grandparents-

and here's a pretty good shot of my sister, my mom and me

We also went to the dinosaur park.  I just love Ali's smile in this one -

And this is when she stood on the dinosaur that she was able to conquer by climbing up on it's back (she's showing you her muscles)-

I also got to visit with some of my good friends from school growing up.  It was so nice to see them!

Hannah (newly married!), me, Heather and my sister

I was also able to go to my cousin's wedding while I was there (which is really why I was there - 2 family weddings within a week of each other.  It was great they could plan it that way).  Congratulations to Kevin and Rose!

The next week with my dad was spent mainly in Oregon.  Or in the car, rather, driving to Oregon for my aunt's wedding.  The kids did much better than I thought they would.  Between coloring, snacking, watching movies and the occasional pit stop, we made it in one piece.  Being pregnant while driving so much wasn't great and I learned why the dr. tells you to stop every few hours and walk around.

The wedding was a lot of fun and staying in a hotel is always fun for me.  Who doesn't love not having to clean up after themselves?  I especially enjoyed just being able to share a room with my sister and having late night hot chocolate that we swiped from the lobby after the kids finally went to sleep.

I was the photographer at the wedding (which was great - thanks again!) and it looks Ali will be following right in my footsteps.  They had disposable cameras for everyone to take some pictures and she took right to it.  Too bad her fingers were too short to actually take a picture.

I already posted some pictures from the wedding on my photo blog, so you can check them out there.

It was really a nice vacation.  We were ready to go home and see Tyler... and when I say "we" I mean Ali and me.  Cade told me on the plane home that he did not want to come back to Georgia yet.  "Don't you miss Daddy?" I asked.  "No.  He is in my heart.  When people are in my heart, I don't miss them."  I thought it was a pretty sweet thing to say.  For the books, he's in my heart, too.  But I still missed him.

Photo Blog

I have finally started a photography blog where you can see my latest work.  Please check it out and let me know what you think!

http://aprilmitchell.blogspot.com/

Pictures Worth a Thousand Words

Due Date: March 29, 2010

A Pretty Girl and some Eggs

Two things happened recently.  The first happened Sunday as we were getting ready for church.  While I was putting on my make up, Ali decided she wanted to be "pretty," too, so I would pretend to put make up on her.  As I finished up with mascara, I pretended to put some on her.  She promptly took the closed mascara and left the room, which she often does.  She can't open it.  Or so I thought.

A few minutes later Cade yelled from his room, "Mom!  Come look at Ali!"  Thinking she was climbing on the bed I said, "Ok - just a minute!"  A few minutes later came another reminder to go look at her.  So I did and this is what I saw --

Thankfully, the damage was minimal.  She kept it mostly on her face and only got a little on the bed and her clothes.  I was just glad it was Stake Conference so we had a little more time to get ready than usual, especially since Tyler was working.

On another note, we went out yesterday morning to feed and water the chickens.  We've been expecting eggs for about a month now and check for them almost every day.  Just as we were wondering if we've been doing something wrong, the kids and I found this:

                            

We are so excited!!!  I thought Cade was going to start turning cartwheels, he was so happy.  Hopefully there will be a lot more to come!

And The Mother of the Year Award Goes To...

So most of you know that I've been doing "pre-k" at home with Cade.  It has been going wonderfully.  We usually focus on letters and practicing writing them.  Cade has been learning so much and I've been so thrilled with his progress.  In fact, the other day we were practicing the letter "R" and he decided to write it on his own without tracing mine first.  He did it perfectly and then decided he wanted to write the word "STOP."  (He knows how to spell it because he likes to point out every single stop sign we come to and shout, "S-T-O-P!") He just sat there and wrote it.  We haven't practiced S or T or O or P.  He just did it.  I was shocked.  It was a day that I felt like I was doing a great job at this "teaching my children" stuff.

Like I said, most days we do letters.  Some days we do other things, like learning about plants.  Or like the other day when we learned about hot and cold and how that can affect water.  I thought a great lesson for that would be to make some Jell-o.  Ali was not tired at all, so I thought she could stay up a little longer before she went down for her nap and help us.  We started off by putting a bunch of ice cubes in a pot, then turning on the burner and watching the ice melt, then boil and turn to steam.  I don't know how many times I emphasized that the burner was HOT and to never, ever touch it.  So far, so good.  Both Cade and Ali stayed away from it.  I even showed them my nasty burn I just gave myself last week reaching in the oven.

We poured in the Jell-o mix and they took turns stirring.  As it was nearly dissolved, I took the last turn to make sure it was ready to pour in our pan.  As I did, Ali was convinced it was still her turn and, being the stubborn girl she is, reached out to hit something in her anger.  Of course, it had to be the scalding burner.  Thankfully, she only got two of her fingers.  I immediately ran her over and put her hand under cool, running water, then put the Jell-o in the fridge.

A few hours later she still sat with her hand in a cup of water, refusing to take it out.  I had planned on making some bread, so while the kids watched a movie (Cade was getting sick and spent the next day puking), I started the bread.  Soon it was time to make dinner and since the kids had had a rough day, I planned on putting them to bed early.  I got the bread dough in the pans and was on the last step of letting it rise.  We ate dinner, but Ali still refused to take her hand out of the water.  I knew she couldn't sleep like that, so we ran out to the store to get some burn soothing cream.

By the time we got back and I got the kids in bed, I realized I completely forgot about my bread.  It had risen an hour longer than it should have.  I went ahead and baked it, and it tastes fine.  Other than the fact it is about 2 inches tall.  The top was so enormous that the whole loaf just completely squashed.

So, to sum it up - Ali got an incredible lesson about hot and cold, my husband got flat bread to attempt making sandwiches with, and Cade spent the next day watching movies all day while vomiting.  

You Know Who You Are

...and hopefully you read our blog.  While reading my scriptures tonight, I came across this and thought of you.

 To our good Samaritans - Luke 14:14