It has been forever since I have written! I have composed like 4 blog posts in my head since the last time I posted, I just never quite get to the computer with them. 🙂

I wanted to share some more of how our autumn went!

Josh outdid himself for Halloween this year! (I think he outdoes himself every year.) He made a big interactive game which was projected on our garage and had all kinds of other decorations to add to the atmosphere! Josh was dressed as a ghost. The black light made it super cool!

Originally, our plan was to do a family costume where we were all Sofia the First characters. But in September, Carter decided he needed to be Olaf, and I got lazy about mine and Josh’s theme costumes, so we had Sofia, Amber, and Olaf. They were all super cute!

I decided, in honor of Halloween, to let the kids eat whatever they wanted after 6:00. We had SO much fun devouring candy, cupcakes, and cookies after trick-or-treating! There’s something special about letting loose as a mom. Usually I have to be the responsible one who tells everyone to eat their vegetables and clean up their toys, so it was fun to let them go for whatever they wanted for an evening!

 

Then, after about 2 hours of taking things down, Halloween was over. So it was time to morph the mantel from Halloween autumn to Thanksgiving autumn.

The week after Halloween Mother and Daddy took us on a trip! (It was our Christmas gift from last year!) We all went to Vernal to see and learn about all things dinosaur! It was really cool to visit the quarry and other museums! The kids’ favorite part was, as always, the hotel room and hotel pool. It was especially fun for them to do it with Grandmother and Grandpa!

We had some really beautiful days in November! We went to the park a few times and also played in the back yard more. Here’s the kids enjoying the swings at the park.

 

Then our lovely autumn turned to winter literally overnight. I love seeing the changing seasons at the pond. Did you all know we have a pond in our back yard? This is the view from my kitchen window!

Now autumn is over, and we are enjoying staying cozy for winter. I’ll try and post more about it sooner than 6 weeks from now!

 

This afternoon, Fay told me she wanted to make a Halloween book with multiple pages. Her request reminded me of little books I made in school growing up which are made out of a single piece of paper. Well, thank goodness for youtube, because I found a tutorial, and made Fay and Carter each a book.

Fay went right to work creating a masterpiece of Halloween literature and illustration! Carter’s illustrations changed as his thoughts moved. At first, all his pictures were of members of the immediate family. Then they were of Grandmother. Then they morphed into spooky things like Fay had been doing in her book. And I don’t mean to say he drew a picture of the family, followed by a picture of spooky thing. I mean the picture he drew was introduced first as a picture of the family, and then it was explained as a picture of spooky things.  I love that boy!

I was quite impressed with Fay’s book, actually. She asked for help spelling each word; but she thought of all the words (though I advised her to shorten the title of her book, so it would fit on the page), and wrote them down. Our Miss is growing up fast right now, and we are loving being along for the ride!

Here are videos of the kids reading their books.

Also, here’s a picture Fay took of Portia when she swiped my phone. The lady in the grocery store the other day told me that Portia’s asymmetrical eyes make her look skeptical. I think this picture definitely captures that. She’s so fun! We’re so glad she’s ours!

We’re finally allowing ourselves to get really excited about the Halloween season around here! The other day, I had a little time when the two littler kids were sleeping and Fay was still working on preschool and I decorated the mantel! This is the first time I’ve really done it since March, and it felt good! Fay even came and helped at the end.

I’m quite pleased with the way everything turned out!

Another, completely unrelated, thing is that Josh and I got to go on a date last night! (Thanks to Kathryn and Steve!) It was just so lovely to be out with Josh sans children, even if we didn’t do anything particularly noteworthy. This is us on our date!

Also, I learned something very important on our date. When you are craving fries, Freddy’s is not the place to get them. However, their pumpkin pie concrete is quite yummy!

I remember when Fay was around Portia’s age, I was still in school and I had a huge research paper due. My awesome sister-in-law, Crystal, agreed to watch Fay while I worked on my paper in her basement. Somewhere in the midst of working on my paper, I came upstairs to find Fay surrounded by three adoring cousins who were each making silly noises and faces in an effort to get her to laugh. It was working really well! She was giggling up a storm! That was the first time I uttered the words “I have a testimony of siblings.”  And now that we actually have some of our sibling action going on around the house I feel it even more!

