Life

We are leaving to go back home to the great state of Texas this week and I really want to be all caught up on my blog before we go. 

Here are some random, everyday pictures of our life lately.

Warning: This is cute kid pictures overload!!

 This cute little boy looks like this after just about every meal. He sure loves to play with his food!

 This is what he does when he's "All Done!"

The weather is absolutely gorgeous this time of year and we have many football /soccer matches in our backyard. What an awesome daddy, right?

Mason is into everything! We call him the Mason-ator. He runs from spot to spot destroying and playing. It really doesn't bother us though. He's happily entertained most of the time!

 He might destroy things, but he is the sweetest sleeper I've ever seen. 

I just love pictures of my babies sleeping. 

Oh and just so you know, he's still obsessed with flags. Driving around on Veteran's day was quite entertaining! He was basically hyperventilating saying, "Fwag! Fwag!" over and over. It was really cute!

 Oh and we do have other kids too! Here are some of Ethan and Ellie. 

Ellie LOVES preschool. We just do a co-op with some other mommies in the neighborhood. It works out really well and she has a lot of fun with it. 

She is one smart little girl. She knows all of her letters and sounds and she's even starting to sound out small words. She's has really surprised me with how quickly she catches on to things!

Mason was caught eating dog food. What baby hasn't tried that stuff out?!

I just love this picture below of my handsome little boy. 

Tripp is still over here just about daily and we just love having him come over and play! Him and Ellie totally have a brother-sister relationship. They are cute little play buddies!

Life is good.

Halloween

Is it me or does Halloween feel like it lasts at least a week or two? There's always fall festivals, class parties, neighborhood parties, church parties, and then there's the actual Halloween night! 

It sure is a lot of partying but it is oh so fun with kids this age. 

Ethan really wanted to be a mummy this year and knowing all I would have to do was rip up old bedsheets for his costume, I was totally ok with that costume choice. Easy and cheap. 

So we got him all wrapped up and left for the neighborhood party.

 He was convinced that he would be the scariest costume there. 

Look, he's even in character!

 Ellie went as Ariel and was head over heels in love with her princess dress.

I really tried to get Ethan to take a normal picture but this was as good as it got! Thanks for trying Ellie!!

Unfortunately, Ethan's costume unravelled and he was devastated that no one thought he was very scary at the party. I really felt bad for him and felt bad that my wrapping job wasn't up to par! So for the next party, he decided that choosing from the Halloween costume bin and going as Luke Skywalker from Star Wars would be cooler. 

We actually carved our pumpkins before Halloween this year!!! I knew Justin would be out of town for Halloween week and since I would need his super strong muscles to do the carving, we carved them before he left. 

The kids thought the pumpkin guts were super cool and both happily participated in gutting the pumpkin out. 

On Halloween day, Ellie got to dress up again in her Ariel costume for her preschool party.

She even showed me how Ariel dances too. 

I just love this sweet little girl.

When Ethan came home from school, we made these cool little afternoon snacks. 

Tripp joined in on the fun too!

 Ethan doesn't like peanut butter (thank you picky kids at school for convincing him that he doesn't) so he opted to shove his mouth full of marshmallows to give himself weird looking teeth.

Later that day, we got everyone all dressed up to go out trick or treating!

Ellie: Ariel, Mason: a lobster, and Ethan: Luke Skywalker

 Mason was not so happy to be in his costume. He cried for the entire photo shoot!

At least he is the cutest little crying lobster I've ever seen!

Ellie is seriously just the sweetest little thing and looked so beautiful! She was my little poser!

Ethan was putting on a show for me! His faces crack me up!

Here they are all together! Yep, Mason still crying :)

 Trick or treating is amazing in our neighborhood. There are SO many kids and SO many people generously giving out candy. One of our neighbors even has a legit haunted house set up. Ethan was too scared to go in and Ellie cried because she wanted to go in! It was very shortly after this that the meltdowns began and we called it good for the night. We were sad that Justin was in Turkey for the week but it was nice that he was in town for the parties the week before. 

And that folks was our Halloween 2013! It was a good one. 

October Break... UTAH!

Here in AZ, our schools give us a week off for October break! Really, I think it's just an excuse for everyone to celebrate the start of cooler weather and to head up north to enjoy the leaves changing to fall colors. We took full advantage of the week off and spent the whole time up in Utah. We really hadn't spent any more time than a quick weekend trip up there since we graduated BYU 4.5 years ago. I was dying for a trip!

Justin was in Spain the week we left to go, so on Friday I loaded up the kids and drove all the way! Jordan (Justin's youngest bro) was amazing to ride with me and be the binky finder, the food giver, the movie changer, etc. Thank you Jordan!

Amazingly, we made awesome time and even had time to stop in Provo to eat a yummy dinner that Justin's sister, Chanda,  made just for us!

She is so awesome. 

Justin flew in from Spain that night so we left Chanda's and drove to SLC to pick up Justin. 

We stayed the whole week with Justin's cousins, Austin & Roseane. They are amazing hosts and it was SO fun being able to spend time with them. Thank you, thank you Petersen's! We owe you... like a lot!

Ethan and Ellie had cousins, Alyssa and Mia, to pal around and play with the whole time and Mason was pretty much obsessed with their sweet dog...

                                      

That is one amazing dog to put up with what our children put her through!

