Fall Break in Idaho

Tyson passed his test last week by nothing short of a miracle!  So we headed up to Idaho with my family for fall break.  Tyson had to work Friday night so Easton went up earlier that day with Grandma and Grandpa Cook, Kennedi, and Collette.  Callan and I picked up Tyson from work around 8 and arrived at my Grandma's around midnight.  We woke up early in the morning to drive to Boise for the open house of the renovated Boise Temple.

It was a long drive!  Luckily the boys had a good nap!

We parked at a church and rode a shuttle to the temple.  That might have been the highlight of the trip for Callan.  "Bus!  Bus!"

 Easton was a stinker during the tour and required both mine and Tyson's attention.  Grandma and Grandpa held Callan up ahead of us but we could hear him throughout the tour: mooing at the baptistry and saying "lights!" in every other room.

 Pretty much sums up Easton...

My Great Aunt Laura and Uncle Dan came to the temple open house with us.  Following the open house, my mom, aunt, Grandma, and I went to a baby shower for my cousin Aleesa.  While we were gone, Aunt Laura graciously offered her house for the kids!  And by kids I mean kids and dads.  The dads sat and watched the BYU game while Aunt Laura entertained.  She let all the kids walk over to the neighbors and pick a pumpkin to paint.  They had so much fun!

Afterwards, all the men who were busy watching football had to scrub the paint off the wrought iron table!  It took a concoction of lighter fluid, acetone, rubbing alcohol, and a lot of elbow grease!

Callan helped clean the paint off the deck!

We were in love with Aunt Laura's beautiful big yard.  It was so good for the kids to run around and the weather was beautiful!

 The afternoon ended with some serious tackle football!

It was so great to see everyone. Easton absolutely loves his Idaho cousins.  Can't wait for Thanksgiving so we can see them again!

Conference Weekend

I'm kind of sad that conference weekend has already come and gone!  It was another great conference - although I did have a hard time with all the depressing talks about children dying and being abused!  I guess someone wants me to face the fact that that is the world we live in!  Other than all that - I thought it was great.  I especially enjoyed the talk about the honey bees.  The very best part of conference was when, for a few brief moments, my little family all snuggled together on the bean bag and listened quietly.  That's what it's all about!

Tyson woke up EARLY Saturday morning for the opening of the duck hunt.  He left for the lake at 3:30 AM!  Craziness.  He and Casey shot 3 ducks, but a hawk swooped down and took one (or so they say.)  I found the other two laying in the garage bleeding out their noses.  I didn't even know they had noses.  That didn't go well.  Tyson cooked them up for Max tonight.  He and Callan both tried some first and I think they liked it.

The rest of us woke up at 7 and got to babysit our neighbor's baby while they ran the Paws for the Cause race at our neighborhood park.  It was so sweet watching the boys take care of Arden.  Whenever she would cry Callan would point at her and say, "No!" just like he does to the dog.  Easton read her a story while I got Callan dressed and he felt like such a good helper.  We had a hard time getting things together to walk to the park and give her back to mom and dad.  At that point I was thinking there was no way I could handle three kids!  Looking back now it wasn't so bad.

The kids played at the park and I entered the raffle at the event to raise money for a boy in our ward's autism service dog training.  I won a gift card to Texas Roadhouse!  Woohoo!  I never win anything!  But more than anything it was fun to see everyone in the neighborhood united for a good cause.

We all got home just in time for conference and heard the announcement that the missionary age would be changed to 18.  My first reaction was, "No! That's one less year I have to spend with my babies!"  But really, I get that it will be good for the boys to leave right after high school.  Less time to get in to trouble, and maybe they won't have a year of horrible college grades that they have to make up when they get back...like someone I know... :)

One of my conference projects was rotating our 72 hour kits.  When we lived in Payson I signed up for 2 kits at a relief society activity.  I ended up having Easton that week so I didn't get to make them, but a nice sister in our ward brought them to me and I was so impressed!  Well that was 4 years ago!  And I had to throw out ALL this food because I hadn't rotated it since!  (Trust me, I tried some of it and it was NOT good!)  So my new goal is to rotate every fall conference.  Hopefully we can have a little picnic or something and eat our snacks from the year before.  That way I won't have to have any more melt downs while filling a whole garbage bag full of old food.

 Tyson worked Sunday so the boys and I went to my parents' for the first session.  It was nice having the girls to play with the boys so I could listen for a while.  We went home at noon and all had a nice long nap.  I got to watch the second session all by myself.  I mostly listened while I made these pumpkin spice cinnamon rolls.  They turned out so good!  I usually have baking mishaps so these must be fool proof!  We had some friends over Sunday night to eat them and drink crockpot apple cider.

Since Tyson passed his test Friday, he had the day off today.  He went duck hunting again this morning and was back in time to take Easton to football.  He got some good pictures and videos for me!

Callan is Easton's biggest fan.

Running it in for a touchdown!

Yay for Fall!

I love fall so much!  Almost as much as Christmas - but not quite.  Something about the crispness in the air and pumpkin spice candles just makes me happy. 

We celebrated the first official day of autumn with a little bbq in our backyard with some of our awesome neighbors.  We feel so lucky to live where we do!

The next day Tyson and I got to go to the broadcast for the Brigham City Temple Dedication.  It was so nice to be at church without kids!  And of course the dedication was nice, too.

The boys got to go see the witches at Gardner Village with Grandma and Aunties while I worked.  Easton has had some trouble with all the Halloween decor that is out everywhere we go.  It stems from a run in with a talking skeleton at Lowes.  Ever since then he won't go near the Halloween aisle at any store.  So he had a hard time warming up to the witches.  I asked him how it was and he said, "Those witches just FREAKED ME OUT!"  He also had some genuine concern for the witch that ran into the building.

 Tyson and Grandpa Page left Friday afternoon for the muzzle loader deer hunt.  Unfortunately (wink wink) they both woke up Saturday morning and realized they had forgotten their deer tags.  But they had a good time anyway.  They captured some lovely fall foliage and went fishing instead.

Since my friend Kristen and I were both deer widows, we decided to spend Saturday morning at Thanksgiving Point.  She needed to buy some tulips so we decided to do lunch at the deli there.  There was a huge pumpkin competition while we were there!  It was so fun to see all the giant pumpkins.  The one we saw on the scale weighed in at 500 pounds!  After lunch we treated ourselves to a delicious brownie sundae.  It was a great time!

 Today Easton started Itty Bitty Football!  Meet the newest member of the New England Patriots!

He had some serious hesitation about doing football.  I had to calm him down this morning and talk it out and we finally uncovered the root of the problem - he was afraid of being tackled by 300 pound men.  Once he got there he realized everything was going to be ok. :)

Here's a little video just for fun.