Olivia's Birthday, part 2

We had Olivia's party on Friday, October 27th. She is now six years old (I can't believe that she is six and in Kindergarten and learning to read) She had a choice of a traditional little party with 5 friends coming to the house and playing games and having cake or going to do something special with just one friend. She choose to do something special with one friend. She decided that she wanted to go swimming. We invited Taylor Bellows and her little brother , Landan (For Garrett She said) to go to the Legacy Pool. So after school we went to the pool that Jenn is now a lifeguard at to go swimming. (Too bad she couldn't get us in for free). We swim for an hour an half and then came home and ate pizza, and cake then opened presents. She got lots of fun things. From Emily she got the cute sweater she is wearing. From Grandma and Granpa Brunner she got a kit to make necklaces, From Grandma and Granpa Doolittle she got a Sara Fina Cat and Doodle Doll. From Mom and Dad she got a new packback with art supplies in it. From Garrett she got a cool pen. Garrett was all smiles as he gave it to her. And from Mom, Dad, and Jenn she got a Russian Dwarf Hamster. She loved it!! She thougth this was a great birthday. She has been giving us hugs and kisses for 3 days now telling us how much she has loved her wonderful birthday. Thank you all for giving her such wonderful things. She really does love them all.

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Olivia's Birthday

Ward Halloween Party

Olivia dressed up as Sleeping Beauty again. We bought her a new tiara. We borrowed a Woody costume for Garrett to wear. You can tell by the picture how well that worked. People thought he was dressed up as Lightning McQueen. We let them believe it.
Jennifer made our costumes for us. Robin is Madusa. A bunch of people at the ward party said they were going to steal her costume idea next year. I was a pirate. The hook is actually from Robin's kitchen mixer. All kinds of kids wanted to hit me with their lightsabers and swords. The party was nice I guess. They had a few games that weren't very well organized with some of the cheapest Oriental Trading prizes I have ever seen. There was a potluck soup/chili dinner and Truck or Treating. We left the same amount of candy we arrived with. The kids had a blast. The best part is we get to do it all over again on Tuesday. Jennifer was working at the pool during this time -- she got to hide behind a corner and jump out and scare kids.

UEA Weekend

Olivia's Story

Olivia was given a calendar on it and on the calendar there is a short homework assignment each day that she is supposed to do. One of the assignments was to draw a picture of a pumpkin, a bat, and a moon. Then on another day she was supposed to tell a story about a pumpkin. I combined the two things. I had her draw her picture and then afterwards tell me a story about her picture. Here is her story:

There was a pumpkin, bat and moon. It was really dark. There was a spider who was really scary and didn't make a sound. A long came a witch who turned the bat into a rabbit. She turned the pumpkin into a spider. Then she turned the spider into an ant. A long came a mom who was dressed as a witch. The real witch turned her into a ghost. Here comes the dad, the witch turned him into grass. Along came the children and the witch didn't turn them into nothing because the children ran.

"Rats," said the witch.

A good fairy came and made the witch run away. The good fairy turned the pumpkin, bat, spider, mom and dad the way they were before. Then they went back to where they lived so they can live.

Jen's Here

Robin's sister Jennifer is in town visiting. She's spent one night at our house and most of the rest of the time with her friend Rowena. Yesterday she and Rowena asked if we wanted to drive up American Fork Canyon with them. We said, "Sure!" We first stopped at the Tibble Reservoir. Everyone had fun skipping rocks. We stayed there a bit and then took a dirt road up to Silver Lake. We liked Tibble better. Silver Lake looked like it was half empty (some might say it looked half full). We did have fun stomping through the creek beds and hopping from rock to rock. Olivia got her feet wet and we decided it was time to go. Later that night Rowena invited us to swim at her community swimming pool. It's basically a hot springs. The water was really warm even though the air was freezing. We stayed until 8pm and then came home. It was a pretty good day. Today, they are coming to our house for dinner.

They never cease to amaze me

Sometimes when I walk in on Olivia and Garrett playing together I am amazed and how well they get along and just how smart and creative they are. We caught them doing this a couple of days ago.

Car trouble

So, my engine light has been going on and off for the past few months. I had the guys at Checker Auto Parts check the system and they said my shift solenoid was stuck open. The didn't have the part and suggested we take it to the dealership. We figured we should probably do that before the car dies completely so we took it to the dealership. Well, I get a call this morning from the dealership saying that the transmission is on its last legs and needs to be replaced. Cost? $3,400. The car is only worth a little more than that and we really don't have that kind of money laying around. I've called another repair shop to get an estimate and we're waiting on that, but Robin and I are seriously bummed out.