Austin has some fun toys. I'd say they were a hit!

Awesome helmet hair!

Sat and Sunday was General Conference. This is where twice a year, we get to hear from our Prophet, Thomas S. Monson and other church leaders. It always recharges my batteries and I love and look forward to hearing their talks. 

During Priesthood Session (Saturday evening), the boys all go to a meeting, while the ladies get to hang out and shop! Shopping is never appealing with kids in tow, so we did the next best thing and met Chanda and Lindsay (sis in laws) at Chick Fil A. I had 5 kids under the age of 6 with me. It was fun! In any other state I would've been looked at like I was crazy. Luckily I fit right in in Utah!

 Mason loved Aunt Chanda's ice cream!

On Sunday evening, we all went up to Draper to Justin's aunts house. Rhonda and Art are always so sweet to invite such a large group into their gorgeous home. And they cook the best food!

Their daughter and grandsons are staying with them for a little while and their little grandson, I totally forgot his name, has the coolest car! Ellie LOVED driving it around!

Here are my gorgeous in laws. Sisters and mother.

The day after General Conference, we decided to go to Temple Square where the Salt Lake Temple, Conference Center, The Tabernacle and Church Headquarters are located. It was good timing to go there the day after conference. Hardly anyone was there!

                                                   

These are the beautiful Salt Lake City temple doors. This temple took 40 years to build! It's even more impressive inside. 

When these two smile, I think that's when they look the most like siblings.

Mason was loving running around everywhere, and especially running away from us :)

We tried to get a good picture of all the kids together. This was seriously as good as we got!

Isn't the temple gorgeous? There was a lot of blood, sweat, and I'm sure tears that went into building this temple. 

If you want to watch a beautiful story about John Rowe Moyle, a stonecutter for the Salt Lake Temple, click  HERE. It's well worth the 3 minutes! 

This is inside the Conference Center, where we get to hear from our Prophet and church leaders during General Conference. The Mormon Tabernacle choir also performs here. This is the largest auditorium (where the seats are all facing forward) in the world. It's spectacular.

On top of the conference center are trees and shrubs native to both the west dessert and the east forrest pine trees. It's really cool. 

The outside of the Conference Center. 

Amazingly, my AZ Science Center pass gets me into all the museums up in UT for free! So we definitely took advantage. After temple square, we went to Discovery Gateway. So fun!

Mason was overjoyed that he could put as many bananas as he wanted in his cart! He was not so happy that he couldn't eat them, however. He pushed that thing all over the place saying, "na na, na na!" over and over. It was really cute!

The next day, we went down to Provo. I love this place. I have so many wonderful memories here. 

First stop was Bridal Veil falls, located not too faraway from campus. 

This is the safe way to feed fish! Strap the kid in the stroller!

Everyone decided to hike it last minute so I learned to never wear your good boots while hiking. Unfortunately they are all scuffed up! But... it was worth it :)

                                 

After, we headed over to Vivian Park and played around.

We even found President Monson's cabin!

The next day we headed up to Salt Lake and went to University of Utah's Natural History Museum. 

It was fabulous. 

The pictures don't do justice to how beautiful this place is. It pretty much puts all other museums of natural history to shame. 

Putting puzzles together and playing some games that were there. 

We did the Beehive House tour (Brigham Young's house), and after ate at the Lion House.. yummm!!!

Oh how I wish I could make rolls like they can!

We also introduced our kids to BYU Creamery chocolate milk. Pretty much the best choc milk in the world. 

After we were done eating, Mason ran all the way down the street to go say hi to this flag. His obsession is really quite funny. 

One of the days, we went with Austin and his family to Trafalga for some games and fun! It was a really rainy and cold day so this was the perfect outing!

Things got serious playing laser tag though...

The majority of people playing were under the age of 10. It's always a humbling experience to realize you've been hit by a 4 yr old :)

Bot our kids climbed the rock wall! That Ellie, she's a tough one!

Austin and Roseane introduced us to Mama Mia's. Yum. So good!

On Friday we went to Cornbelly's for some fall fun!

After, we headed right next door for the dinosaur museum at Thanksgiving Point. 

On Saturday we were in Provo pretty much the whole day for BYU's Homecoming day activities and football game. 

We started out the day with the homecoming parade.

Isn't Mount Timpanogos gorgeous?? 

We took a walk around and through campus and fed the ducks at the Botany pond on the way. 

Later that day, we went to the football game. Gooooo Cougars!!!

                                     Justin and I went on many dates to this place! It was so fun to be back here and reminiscence on how we got together, see the places we used to go, and best of all we had our kids there this time to enjoy it with us!

I sure do love this handsome guy and I'm so grateful I met him here!

This is seriously the best picture we could get of everyone... Ha!

                                     

After the game (we won!!), we drove up to Rexburg, Idaho for Celeste's baby blessing (Barrett and Lindsay's little baby). It was a beautiful blessing and she is such a beautiful little girl! Sadly, I only have these two pictures. I guess I was having too much fun chatting with family. I'll make sure to take some pictures of Celeste at Christmas so i can show you just how cute she is!

We went to church with B & L right next to the beautiful Rexburg, ID Temple. 

Here's the whole gang!

So we had a great week playing in UT and seeing the rest of the family up in ID. Justin and I were seriously trying to think of any excuse to buy another home up there. Maybe someday!