13 years old

Olivia turned 13! We celebrated her birthday all weekend. On Friday, a couple of her friends decorated her locker which made her day. On Saturday, we took her to Texas Steakhouse for lunch and got a sitter for her brothers. After lunch we took her to a couple of stores and let her pick out things she could decorate her room with when she moves back downstairs.  Sunday Morning, we made her breakfast in bed and let her open her presents.  Sunday Evening, I made her spaghetti and bread sticks for dinner.  Then I invited Grandma, Kurt and Stephanie and their kids to come over for desert.  I made her Oreo Dessert and Peanut Butter pie.  I think she had a  good birthday and we did a great job of spoiling her.

We love her so much! She is an awesome girl. She is helpful, kind, pretty, smart, hard working. So glad she is ours.

Presents she got for her birthday:
From Mom and Dad: Camera with a case and a memory card, plus the things to decorate her room
From Jennifer: A heating mattress pad and nail polish
From Garrett: Phase 10
From Devin: Molding Clay
From Grandma and Grandpa Doolittle: Journal, and lip gloss

Carving Pumpkins

We carved our pumpkins that we got at the pumpkin patch on Saturday. We were going to wait until closer to Halloween but we had a church Halloween party where there was going to be a pumpkin decorating contest. The kids wanted to enter the contest. The kids love carving pumpkins.  I didn't carve one but I helped Devin with his.   

Olivia's pumpkin was one of the winning pumpkins at the party. She was so excited because she won a five dollar gift card to Kneaders.  Then after the party, Jeremy took her to Kneaders when the Cheesecake is half off and got 3 pieces of cheesecake and only ended up paying a dollar.

Garrett's Bear

Garrett loves cub scouts. He works really hard and is constantly getting his book out to work on it or asking us to do things in there with him. He has now earned his Bear.  He will now start working on his Weblos and his arrow of light.  Some of the things he has done  for his bear will count towards his Arrow of light.  I am so glad he enjoys doing this. 

Cookies with Livvy

The kids get Monday after fall break off but the teachers all have to go back for professional development. Olivia babysat the boys all day. She had a list of activities planned for the entire day to keep the boys busy, happy, and not fighting. One of her activities was making sugar cookies with them and decorating them. She made both the icing and the cookies from scratch.

Canyon

I love going up the Canyons to see the fall colors.  We stopped at Mill Creek Canyon on the way home from the Zoo during Fall Break.  It is so pretty and peaceful.  It makes me really appreciate all the beautiful things that Heavenly Father created for us.   Plus I always hope to get some pictures of the kids that I can hang on the wall.

Socks and Sandals

We were getting ready to go grocery shopping. Garrett is wearing socks and puts his sandals on over top of his socks. I tell him, "You should go put on real shoes. You look ridiculous." He looks at me and responds, "We're just going to Walmart. Like those people care what I look like."

Pumpkin Patch

15 Million Views

On October 12th, my YouTube video passed 15 million views.

Mario and Luigi Legos

Garrett made his two favorite characters out of Legos:
 

School Pictures

Devin: Kindergarten

Garrett: 4th

Olivia: 7th

Zoo

For our second day of fall break, we took the kids to the zoo.  We haven't been to the zoo since before my first surgery.  They have made a lot of changes to the zoo.  It is a really nice with better walk ways and better habitats for the animals. We got to the zoo right as it opened at 9 and it was not busy at all.  The weather was perfect!  I think that when we go back to the zoo it will be another fall visit.  We really had an enjoyable visit. 

We got to see the trainers work with the elephant.  It was fun to watch!

They had a play area and had a pirate ship.  Devin kept saying "AR" and making funny faces.

They had a new exhibit with seals and a polar bear.  It was cool to watch them swim around and be playful.

This is the baby giraffe.  Isn't she cute!

Fall Break Late Night

The kids have been begging to have a late night with some friends.   Since it was fall break we decided that they could invite a few people over.  Garrett invited Landon.  Devin invited Kasi.  Olivia invited Taylor and Maddie. 

Garrett, Devin, Kasi, and Landon played with the parachute, glow sticks and played spoons.  Garrett had written a schedule of the activities that they could do.  

 The girls made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and then played Apples to Apples

 Then both groups went downstairs and ate cookies and watched a movie.   We like late nights because all extra children leave at 10.   Plus it is a pretty good motivation for our kids to help clean up the house and their rooms.

Before the late night we took the kids to the Water Gardens Theater and watched "Planes"  It was cute.