November

And the chaos begins! I love the holiday season, but I hate the stress that comes along with it. This is the second year that we have gone to the Phoenix zoo for thanksgiving. Guess what- the zoo is dead on thanksgiving day, very few people are there. It sure beats cooking in a hot kitchen all day. And it was overcast and beautiful weather the whole time. Uncle Drew and Grama Lene were with us, so it was extra fun.













Arlene's sister Suzanne was here for a few days, they sure loved being with the babies, and the babies sure liked being held.

I always end with the most recent picture of Jasper and Jayden. Jayden on the right, Jasper left. They love playing with their little toes-ees.

Fun stuff

I leave Maysa alone with Jayden for 2 minutes and this is what I find..... Poor little guy, he is already being subjected to sibling cruelty.... :)


This was a fun family home evening project. Maysa picked the color- "cotton candy blue", it is very bright and cute!





My sister had these beautiful flowers delivered for my birthday last week, aren't they great! The girls loved watching the lilies pop open every day.


Maysa took this cute little picture of Jasper, seriously great picture, she needs to sneak the camera more often.... mmmmm maybe not


And more of my handsome brown eyed devils....


They keep me up all day... AND all night...

...but their cuteness forgives them.

~Apple Annies~

Well fall break is just about over and we've had so much fun. After coming back from Emerald cove we took a few days off at home then we went to Wilcox for a couple days. We stayed with the Allreds, who use to live in our town but moved out to their own little slice of heaven a couple years ago. They live in the boonies on a beautiful acreage with huge groves of magnificent pecan trees. It was so nice and peaceful there. The climate is also much milder there. We really miss the Allreds, they are such a fun and sweet family. On Saturday morning we all went to Apple Annies for breakfast and apple picking. We ate all you can eat pumpkin pancakes with apple cider syrup. And yes, it is actually more delicious than it even sounds. Then we went for a wagon tour around the orchards, it was beautiful. We then spent the afternoon at Jared's parents house, the kids had lots of fun playing in the yard and playground. Then we went out to the corn maze and pumpkin patch. By then the sun was going down so it was nice and cool inside the maze. The babies loved the stroller ride but Melanie had an eventful time chasing after her two year old in the 12 foot high maze. After conquering the maze we had just enough time for the girls to pick out their very own halloween pumpkin. I have to say what a fun time we had, we hope to come back real soon.


There were no apples left on the trees to pick, except for maybe one or two old ones.

Sierra did manage to find this nice one, it still tasted ok actually.

The babies do so well when we are out and about, they like the excitement. This was on the tractor tour and it was kind of sunny for them.


The kids liked the tractor tour, but they had to be told at least twice to "SIT DOWN" very firmly by the grumpy old man that was driving.

Here we are eating homeade apple crumble and pumpkin icecream. I liked the apple kind better. It was SOOOOOOO delicious!


Elena is making jump ropes from a rope twister.

Elena and the other girls used their ropes to jump but of course Grant and Davey used theirs as a lasso

This is Maysa on the "firehorse" as she called it, at the Allred farm.


The Allred farm was really fun, Dan had fun taking the kids for a ride on the 4 wheeler trailer.

Maysa and Davey played with this little frog for over an hour.


The pumpkin patch was HUGE, the field seemed to go on forever, and then there was some buildings, and then another field that went on and on and on. You would be hard pressed not to find a perfect pumpkin every ten seconds in this patch.


This corn maze is especially impressive. We decided to take the advanced tour and came out pretty well in the end. At halfway is the circular sun, I thought we were done, but the corn cop came along and said we're not even half. It is supposedly the biggest corn maze in Arizona, which is easy to believe.


It was a grand tour, I loved it. We had to answer questions about agriculture and corn to advance and make the right turns, we only messed up a couple times I think. I'm not really sure because I was at the tail end pushing my massive stroller enjoying the nice cool air breezing through the 12 foot stalks. The babies really liked it too, was a tad bumpy but they didn't make a peep the whole time.



I would encourage you to make the two hour trip from CG for this place, it was really a fun day. I think we'll be going back for peach season next summer!

October Beach Vacation

October is always a fun month for us... there's conference, fall break, and somewhat cooler weather. The girls got their first progress reports back from school. I am so happy with their efforts. Elena got straight A's and was put on the Principals Pride list, Sierra also did very well. Except for math, she got a C, a rough start, but only because at Legacy they are a year ahead in math, so she was expected to jump right into 4th grade math, when she is only in 3rd grade. However the school does free tutoring so after 5 weeks of tutoring she went from a 37 percent on her first test to a 100 percent on her 5th test and she has been getting A's ever since. Its too bad those first couple tests tanked her grade. I can't say enough great things about Legacy traditional school, I am so happy with it.
For five days we went to our favorite vacation spot- Emerald Cove rv resort along the Colorado river. Its always warm there because its along the sun belt. We usually stay at a rental rv along the beach, but this time we felt like a we needed a cabin instead. With a family of 7 afterall!! The cabins are tiny but we could put up a tent on the deck and the kids had a blast sleeping out there. We met our good friends Russ and Tanya Johnson there, they rented a cabin right beside us. Our kids are the same age, so they play and play together, its so much fun.
















We go to emerald cove about 2 or 3 times a year. October is one of the best months cause its not too hot or cold. We spent alot of time at the kids club making crafts, playing pingpong and shuffleboard, playing at the playground, swimming pool and the beach. The babies liked swimming, but the water was a bit colder than at home. Dan and the kids always do the swim races on Saturday and they end up winning anywhere from 10 to 20 dollars of resort money everytime. So we always buy a huge lunch at the pool cafe after. The river water was much colder than I remember, everyone had fun jumping off the dock, but I hardly put a toe in this year. We usually take our bayliner boat so the kids can tube and waterski but obviously with the babies thats not possible, so maybe next year. We just got home, but I'm already thinking of when we can go back!