Happy Halloween!

Ty has finally decided to branch out from the usual football player. He told me a little too late, so we scrounged up this cow outfit in the back of Leighna's closet. Will started out as a football player, but decided the pads were too heavy and too hot, so that didn't last long. He went with his usual skeleton. Someday we should maybe get new costumes, he's been a skeleton for several years now, but it's a whole lot cheaper that way! 

I had to post this one, cause I just think it's funny!

My little trick-or-treaters. Actually, Ty decided he's way too old for this silly stuff, so he didn't go trick-or-treating, he was my candy passer-outer at the trunk-or-treat! I was lazy this year and we did they trunk-or-treat at the church with all three wards in our building, which was actually pretty fun! Then we went to Jodi's and one other house. That was it. It was pretty nice since it was just me and the littles. The Babe is on Antelope Island at the Bison Round-up. Leighna had to work and then went with Jack after, and Porter was off with his friends all day. 

The Elementary school parade. Will was too fast the first time around. 

By the second time around he had already shed the costume!

This is my friend Chrystal! She was the best witch!!! It has to be documented! 

A quick stop at Jodi's to let Jodi and Andy love on the littles! They're always so fun! Andy was watching the world series on a projector, Will kept doing shadow puppets in front of it. It was so so funny to watch him! I wish I would have taken a picture or recorded it! He was being hilarious!

The day before Halloween, it was Barbie day at school, so Porter is sporting the rollerblading Ken outfit! He makes a really good Ken! It was so funny. This kid has so much confidence, he can pull anything off! 

For actual Halloween, he and his friends all went as missionaries! (The two on the left...missionaries on P-day) I hope all of these kids make it on missions! They're a fun bunch!

Jodi sent me this picture this morning, and said, "I hope we can reenact this picture one day!" 

I hope so too!

15 Years Ago

Sunday birthdays are actually the worst when you're a kid. We tried to celebrate as best as we could. We started the day off strong with our traditional Disney birthday song, which included a rousing dance number by Moi! It was unappreciated by the recipient! 

The Babe made Porter's favorite meal. Wings and homemade french fries. They were delicious, and I didn't have to cook! It was fabulous! Sarah and Hartley came over and we popped a candle in a cupcake and sang a beautiful rendition of Happy Birthday! What more could a boy ask for? 

Happy 15th Birthday Porter! We love your sense of humor and all that you bring to our family! Tomorrow he will take the driver's test and possibly get his learners permit if he passes. I can't believe he's old enough for this! 

 

Things for Today

Leighna is on her Sadie's date tonight with Jack. 

I know they went bowling, but I'm not sure what else they had planned. I'm waiting anxiously for the full report! 

Porter is the proud owner of a pig!

Meet The Notorious P.I.G

(Yes, that's his name.) 

He has worked hard all summer to save enough money to buy and raise a pig. He will be entering it in the 4-H show in the spring. He's pretty excited about this adventure. I'm skeptical. His buddy Gatlin is letting him keep it at his place. I should say, his mom is letting Porter raise the pig there. They live just up the street from us but they have a big piece of property and already have a lot of animals. 

Today was Ty's last football game. It was cold this morning when they started, but it warmed up and was actually a really nice day to watch a football game. They played hard, but they lost. Ty hurt his ankle just before halftime. He stayed on the sideline for a couple plays, but then he was back in the game and he finished strong. I'm proud of him for sticking it out this year. He played quarterback all season, and he got better every game! I'm not sad that it's over, but it was fun to watch my boys play this year!

Will is just hanging out with all of us. We drag him around to all the older kids' things and sometimes he really hates it. But today he was trooper and came along with a good attitude. 

I talked to Addie on the phone for awhile and it was good to talk to her. She's doing well. She has 5 more weeks until she's home for Christmas break! 

Ballroom Dancing

 

This morning I woke up with a slight headache. I figured it was a good enough excuse to climb back in bed and sleep! I got the kiddos off to school and that's exactly what I did. I slept for an extra hour. It felt good. I did tomatoes today. I made them into pizza sauce, and I had a few extra so made a few bottles of crushed tomatoes. 22 pints on my shelf. It sure is a lot of work, but it gives me a lot of peace of mind! Porter and his friends came home for lunch today and I really didn't have anything to feed them since I was in the middle of tomatoes, so I whipped up some fresh salsa and they had chips and salsa and jalapeño bread. I'm sure they were impressed and I'm also sure they all went back to school starving! 