The other day, the sweetest thing ever occurred. Carter wanted to feed Portia her baby food, and I let him. It’s so cute to hear his little baby voice, because he already has a baby voice all the time, but he accentuates it for Portia! Fay does the same thing, and it is also pretty cute!

Fay loves snuggling with Portia and loving on her! She talks to her so sweetly sometimes, and I’m just so happy that Portia gets love from so many sources at home! Fay also loves trying to carry Portia. The other day she declared that she had “big muscles” and could therefore carry Portia up the stairs unaided. Her muscles were apparently not quite as big as she had thought, and it was a very good thing that I was spotting the endeavor. But, even though I do intermittently fear for Portia’s life, it is fun to see the sisters love each other so much!

But Portia isn’t the only one who benefits from siblings. Fay and Carter have been buds forever, and they are each other’s very best friend. Sometimes they fight–we are trying really hard to encourage other methods of negotiation–but most of the time they just enjoy each other’s company and love trying the things that the other loves. Here’s a little taste of how they play together.

I just love them all so much!

People often say they don’t have a favorite child. And I get that. I mean, how could you pick favorites among your own offspring? But let me tell you: my Fay is something super special. She is so funny, and bizarre, and then super sweet and Christ-like within seconds of each other. She gets pretty dramatic sometimes when things don’t go her way; but she is willing to completely forgive in a heartbeat! She loves anything princess, anything girly, and anything Carter is currently enjoying. She is all fun! Fay could definitely be my favorite child.

Oh, but then there’s my boy. Carter is such a gem! He does what he wants and the way he wants it. If you get in his way you will incur his wrath and rage–mostly this is the case when he is tired or hangry. He gets VERY hangry.  But when he is well rested and well fed, he is a sweet little snuggle buddy! He loves getting his toes kissed or kissing Portia’s toes. He loves taking naps (but not going to bed), peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, singing songs, and reading stories. And he gets so much joy out of simple little things like his Mater (from Cars) toy. Yeah. He might just be my favorite child.

But if you have ever spent any time with Portia, you know that she is a shining star. She is just so enthusiastic about her little life! She relishes every ritz cracker that is placed before her, devouring it with more cuteness than one would ever think possible. She has a smile as wide as her whole self that she sports readily to anyone who pays her some much-craved attention. She is snuggly and loving, but also can be independent and takes to new skills quickly. If you ever need somebody to stuff something in their mouth and chomp on it for a while, you will never find a better volunteer than my Portia. Pretty sure she’s probably my favorite child.

So, I really do understand those people who don’t have a favorite child. But I do. I have a favorite child. Three actually. They each have the personality and make-up to warrant being my favorite. And they really are each my very favorite child.

And thinking about that makes me think that maybe Heavenly Father picks favorites too. Maybe He has an equal number of favorite children to the number of children He has. It is a pretty powerful thought to me to think of being Heavenly Father’s favorite child. And I think we really each are His very favorite child. 🙂

Anyway, pontifications aside; here’s a little bit of what we’ve been up to recently.

Not too much, actually; which is kind of nice. Me and the kids have spent a lot of days at home in the past little bit. Although, we did go visit cousins yesterday, and that was definitely the highlight of the kids’ week!

On Sunday, we went to Sugar House park for a picnic dinner. The kids discovered a tree that they could easily walk under and declared it their cave. They spent over an hour playing in their cave together. It was so cute! It’s so special when they play together and just get along!

Today I got some rare time alone with Carter. Usually Carter and Portia’s naps overlap, so I can get some time alone with Fay. And when Portia goes down for her nap later than Carter, but Fay is doing preschool I can get some alone time with Portia. But by the time Carter wakes up from his nap, Fay is always done with preschool and we’re kind of back to the norm. But today, Fay randomly took a nap while Portia was down, so it was just me and Carter for a while! We checked for ripe tomatoes in the garden, then we sat on the deck eating apples (thanks Maren!) together and chatting about grasshoppers, Daniel Tiger and Mater. It was priceless!

