Thanksgiving

Caia making a crust for Great Grandma's Dutch Apple Pie.

Payton eating peels.

Caia peeling, slicing and coring apples for the pie.

Payton eating the peels almost as fast as Caia is peeling.

The table all set, we even had place cards this year!

(Only the best for our guests.)

Notice the fog setting in, we had

over 24 consecutive hours of a heavy fog.

Our last two weeks were good ones. Jolyn came and visited for the weekend (20-24). We enjoyed the start of my Christmas shopping in Spokane. For my birthday we started the day off with presents. Then I let the kids skip the morning of school and we went to the Breakfast club for breakfast. The girls love to go there for breakfast. We spent the day around the house, and that evening enjoyed prime rib at the Keusperts, (he was Marks 1st councilor for the first 2 years.) I picked up a chocolate pie at Costco for dessert. The girls sure got a kick out of all of those candles! Saturday we started some small gift crafts, hit a craft fair, and we topped off the evening with my friend Wendy at Twilight I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. I can't wait for the next one and now I'm reading them again!

Jolyn was off to the airport and I turned to Thanksgiving preparations. We had two families of 4, one of 6, 4 Elders and us. I have to admit that everything went like clockwork. After dinner us girls slipped out to the Thanksgiving Michael's sale. ( I had to get my $30.00 Cricut cartridges!) The last 3 days have been unusually quiet. Mark and I did hit a few sales Friday late morning. And attended a Friday night baptism for a convert in our ward. We were excited that Logan Finally took the plunge, she is 16 and was baptized by her 16 year old cousin it was a very special evening.

The girls are all in bed and we are looking forward to the Christmas break I enjoyed having everyone home and happy to play together. Thank you to all for the Birthday wishes.

Have a great week.

10 Things that make me smile!

OK I was tagged several weeks ago so here I go. I'm excited to take time to think about this.


10 thing that make me smile. ( Not in any particular order)


1. When Mark gets home and all the girls run to him yelling "Daddy"!


2. Listening to Elyse in the bath tub.


3. Watching Payton push every ones buttons. It can drive me crazy but at times I can't help but laugh.


4. When my girls leave for school, When my girls come home from school.


5. That Caia made her dad take her shopping for a birthday present and she wrapped it and it even has a great bow!


6. Mark, he can make me smile just by telling me that his whole world revolves around me, when in reality we all know our world revolves around him.


7. Knowing that even away from family that my Thanksgiving table is full, and getting to make Aunt Barbara's Stuffing. I love the smells while it's being made and I see in my minds eye her stirring that BIG bowl.


8. Remembering that my dad calls me "doda".


9. Elyse saying "it's just you and me kid" after we say good bye to the sisters.


10. When my girls snuggle up to read a Wrinkle in time. I'm amazed at both of their ability to see symbolism in this book.

OK I tag, Jackie S, Alisa S, Annie L,

A bit here and a bit there.

(This post refers to the first 2 weeks of November. )

Not much of a picture week, but some great things to remember.


Elyse: She likes me to snuggle by her at night "for 1 minute". So the other night I was snuggling by her and Payton was asleep already. She closed her eyes for a few seconds then opened them and says, "mom, it's so hard to make the sun come up." Life is amazing when your 3 and the sun rises and falls around you.


Payton: Currently she is into riddles. The other night she was making up riddles about our family members. Here is my favorite. "She is the best piano teacher ever!, she likes to snuggle me, she makes breakfast, and lunch, and dinner, who is it?" She also lost her top tooth, I'll have to get a picture of that one posted. It's so cute her last two teeth she had our friend and neighbor Nik Schwartz pull them. All last week she kept saying "it's a good thing Nik is coming over on Friday because this tooth is loose" How funny is that? No he has no gimmick, no tricks, he is just Nik and can do it! I love having such nice young men in our ward.

Caia: HHMMMM she is 9. Past the cute saying stage but dabbling in the art of sarcasm, and giving her mom the cold shoulder when we strongly disagree. Luckily not good enough at it that when I smother her with attention for it she cracks a smile and life is back to normal. She has such great friends, she and Emma Clark have been friends since they were 1! and Addi is such a cutie too. They are currently playing Little Women at recess. She is a great reader, Emma read Little Women and now Caia is working on it. I think I had better borrow it next and read it. She is getting ready for a Christmas Peter Pan where she is an Indian Dancer with her Celtic group.

Halloween

Emma Hansen, Caia, Payton, Spencer Banks, and Elyse

Payton and Lola decorating cookies, Elyse spilled on her costume so why not get comfy! My girls and their PJ's are inseparable.

Wow what a crazy Halloween season. With all of our little parties it felt like Christmas. After Payton's festivities it was Elyse's turn. It was our week to host our Joy School friends so that meant another Halloween party. The kids were so cute! The older girls were out of school so they were happy to be involved. We painted pumpkins, sang songs, ate more worms, and decorated yummy pumpkin cookies.

We have a fun little tradition with the Hansen's in our ward. We get together Halloween evening for soup and bread then the dad's take the kids Trick-or-Treating and we stay home and pass out candy, and chat. We invited our friends the Banks this year . This has to be the warmest Halloween ever. The kids wore a light sweatshirt and they didn't freeze! As for their costumes; Elyse switched costumes about 10 tens over the week. That night we took her down to the dress up box and that's what she came up with, although I think before she made it out the door she made a few more alterations to it. Payton too decided to change at the last minute, whatever! Life with 3 girls is always about going with the flow and a lot mind changing. What's important is that they had so much fun! ( Elyse is now telling everyone that next year she is going to be "a Super Hero". This post Halloween choice is her longest lasting decision, although I'm grateful for a whole year to figure out what on earth a super hero is to this 3 year old.)

Saturday was just as fun, the girls spent Wednesday night and all day Thursday gutting their rooms and cleaning so we their treat was High School Musical 3. Mark decided to "keep his man card" and volunteered to stay home with Elyse. I used to think there were way to many school holidays but I have grown to love our breaks, the girls are at such fun ages.