Halloween

We have had a lot of Halloween Activities. This year we went to the ward Trunk or Treat, had Halloween parties at school, went to the Legacy Center where Jenn works for a Halloween party and trick or treating, we carved pumpkins, and Jeremy went with the kids around our neighborhood trick or treating. They have gotten a lot of candy. Before he left he set up the dry ice and the green lasers at our house. You could hear all the kids arriving as exclaimed how cool the lasers were.

We are offering to buy our kids' candy from them and then get rid of it by donating it to their classroom or taking it to our schools for our candy bowls that we bribe the kids with. We just don't think they need this much candy. Devin last night after trick or treating dumped his bag on the floor and proceeded to to open as much as he could and shove it in his mouth. I told him he was going to be sick. He then took a candy and was eating it and started spinning in circles chanting "I'm going to be sick, I'm going to be sick." I had to take his bag of candy from him. He then told me wanted to eat it all. This morning he wakes up, runs to the living room, and dumps out his candy and wants candy for breakfast. I let him have one piece. But he is sneaky and I swear he had 3 more.

Here is Devin with his pumpkin. Doesn't he look like he is up to something in this picture. Yes, he does have underwear on.



Here is Olivia with her pumpkin. She cleaned out all the slimy parts from the inside of her pumpkin this year.


Here is Garrett with his pumpkin. He was excited to draw his own face on the pumpkin. He didn't want to touch the insides at all.

Here is all three of them.
The kids drew on the pictures, Jeremy carved, and I scooped out all the slimy stuff. I saved some of the seeds to roast.

Here are all the costumes:
Devin has a cowboy. His hat didn't fit. The size said 2-4T. Thought we would be good since Devin is only 2. But apparently he has a big head. He was still a cute cowboy. Jeremy said while out trick or treating he would run to each door. He was so excited.

Garrett was Mario. He is obsessed with Mario. He loves to play it on the wii, play it on the computer, he has had me run off pictures that he colors and then pretends to be Mario. It was kind of a cold and rainy Halloween. Olivia and Devin lasted for about and hour so Jeremy brought them home. Garrett was not done done, so Jeremy took him back out for another hour. Olivia is a cowgirl because she love the book "Rapunzel's Revenge" who the main character was Rapunzel as a cowgirl.
All three of them. This is actually a pretty good picture of all 3 of them.
And of Course Jennifer. She is some kind of swamp creature. She made the entire costume herself. She is amazing and talented.


Jeremy was a mad scientist again and I was a Viking. We have been these things before so we didn't take picture of ourselves.

BIG 1-0

Olivia turned 10 today. It is so hard to believe that this cute little baby is now 10!

She is growing ups so fast. She is such a good girl, a great helper, she is thoughtful, smart, a hard worker. We love her so much.
So for her birthday, Jeremy and I took just Olivia out to eat to where ever she wanted to go. She choose to go to Texas. She ordered off the grown up menu, ordered a frozen lemonade. And she was slightly embarrassed when the the people came to sing to her. Then we came home and opened presents and ate ice cream cake.


Devin wanted Olivia to share her toys. He was trying to bop her on the head with her wand and turn her into a frog.




She was slightly spoiled

From Jenn: She got a new purple coat and picture frame Art Kit.
From Grandma and Grandpa Doolittle: She got a lunch box stuffed with stuff like pens, a notebook, five dollars, fingernail polish, a watch, and a necklace.
From Mom and Dad: 2 books, the new Tinker Bell Movie, and necklace making kit
From Emily: purse that had 5 dollars, lip gloss.
From her Brothers: A wand, flarp, bracelets, glow in the dark stars
From Grandma and Grandpa Brunner: A card and Halloween Stickers.

Cookies

For tonight's Family Home Evening treat Olivia wanted to make pumpkin cookies with chocolate chips. I didn't have any shortening, but I remembered that a friend of mine said she made these type of cookies with a yellow cake mix so I gave it a shot. They turned out really good.

This is what I did.
1 yellow cake mix
1 1/2 cups of pumpkin
1 egg
2 tsp cinammon
1/2 bag of Chocolate chips
Mix it all together. Put onto the pan and bake at 350 degrees for 10-12 minutes.


I was pretty impressed that they turned out since I was making up the recipe.
Speaking of cookies. We bought some cookie dough from a neighbor who was selling it as a fundraiser. My kids know just what to do with cookie dough. Eat it before it gets baked.

Not ready for this!!!

We have had beautiful fall weather this year with the temperatures in the 70-80s. But for the last two days it has rained and became cold which made us a little sad because we knew that the warm weather was about to come to an end. Well this morning we woke up to SNOW! So goodbye nice warm weather. You will be missed.

I am really was not looking forward to cold wet snow! Just one more thing to worry about with a cane or crutches: Slipping. I am a little paranoid.

Halloween Trunk or Treat

Friday Night we had our yearly ward Halloween Party. Jeremy wanted to use his new laser to decorate the car. He went and scooped out the church to find an outlet so he could plug in the laser, plug in the pumpkin, and plug in the cd player to play spooky music. And to add to the decorations he went and bought dry ice and had it smoking. Everyone who came by loved it.

I went through two big bowls candy! The kids got lots of candy so we are going to use that candy on to give away Halloween night.

Midway Getaway

Jeremy had a Principals' Retreat in Midway. He wanted us to come up and join him and spend the night up there. The kids and I drove to Midway after school on Thursday and spent the evening at this really nice resort. They had an indoor pool. The kids loved swimming and loved being the only ones in the pool. The pool was actually connected to the outdoor pool and the older two loved going back and forth between the two. I enjoyed staying in the hot tub with the built in waterfall. We went swimming Thursday night and then we also went swimming Friday at 7 in the morning before Jeremy had to go to his conferences again.





So while Jeremy was at his conference the kids and I went exploring. We went to the Aero Museum. It was a small museum that had some WW11 planes and memorabilia. We were the only ones in the museum so we got a personal tour and the tour guide let the kids get into the airplanes. They are still functional airplanes that fly. The kids loved them.





We then went to Pizza Hut for lunch, then to Granny's for ice cream shakes, and to a park and then I found this covered bridge. The kids had a great time collecting rocks and throwing them in the river below. They could have spent all day there throwing rocks. I don't know what it is about throwing rocks into a river but it is fun.
I was really enjoying the fall colors. A lot of the leaves had already fallen but it was still pretty. Made me miss West Virginia.




They would race to get more rock and then race back to throw them over the bridge.


Once again my best picture of all three of them. It is almost impossible to get a good picture of all three of them. I will keep trying.

It was nice couple days away from home.

Green Lasers

At the Halloween store Jeremy saw this Green Laser. It is really cool, the lasers can move in different patterns. The kids love to play in the laser's green dots. We decided to take some pictures they turned out really cool. Every night since we got the lasers. Devin will point to the laser and ask for the green dots. It is a lot of fun to watch the kids play in the dark with this.
We took these pictures with the flash off. Really cool!
Here is Devin
Here is Garrett.
Here is Olivia.
Just the laser as it is moving.

I took this picture with the flash on, if you look on the wall on the floor you can see the green dots barely.

Colored Water Balls

For our Family Home Evening Activity we got out some of the Steve Spangler stuff and and we mixed colors and then we took the water balls and put them in the colors to grow. The next morning the kids were excited to look at all the different color balls. Even Devin had fun mixing the colors and he especially loved playing with the slimy colored bouncy balls.

Olivia took some of the balls to school to show her friends and teacher. One of her old teachers said, "That's disgusting." Olivia's reply was, "No, it is Science."