I have been LOVING the past two days of cooler weather!!!! I am super excited for when it gets serious about being autumn! But we’ll try and enjoy a few more days of wearing shorts and sandals this coming week, too.

A few weeks ago we discovered that we had more than just Virginia Creeper vines on our back fence; we have grape vines too! And there were even grapes growing thereon! We harvested them last week and made about 3 liters of grape juice! About 60% of that juice was consumed by Carter.

We planted some carrots this spring. We planted two rows, but only one actually grew. We harvested them the same day as our grapes.

We’ve also been enjoying lots of tomatoes! We planted other things; but we are still pretty new to gardening, and lots of things didn’t ever come to fruition.

We have family party (family home evening) each week; and we really try to make it exciting and enjoyable for the whole family. We have noticed that the things the kids love the most are usually the simplest: playing with toys as a family, making music on household objects, etc. So this past week Josh had the idea of just blowing up a bunch of balloons and letting the kids do whatever with them.

We have really had a fun summer! We’ve done lots of cool things together, and enjoyed never wearing jackets or socks! But, to be honest, this is the time when I always feel ready for summer to be over. We have nobody in out-of-the-house school (Fay does an online preschool), so we’re still just doing the same stuff as we have been, and I’m feeling the need for a change. I’m not seeing anything very obvious, so I might have to get creative…

Also, here’s Portia! She is wearing a super cute outfit! She is super cute in the outfit! She is also just plain super cute!

 

 

We are just about the luckiest family ever! We spent all last week in paradise with Josh’s whole family minus one (we missed you, Katie). We went to the Island of Kauai, and did all the fun things you can do on an island! And, incidentally, being in Hawaii makes 50 states for me! Thanks to Mom and Dad for making my life-long dream come true!

Take a look at what we did!

Fay and Carter were champs on the two flights there. They kept busy playing with little toys and coloring. Portia was also pretty good. And people could not get enough of her. Every time the flight attendants walked by they would each make some face or noise at her to solicit a smile.

This picture was taken approximately 10 minutes after we arrived at our “Hawaii House.” Fay drew this picture and planned this outfit days before we left, and she said that she MUST have her picture taken in Hawaii with her picture of Hawaii.

Josh and I got to have some dates! It was a super-treat to have time to ourselves so many times in a single week. Thank you to all who watched our kids!

The beach was definitely the favorite destination of the kids. Fay took to the water from the second we got to our first beach. Carter was hesitant in the beginning; but he was just as enthusiastic about the water and waves as Fay by the end of the week.

Along with beaching, we got to do lots of other cool watery activities. We went snorkeling multiple times, and they were all amazing! We snorkeled on a reef and I felt like I was in Finding Nemo or something! There were so many different kinds of fish! Another time we went snorkeling in deeper water and because of a nearby boat throwing food into the water, there were TONS of fish! It was like swimming as part of the school. Josh and I each touched some fish! There were also sea-turtles. Mom said she followed one for several minutes, and the turtle wasn’t even concerned.

Another adventure we went on was a tour which included kayaking up a river (where we saw THE fake vine that Harrison Ford swung on in Raiders of the Lost Ark), hiking through the jungle, and then repelling down this beautiful waterfall!

It was such a cool tour! Even if all we did was the hiking through the jungle part it would have been amazing!

We went on a boat tour of the Na Pali coast. It was absolutely beautiful, and amazing to think of the forces that created the shapes in the landscape. The powers of lava rock and rain! We also learned a lot more interesting things about the island in general from our guides.

We also ate a lot of yummy things! There was island-fresh fruit, plate dinners, tacos, pizza, and fish, to name a few!

One other amazing thing we saw was on the “ugly side” of the island–which looks strikingly like much of Utah…. They call it “The Grand Canyon of the Pacific” and despite having seen many canyons in my days, I couldn’t help but be impressed by it. I found it especially cool that it was almost tucked away in the middle of the island. The island isn’t very large, and so to tuck something like this away is pretty impressive.

We also enjoyed hanging out at the “Hawaii house” (Carter’s name for it).

I couldn’t decide which of these two pictures to post, so I just posted them both. I like the first one because it has the sisters together. But Portia just looks so perfectly babyful in the second one.

