The start of Holiday Season

Thanksgiving

This year we had Thanksgiving with Nana and Papa.  We split up the cooking responsibilities and the amazing thing is it was all super yummy and it wasn't a killer day!  I love homemade pies but this year Smith's had a killer deal on pies - so we had 4 different pies for 8 people!!  I know I made the turkey - it wasn't fancy but it was super moist and best one yet!  My mom made her famous stuffing and all my boys were crazy about it.  See that big bowl of stuffing on the table?  That wasn't even half of what she made - so we enjoyed stuffing for the next week!  It was a lovely and very low-key day.  I love having family close to me!  I love them SO much!

Christmas Parties begin!!

First weekend of December we attended the BYU President's Christmas party for faculty and staff.  This has been a family tradition since Shayne was a baby - and I think we've only missed 2 of these parties in the 15 year of marriage.  One of these days I'll do a post with all the pictures through the years - I've been dreaming about it for years and eventually I'll get to it!

There's always a craft and the boys enjoyed decorating their own rubix cube - they kinda fell apart within the day - but hey, the coloring part was the best part!

A surprise Christmas party

Later that night - Grandma and Grandpa played a special role at their church party as Santa and Mrs. Clause!  We snuck into the party and onto the stage at the end and it was a great little surprise for Santa to have his Grandkids on his lap!  (Grandma had told me the details and we kept it our little secret)  Aren't they the cutest Clause couple ever?!?!

Preschool and China

This year I am part of a co-op preschool with Skyler.  Each of the mom's take a turn doing two days of preschool with a theme we decided at the start of the year on a 5 week rotation.  I've really enjoyed this preschool group.  When I did it with Danny for one year I promised myself to not do it again - I really struggled with it, but this year has been different.  Mostly the fact that the curriculum is whatever I want it to be has changed my perspective and expectations.  This was one of my favorite days I have done this year and I just had to share a couple pics - we learned about China.  I gave them noodles and chopsticks for their snack (that took a while to eat) and we built the Great Wall of China with sugar cubes.  I don't recommend hot glue guns with preschoolers - it was kinda scary - but we survived.  The walls were awesome and it's so funny how they were each so different just as different as the kids are from each other!  We had a great time!

Maggie vs Husky

In early November, while I was teaching lessons - the weather was warm and the kids were running (literally) in and out the doors playing together.  Maggie was sitting out on our front lawn and a Husky (he lives the next street over) had gotten out.  The teenager from the Husky's house was chasing after him - and he saw what happened next and so did Cole's best friend, Connor.  The husky picked up Maggie and shook her fiercely.  She fought for her life and got away - but there were injuries: a puncture wound on her tummy, a puncture wound on her side, a broken tooth (which was pulled later) and she also got stitches in her paw.  She was also traumatized - she wasn't our Maggie for the next month+.  She had a hard time with her appetite and just seemed miserable.

She kept gnawing at her wounds, so I put a t-shirt on her to keep her from touching the wounds.  I didn't realize she had developed an abscess in the side wound - we went back to the vet and she had a drain placed and new antibiotics.  The drain was only for a few days and it healed very quickly.  

I had to be very creative to get medicine into this little girl. YouTube really is amazing - I learned how to make pills out of chicken that would dissolve when placed in the side of her cheek - otherwise she would have been even more miserable without the pain killers and antibiotics.

This is the drain.

A new shirt for Maggie 

I'm terribly behind in blogging - so FYI, she is back to herself now.  She sits in her window spot and tries to get out if the kids leave a door open.  It's nice to have Maggie acting like Maggie - we're all happy to have her with us a little longer.  

This is how we HALLOWEEN

*warning!  this is a long post because we LOVE Halloween in this house!

Haunted Garage

First, we have to clean out the garage - and that means EVERYTHING goes out to the patio in the backyard.  Then we start to hang those plastic coverings to be our walls and make the HAUNTED GARAGE.  I tried to get pics this year - this is our 4th or 5th year of doing the Haunted Garage - and you know what - it's hard to take pics at nighttime and show what REALLY happens in here.  It was our best one yet - Shayne is the mastermind and creative genius. 

This is what my front room looks like for a couple weeks - all these costume and prop bins!!

This year's theme as you entered was a restaurant.  Here are some goodies on the shelf to eat...

Our maitre d' was Hunter.  

This is the photo that was in the frame as you entered.  Hunter introduced the special man who made our restaurant AMAZING and asked them to look at his spatula closely - then BAM, the picture would fall out and Sheldon was behind the picture all glorified in creepy make-up.  We got a lot of screams on this one.  (from adults!)

Next room...  would like to try our food?

It might have jumped out at a few people, here are a few of our helpers this year (Chans and Liam)

Next room - creepy masks that glowed in the dark.  Like I said - I can't take pictures of dark... but it was a great room with several kids in black too.

Next room - here are a few props I fixed up...

Danny, Ben, and Elsie

Creepy little kid's room...  with scary kids coming to get ya'

Halloween Parties

A visit to a local pumpkin patch with the preschool kiddos

Preschool Halloween party

I made this AMAZING witch's brew!  Some didn't want to drink it though after watching me put in worms and such (I didn't let them see if was candy worms)

Grown-ups have parties too.  

Pumpkins!

We've entered a new stage in life when our kids do their own pumpkins - Skyler needed help, of course, but Danny, Cole, and Hunter did their own!!

Cole's artwork

  This is Shayne's pumpkin

Going to School

Dracula and Ghost-Buster

Later that night, Cole changed his look to this 

Skyler decided to be a snake last minute 

And Hunter was a stick-man - all glowsticks.  It was fantastic!

Enjoying some loot...