Tonight was Porter's first ballroom dance performance! He did a really good job. It was so fun to watch him. Mom, Leighna and I had to sit through a 2 hour dance performance to watch him perform one dance though. His number was the 2nd to the last one! Leighna's friend Harlee was sitting behind us and at intermission she told me that I was the reason she tried out for ballroom because I always talked about when I took ballroom in college! Apparently, I have been misleading young children everywhere because Leighna and Porter were also surprised to learn that I didn't take ballroom in college!! I had a social dance class where we learned all the ballroom dances and I always, always wanted to be on a ballroom dance team, but I only took that one class. Needless to say, Harlee tried out for ballroom, she didn't make it the first year she tried out, but because I'm so inspiring (wink, wink) she tried out again, and made it!! Now she is on the varsity team! I told her I was changing people's lives every day! It was really a funny conversation! 

The Babe is in Salt Lake helping his brother Matt. I'll be glad when he gets home tomorrow. I miss him when he's gone. He'll be gone most of next week too for the Bison Round-up. So, I'm flying solo for now.

Donut Night!

This year I had lots of recruits! 

I put the Bigguns to work!

Leighna and Jannessa were my master cutters.

The Babe was my master fryer. We dubbed him Frier Tuck for this occasion. 

Josh and Porter were my master glazers.

Addie and Georgie joined our glazing crew,

 and we busted out some donuts!

I always forget to take a picture at the beginning of the night, so this is about halfway through. My closest estimate is that we made about 300 donuts! And by the end of the night, we had about 20 left over. This year we got smart and had all of the cooking done by the time the guests arrived! Except for Shawna and her family. They had company in town, so they came a little early, before the crowd got there. Anyway, it was so nice to have all the cooking done, then it gave us more time to visit with everyone! It was great! We are so grateful for the many people in our lives that we have been able to have friendships with! I love that once a year we have a little tradition that keeps us all connected! I love it! It feels my heart with joy. I love for people to love my food and I love that people enjoy coming! 

Porter got to see his buddy Cole. He hasn't seen him for a while, so it was cute to see them together.

Donuts were enjoyed by all!

#favoritetraditon

Another successful Donut Night in the books!!!

P.S. This should be noted...

Today is the 20th anniversary of us moving into our house!

 After a grueling 6 months of building this and 4 other homes, our home was finished and we spent our first night on October 21, 2003! I can't believe it has been 20 years!!! We have lived so much life here. I will always love this house! Jon loves Trina is written on the studs of this home! 

It will always be a treasure.

The Assault of the Gallbladder

Mom hasn't been feeling well for the past week or so. We had concluded that she must have a kidney stone. Finally, when she couldn't take the pain any longer, she went to the ER. I received a phone call from Dad telling me that she was going in for surgery to have her gallbladder removed. The surgery went pretty smoothly, but her heart started going into A-fib during the procedure, so they kept her most of the day for observation. Her gallbladder was really enlarged and elongated and had a lot of gall stones. It's good that she got it out. Marie came up from Vegas and we sat with Mom and Dad and visited for the day. Mom felt bad that she wasn't a better hostess and kept falling asleep! She also informed us that she could not drive home! It was so cute!

It was freezing in that hospital room, so while we were waiting for the nurse, I wrapped myself up in the hospital curtain to warm up a little! Marie kindly snapped a picture! Sometimes I'm really dorky! 

Mom's nurse was super awesome! We learned that she had been a stay-at-home mom for 22 years and decided to go back to school to be a nurse. She got her nursing degree and has been working 2-3 days a week for the past 2 years. I felt so inspired by her story. My Patriarchal Blessing talks a lot about my education, but I never know what I'm supposed to do. Maybe it's getting close to time for me to finish out my degree. (I'm not sure that sentence made sense😝)

 We got Mom home and semi-comfortable around 6:30 pm.

I got home at 6:45 and had Relief Society visits at 7:15. We had some really good visits. Karen wasn't able to make it this week. I have the best of the best in my presidency! It's a little different getting used to a new counselor. Our dynamic is different. I still have a good 2nd counselor. I could not do this calling without them!