After a beautiful, magical week of paradisiacal bliss and adventure, we were a little worn out. But nobody who saw us on the plane would have guessed we were the least bit tired. 😉

It was seriously such a cool trip! We can’t express our gratitude to Mom and Dad enough for the amazing memories we made!

The other evening, we took the kids to the church parking lot so that they could all freely ride their bikes.  It was a beautiful evening, and the kids all three had so much fun! Josh and I had fun just watching them. Moments like these remind me just how much Heavenly Father loves us and all His children.

I had a birthday on July 24th, as I am wont to do each year. 🙂 I am now 26, and it feels really good! I told Josh that what I wanted for my birthday was the same thing that I always want: time away from the kids, and ideally, time with Josh away from the kids.  He gave me a birthday marathon date! It was all the wonderful!

As my actual birthday was on Sunday, we had our date the day before. We enjoyed the following activities

• Dinner at Black Sheep cafe in Provo–which I have wanted to try since before we went to grad school.
• Tennis–we have gotten back into tennis this summer, and even though we are SO BAD at it, we have so much fun!
• Brownies and BYU creamery cookies and cream ice-cream–I told Josh that instead of a cake I wanted all the brownies and c&c ice-cream I could eat, but it had to be from the creamery. That is the reason we took our date all the way down to Provo.
• A small amount of shopping
• Some of movie night at my brother’s house
• Lots of lovely conversation while in transit

It was quite lovely!

My actual birthday was super great too! Josh made me all my favorite foods all day long! The primary sang “Happy Happy Birthday” to me twice! And I ate even MORE brownies and ice-cream! Plus, Fay and I matched for church.

The next day my parents and siblings and company celebrated Pioneer Day, which meant more celebration for my birthday too! It felt like I had 3 days of birthday this year! I am too spoiled!

After all the fun, we sort of resumed normal life for a couple of days. One day I took the kids to the aquarium. They love going there, and so do I! I think we should probably go again this week…

One day, my brother Morgan texted me and asked if Portia was still cute. I sent him this picture and said “See for yourself.”

We had our three days of normal life, and then we partied some more! We went to southern Utah for a family reunion for my dad’s family. It was really fun to visit, play games, go on hikes, and eat yummy things! The kids LOVED playing in all the dirt! I’m interested to see what laundry is like tomorrow.

Now we’re home again! And an exciting surprise awaited us upon our return!

Yeah. Summer is good.

There are a lot of administrative changes going on at Josh’s work because of a merger with another company, and Josh hasn’t had much actual work to do. So he decided to take July 5 and 6 off. But then July 7 rolled around and there still wasn’t anything to do, so he took that day off too. He did go into work on Friday, but only a half day. So we have been partying!

We didn’t have much planned for July 4, since Fay had been throwing up over the weekend. But there was a parade just a few blocks from our house; so we decided to go check it out! We loaded everyone in the stroller in their red,white, and blue best and enjoyed watching big trucks and princesses (Carter’s and Fay’s favorites respectively).

It was seriously HOT at the parade. All the kids got burned out (if you’ll pardon the pun) after only about 20 minutes. Here’s what they looked like when they got home.

Tuesday and Wednesday we were at Mother and Daddy’s house to work on their holiday lights. (I say that not to be “politically correct” but because the lights can be set for any holiday. They are really cool!) Josh put them up originally last November–in the freezing ice and snow–but because of the weather he was unable to install them exactly how everyone wanted. So he is working on getting them going just as they should be.

While we were visiting the parents, my brother Tanner snatched my phone for the first time since returning from his mission to Georgia. I’m just glad he didn’t take his traditional picture of his toe.

Recently, Fay has gotten really excited about taking pictures all by herself. It is kind of fun because then there are actually some pictures of me to post–just to prove that I do exist in real life. So this next beauty is from Fay! Thanks, girl!

Yesterday, we took a family field trip to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple. It was really special to be walking around the temple with our whole eternal family! And it was double awesome because today we talked and sang about the temple in Primary! Parenting win!

Another family activity from yesterday was washing the car!

 

It was a good loooooooong weekend. And I think it was long enough that we really are ready go back to work tomorrow!