Pumpkin Carving

After a long week away at a conference I returned home just in time for our annual pumpkin carving party at Grandma’s house. Katie had a particularly long week and was probably a little overwhelmed to have her “4th child” back home. Ben and Kallie both had their Halloween parties at school on Friday and we also got to see Ben in the school’s Halloween parade. This year marked a first in that we didn’t have a different costume for each child for each different Halloween event. Everybody just had one costume and we stuck with it.

This year Ben was a dead pirate, Kallie was a beautiful witch, and Andrew was a fireman. Ben didn’t think his makeup was scary enough until we got to Grandma’s and one of my cousin’s kids started screaming. He had to wash it off and pretty much apologize to his mom for having demanded scarier makeup. As per tradition the kids picked out their own pumpkins:

The hard part done we just had to carve three pumpkins. This year went a lot smoother with all three kids actually helping and caring about it and mom scooping out all the guts. Andrew in particular was not about to let this experience pass without personally removing as many pumpkin innards as possible.

Grandma and Aunt SaraAnn made fresh donuts for the carving crew.

Papa worked hard too.

The best family shot of the night (out of 20).

Or maybe it was this one....

The Final Results

Our last fun pumpkin carving at Grandma’s house for the foreseeable (yes, that’s really how you spell it apparently) future.

Please HELP!!!

VOTING ENDS TOMORROW!!!!!

Most of you have already gotten an email from me about this…..but KEEP reading! My friend Tecia in is a contest to win a new couch. Here is her story in her own words:

Entry #51 by Tecia in Provo, UT
This is our ?Scary Couch? we received this from my Mom 4 years ago and were so grateful to get it. We needed a couch and couldn’t afford a new one.
In May of last year my husband was diagnosed with a Brain Tumor. After he was released from the hospital he started Radiation, and Chemotherapy he got so sick and would be up all night. He ended up sleeping on the couch, where it was more comfortable. He then ended up getting vertigo and he would sleep on the couch to be closer to the floor where, when he fell he wouldn’t get hurt as bad as off the bed! As you can see it has been used and abused and is quite ScAry we would LOVE to get a new couch and put his cancer and the couch behind us.

I know most of you have already voted…but when I checked this morning she was in second place by a mere 7 or 8 votes. So could you please send your friends, family, co-workers, husband, wife, kids, neighbors, ward members….ANYONE to go and vote for Tecia? Please Please Please! You only need a name, and an email address!!!

Go here: www.rcwilley.com click on the right hand side under scariest couch contest and find #51, TECIA, Provo, ut. If any family needs a new couch…it’s THIS one!

Thanks everyone!

Candy Anyone?

Last week I had the rare opportunity of accompanying Ben on a field trip. The class went to Vineyard Nursery’s Pumpkin Land which Katie covers in a previous post. While there I noticed a bucket of habanero peppers for sale so I bought a handful. They were sitting on the counter in a plastic bag when Ben came home from school.

Since Ben isn’t nosy and doesn’t steal candy from other people he naturally opened the bag and decided to chomp on the brightly colored shiny contents. Aside from the fact that the kid literally got a taste of hell, let me tell you why this was funny: Ben does not put food in his mouth, much less questionable and unknown food.

Everybody can be eating some wonderful and delectable desert and Ben will not even taste it. He will only eat ego waffles, kix, and german pancakes (dutch babies). Yet he will pick a tack out of the bottom of his shoe and suck on it while walking around, clean rocks with his tongue, and put just about every non food item in his mouth. So the fact that he came home and popped anything in his mouth that he thought was meant to be eaten is something of a mystery. Luckily, he was smart enough to realize there was something very wrong as pepper juice started to spray his mouth and he didn’t even get a real bite off. He was still bawling though.

So I turned these puppies into poppers and made it through 7 of them. Then I thought about it and realized that was three and a half peppers. Who sits down and eats 3.5 habaneros? Then I thought, “that’s stupid” and ate one more to make it even. I had a couple of more with my pizza for dinner.

My mother in law walked in the kitchen while the poppers were sitting there on a plate and had one… he he he.

Princess Tea Party

Grandma is always doing fun stuff for my kids. Earlier this week we got a invite in the mail to attend a “Princess Tea Party” with instructions to come dressed as a princess. Kallie was so excited! Our little friend L—joined us this morning and off we went to Grandmas!

Andrew, not one to be left out, wanted to dress up too. He got all ready to go….in Princess attire. Thankfully a quick thinking Kallie reminded me we had our dress up/halloween stuff out so we quickly talked up cowboys, hats, vests, boots, etc. and changed Andrew’s mind from princess to cowboy.

Caden and Andrew enjoying the tea party setting up process…

II could not get over how adorable the set up was! She has little tea party plates, favors, tea cups (which we had to refill at least a thousand times. The girls thought it was so fun to drink out of a cup that only gives one swallow! Why don’t they make those things bigger!??!?!), and just all around cuteness!

The girls enjoying their party

Our friend L--

We are working on a more flattering smile. Just not fast enough…(see pictures below)

Caden and Andrew were feeling a little left out. So quick thinking Grandma got them a tea party going! They couldn’t be happier! They too liked those little, little cups to drink out of. Then they discovered the tea pot and I swear they just downed one cup so they could us the tea pot to fill it back up again!

I love this smile!

The boys realizing that the girls set up was a little more decked out than theirs

Miss. Ava finally joined in the fun! The girls loved pouring her tea and giving her all their

All our princesses needed an individual shot! Aren’t they adorable!

I have been informed by Kallie and L—that we really should do this everyday. They had so much fun! Grandma is amazing and so talented! She made all these things and you can download them on her website at Parties and Patterns to do your own tea party for your girls! I know we are now having one at least once a week (Kallie drives a hard bargain!) Thank you thank you thank you for such a fun party Grandma!!!

Pumpkinland

Benjamin’s class went to Pumpkin Land yesterday on a field trip. He was so excited to go he had a hard time falling to sleep the night before! Thanks to our amazing neighbor, J, Chris and I were both able to go and take a group of boys around. In our group we had T—who has been Ben’s best friend since they day they were born, and two kids I hadn’t met yet. They were so easy and fun to take around. I am loving this age!

Right before we started the corn maze. I know these are supposed to be fun, but honesty I HATE them! So I’m so glad Chris went with me :)

We found a Mickey Mouse pumpkin and both T—and Ben wanted to take a picture of it for Andrew.

Love this shot of the boys walking around! We live in such a beautiful place!

Chris helping Ben find the “perfect” pumpkin.

All in all I thought Pumpkinland was ok. The boys had such a great time, but to be honest I don’t think I would pay $4.00 a person to go there. If I’m going to go to a pumpkin patch I think I would just pay a little more, drive a little further, and go to Cornbelly’s. Pumpkinland had a few things for the kids to do, but it was so crowded with school trips (which they said they do everyday) that you really couldn’t enjoy it because you were always running around trying to find your own kids in the flood of hundreds. All in all I’m glad we were able to go and have this fun time with Ben and his class. We had such a fun day!