light the corners of my mind

Halloween has made me remember the last time I dressed up for anything. I hate dressing up. I was so self-conscious when I was a kid that I always a cheerleader-or almost always. That way everyone would know who I was and no one would have to ask me.

But I discovered in my fabulous college days that dressing up is fun...as long as I have a posse to join in with. And remembering that made me miss my girls. So much! So here's an all-embarrassing blast from the past. (Hope this is okay with you girls!) It's been 10 years since we graduated. What do you think...Reunion time????

Papa and Gaga

Thanks for coming to visit, Papa and Gaga. We had such a great time. We miss you. We love you!!

new duds

Lucy got a new, adorable dress. It was described as hippie, Mexican, and Pocahontas. Whatever she looks like-she's adorable.

bruises and bath time

Can you see the 2 bruises on her jaw bone? She fell off the arm of the couch. Onto power tools. Well, onto a case for power tools. There was an even bigger one on her collar bone. So sad! But she recovered quickly and completely forgot about them in a few minutes. She's helping me out!

actual halloween

Sick of seeing pictures of my kids in costume yet? Well this is the last one...I think. Here's us getting ready to go trick or treating.

Here's our Hermione once again. She loved all of our decorations this year and each time we went to any store during the Halloween season she asked if she could buy more decorations. This pumpkin was her favorite. Sometimes she drops the S at the start of her words so she would always talk about our 'pooky pumpkin.' Too cute.
And our adorable Ewok. Never been a cuter one.

Even cute with the binkie.

Here's the skeleton we made at Lucy's party. She wanted to pose by it.

"Trick or Treat. Smell my feet. Give me something good to eat."

Enough pictures. Now let's go trick or treating!!!

We got to go trick or treating with Lucy's BFF in her new neighborhood. (Daddy helped move them in earlier in the day.)
Our post-trick-or-treating tradition is to raid our goodies and watch a Halloween movie. This year: It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.

Alright. That's it for Halloween. I promise. Well, I think that's it....

happy happy birthday, Lucy dear

We decided to have a Halloween-themed birthday party for Lucy this year. She got to choose who she wanted to invite and luckily for me, she only wanted 4 kids to come. 5 kids total, I think I can manage that! We had such a great time and luckily my mom was here and one of the moms stuck around so I had lots of helping hands--otherwise I would have needed a few copies of myself to get everthing done. Birthday parties are hard and a ton of work. How come no one mentioned this to me before? Next year, either no party or we're going to McDonalds playspace.

The scene is set.

Set up for craft...check (they made their own trick or treat bags)

Pin the Ghost in the Haunted House...check

The Penny Game...check

Cake decorated...check

Here we go!!!

In costume...check. What's the fun of a Halloween party without the costumes?

Tanner's BFF came to the party. He's such a lucky guy!

We headed out back to find bones that were hidden in the backyard (thank goodness for great weather!!). Then inside, we matched the bones onto a drawing of a skeleton.

We played gourd basketball.

We ate dinner.

We played the Penny game--an old favorite from Ty's youth.

We had cake!

We tried and tried and to go downstairs into the spooky, haunted alley, but our fogger we bought set off the smoke detectors-twice. Guess we didn't learn our lesson the first time. After all the high-pitched beeping stopped, we could finally head downstairs. One of the kids when up to my dad and said, "I hear something." Yep. The whole neighborhood is probably hearing something. The spook alley was Ty's idea and he did a great job! The kids loved it and luckily no one was scared.

First stop, Spider Alley

Then Ghost Junction

Then they went trick-or-treating in Lucy's cardboard house. There was a ghost rigged above the door of the house and it dropped on the kids as they entered the house.

It was a fun day! We had a blast and we hope our friends did too! Happy Birthday, Lucy! We love you so much!!

everyone's doing it

The Halloween Post. Everyone's doing it. I'm excited to post all of our Halloween festivities, though. We had a great holiday and made it last all week long!! We wore our orange shirts as much as we could during the week. We also got a lot of use out of our costumes with Trunk-or-Treat at the church, Lucy's birthday party which was Halloween themed, and then Halloween day itself.

Here's us getting ready for Trunk-or-Treat:

Her Hermione hair-do.

Our little Ewok.

(Just in case you were wondering, the socks are authentic. I'm just sure of it.)

Year 3-still Hermione. At the last minute she thought she wanted to be someone else, but we decided to stick with Hermione and try something new next year.

Decorating cookies at the Trunk-or-Treat.

Lucy's BFF...complete with cookie crumbs.

That was one yummy cookie.

I was told not to post this-just don't tell C's daddy!!

We carved and decorated 6 pumpkins.

Lucy's jack-o-lantern.

It's dark, but she's there. Hanging with the pumpkins.

We had a great week-hope you did too!

just can't get enough

Another day in Wildwood Park. We took a picnic dinner and had fun exploring...again! We just love it there!

I'm really into reflections right now.

T: 9 months (+1 day) old

Here's some info about our world's cutest boy:

His 2 bottom teeth have finally inched their way through his gums.

He crawls everywhere.

He's already into mischief.

He can't stop smiling when I pull out the camera.

He thinks this game is the funniest thing he's ever seen.

(Don't you love my adorable family in their matching Sunday argyle?)

He has amazing hand-eye coordination. Seriously, he can already catch things.

Lucy loves to play with him and will get down on the ground and say, 'Follow me, Tanner.' or 'Tanner, come here!' I think they will both love it when he can actually follow her commands.

He loves to watch television-especially anything with music or dancing. Animation doesn't hurt either. He'll even try to see around something that's in his way (usually me).

He's not going to be Superman for Halloween.

pandapas pond

After Stake Conference a couple of weeks ago we were invited to a picnic with another family in the ward. We had a great time and loved finding a new, fun, beautiful place around here! Lucy had such a blast playing with the boys, playing with sticks, and feeding ducks.