This picture is how I felt pretty much the entire October. We had general conference, fall break, Arizona State Fair, Temple Open House, Halloween and a lot more! Here is pretty much our month.
You know you live in Arizona, when you sit down at the computer and see a lizard on the INSIDE of the window. I was able to get it outside safe.
Thomas was laughing so hard one night we told him not to laugh for a minute and he barely made it.
The kids love watching Dad's football with him. Here is team just scored a touchdown!
For General Conference, my brother came down and made his gingerbread house replica of the Phoenix Temple. Grandma helped him.
Grandpa enjoying the Sunday paper.
Rebecca with pony.
Also over conference weekend, we switched cell phone plans and put my parents on with us. That meant they had to get new phones. They both got new iPhones and have spent the month learning how to use them. Here is John teaching mom how to send a text message with a picture attached.
Rebecca built a train out of gingerbread scraps.
On Monday, the boys got their items ready for the Arizona State Fair. We had leftover cupcakes, so Rebecca got to decorate a few. She put on pink marshmallows!
We were able to catch a beautiful sunset one night.
Rebecca loved it because it made everything pink!
Here is the finished Phoenix temple with my brother and mom. A lot of love went into this project!
Here were my boys submissions to the fair. We scaled back this year and it was a lot easier for me to manage.
With fall break, we went to a museum one day. It was a kids museum, so I let Jonathan bring a book. He was able to find a spot to sit and read at least.
Puppet show!
Creating Art
Thomas wrote me a note. It said, "I love you mom! Thomas"
Thomas loved building with all these different blocks.
Making crafts from recycled materials.
Jonathan finally found something that perked his interest. They had a tv that had a puzzle that was timed. Jonathan was in it for the time factor.
More crafts...
Jonathan had Taylor come over and help him so they could improve their time.
Rebecca also enjoyed playing with the blocks. What you don't see are how many kids were actually there. Because it was fall break, and there was a Groupon available, and other various discounts, it became so crowded, that after an hour I had to tell the kids I was done. It was too chaotic for me and my stress levels were rising.
On Thursday, I took the three kids to the Zoo. There were a good amount of crowds there too, but not as bad since the zoo is large. We were able to see the animals the each one wanted to see.
Thomas - giraffe
Rebecca- anything pink
Thomas was also our official map reader. He did a good job too!
Rebecca - monkey
It is getting harder to take pictures of these kids without having one or more pull a funny face on me.
Point taken. We had a great time!
The last day of fall break, they had a sale on John's suits at Dillard's clearance center. We were there the weekend prior and John found a suit he wanted. at 60% off, I went down and picked it up. Overall we saved 84% off the retail price! This cutie came with me.
Friday night, we were getting ready to go on a date and Thomas said he could not find a pencil. The one he had got stuck in the pencil sharpener. So I had to take it apart and we found this:
I still am baffled that he thought he could sharpen this.
Saturday we went to the fair to see the kids items. Thomas got an honorable mention for his Christmas ornaments.
My brother pulled the purple rosette best in show for his temple.
Thomas got 2nd on his Snickerdoodles.
Jonathan got 1st on brownies.
All 3 boys got 1st place on their needlepoint.
Taylor got 2nd on his fudge.
Thomas got 2nd on his cupcakes.
Taylor got 3rd on his car.
Now that we looked at the awards, they were ready for some fun!
We lucked out with a pink teacup!
I took the older boys and they did a roller coaster ride.
Then they rode this swing.
Their third ride was the log ride.
Break time!
We saw the animals and the baby chickens!
Rebecca rode a train
Thomas ended up doing 3 fun houses. He loved them!
This was at the end. We were hot, tired and ready for a nap!
We surprised the boys the following week when we found a deal (finally) on a minivan. We took Taylor & Thomas and picked it up. All we heard was "This van is so awesome!"
Give a girl some apples...she does this-
We had the blessing to go through the open house of the new Phoenix Temple. We got to ride in tour buses prior to going on the temple grounds. Here we are waiting for them.
This was our bus!
On the bus.
They played a short movie that explained the importance of temples.
So pretty!
Here we are after our tour.
Ok...so this next picture will not make sense unless I explain what is going on. I have not felt well this month. In fact, it has been a horrible month as far as pain and symptoms. I have had severe intestinal cramping, MS like symptoms with pain and nerves. Emotions have been all over and on top of that I am just exhausted!
I went to see my nutritionist and she poked me and we were able to see Lyme bacteria in my blood. In addition to that, we came across this beauty - it is a bunch of crystals that were floating in my blood. The round circles are red blood cells. We are still not sure what that was. She has done this for 15+ years and has never seen Lyme or this. I took a picture so we would have it for the future.
Side note- it was very surreal to actually see this in my blood. Kind of one of those you are not sure how to feel about it. Looking at something that has turned your world upside down.
Taylor came with me to Costco and we saw these giant Minnie Mouse dolls. He wanted to dance with it for Rebecca.
Rebecca loves to exercise with her daddy. She is really good at it too!
They had this at the library. Very cute!
John and I went to see Colbie Caillet at the State Fair. It was a great concert and we loved it! We took others advice and got reserved seats. We were in row 4, in the middle!
Great time!
I know they try to keep coming up with ways to deep fry items, but Deep Fried Coffee?
We got home late from the concert and Rebecca ended up coming into our room that night. I told her just to go lay down on the ground. It is a good thing I did because apparently she cut her hair just before coming in.
To say I was a tad frustrated was an understatement. This was after a week of one thing after another with her. She wrote all over the couch, table, walls, banister, books, cut books...seriously it was one mess after another!
I took her to get her hair cut. She looked cute coming out, even if she did not get a pink ball from the machine. (It was orange.)
And here is her hair!
Even after that, I earned Mother of the Year when I found this pink pumpkin for Rebecca!
Rebecca had her pre-school Halloween party on Thursday. She was Cinderella and mom got to come the entire time!
They did a parade.
Took pictures
Then they divided into groups and went to 5 stations.
I promise she had fun.
Jonathan decided he wanted to be Steve from Minecraft. I was able to make this for him.
On Halloween, we went to the boys school and found Taylor.
Then we watched as our Captain America was in the parade.
We went to Daddy's work and she looked more like Sleeping Beauty vs. Cinderella.
Here are pictures before we went to our neighborhood block party.
Jonathan (13) Steve from Minecraft, Taylor (11) Ironman, Thomas (7) Captain America, Rebecca (3) Cinderella.
Dad took the two younger ones out and they were only gone for an hour. This is what they got in an hour.
They took over handing out candy. I think they enjoyed that more than going door to door. They told everyone "Nice costume", and "Happy Halloween" Oh and..."Please take just 1."
Taylor and Jonathan got home at 9 and dumped their bags. They got quite the sugar load as well:
I love how they sorted all their candy and then traded.
October was a good month. It really was a blur.
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