Jessica, Cynthia, Me

I finally got home at 9:30 pm. 

 It felt like a really long day. 

Yellowstone

Day 4 and 5

More beautiful scenery! 

This whole mountain was smoking. It was crazy. We found a pay phone and made Addie try it. You don't see those around anymore!

Petrified tree. We drove the high road today! It was incredibly high. We were on the edge of a cliff for a long time. Leighna didn't like that road at all! She was pretty worried! The forest was so thick and beautiful! 

The terraces. So incredible. I sound so redundant! I'm sorry about that, but I just don't have the words! Yellowstone was amazing! 

We saw some mountain goats and a coyote and more buffalo today! Oh, and a bunch of elk, even a big bull! 

After finishing up in Yellowstone, we went to Idaho Falls, and we stayed with my cousin Jacob. I haven't seen him for about 12 years or so. He and his wife Nicole invited us, so we stayed with them. He invited Aunt Julie and Uncle Virgil over for dinner. Jonny and Virgil's mom came with them too. It was so much fun to visit with them and catch up! Will was so thrilled to have some cousins to play with! They had a great time exchanging Pokemon cards (which I don't get, but he was happy!) It was actually pretty fun to be there! Sunday morning we got up and had breakfast and headed home. We stopped in Preston and had lunch with The Babe's missionary companion, Elder Dasler. We had a good visit with them as well. Stopped at Aunt Jan's to get keys, but she had already sent them to Nephi, so we went on to Nephi and had dinner with my mom and dad. We thought about staying the night, but in the end everyone was ready to be home so we just came the rest of the way home. 

We had a great time together! It was so fun to see something new and different!

 I love my family!

 

Yellowstone

Day 3

Yellowstone was incredibly beautiful! I couldn't get over the thought of being on top of a volcano. There was steam coming up all over the landscape. It was so interesting how some of the hot pots were crystal clear and some were muddy and all boiling hot!

I know this is a picture overload, but it's just impossible to describe! 

Waiting for Old Faithful. We had to wait almost 2 hours, but it was worth it! 

It was way bigger than this, but I was recording and forgot to take a still shot! 

Yellowstone lake was stunningly beautiful! We were all so tired by the time we got there, so we all slept past most of it. The Babe woke me up a few times to tell me I just had to see it, and I'm really glad he did!

These were my favorites! The muddy pot at the top was almost a silvery gray and it boiled up in a rhythm. The middle top was called the Dragon's Mouth. It was a small cave that was steaming and the water would splash out. It sounded like there was a dragon in that cave, There was a rumbling from the water boiling inside. It was SO cool! And the mud pots were awesome! I loved the huge waterfall! Will took the binoculars with us when we hiked over to look at it. He kept telling us there was a deer on the waterfall. We kept telling him he was seeing things. But then I finally took the binoculars and looked, and sure enough, at the top of the waterfall there was an elk. I don't know how he ever saw it, but he did! It was really cool. 

We were starving by the time we got back to the b-n-b so we went to eat at Applebees. It was a beautiful day! We saw a lot of buffalo, maybe a bear....it was pretty far away. Yellowstone is hard to describe. It was fascinating. Barbara wanted me climb the fence and go swimming in the fire hole, but I wasn't brave enough to cross the fence and it was freezing cold! I can't imagine getting out all wet! It would have frozen to death! Plus The Babe wouldn't let me break the rules! What fun is that??? 

Actually, I'm a rule follower too, so I don't know if I could have crossed the fence even if it wasn't cold! 

Yellowstone

Day 2

Lots of driving today. But it was so incredibly beautiful! I have been trying to get to the mountains to see the fall leaves for a few weeks, but I'm always too busy. So I was really happy driving through Sardine Canyon it was gorgeous! 

I wanted to get a picture of us in front of this tree. But we covered it up! Had to do a re-do! 

We stopped at Gossner and got some flavored milks and cheese curds. 

Then we went to Bear World in Rexburg. It was really fun to watch the bears. The baby bears were the cutest! 

They also had a dinosaur animatronic park. It was pretty cool too!

Everyone was happy to be out of the car for awhile. 

We stayed in a really cute Air-b-n-b.