School Fun

This week I got to spend a little time at Weston's school. On Wednesday evening they had a school activity. First we went to his classroom for a fun little math workshop. We were the first ones there so I made sure to get a couple pictures of his space project.
There were only a couple kids at the workshop, so it was pretty relaxed and Davin got to participate too. They learned about sorting and counting. Weston's classroom has this really cool "Smart Board" that is a touch screen, so they could move the candy on the screen into the correct categories. They also each got a bag of candy to practice sorting and counting and graphing in different ways.
After the math workshop we went into the cafeteria for the PTA sponsored Halloween magic show. The kids got to dress up and the PTA sold cotton candy, popcorn, and sodas. The magic show was pretty fun. Definitely catered to the elementary set with underpants jokes and balloon animals. Talia was getting pretty tired and squirmy by the end, but she made it and we all had a fun time.
Today was the school's costume parade and Weston's class party. I took the little ones with me to watch the parade in the morning. I was very impressed that every single kid in Weston's class was dressed up. At the end of the school day I dropped Davin and Talia off at my friend's house and went in to help with Weston's class party. I was in charge of the spooky story. We read "The Little Old Woman Who Wasn't Afraid of Anything." It's a cute story and all the kids got to participate with props. I enjoyed getting to watch Weston interact with his classmates and seeing his teacher in action. She's awesome. By the time the party was over I was exhausted. I could never be a kindergarten teacher. Whew! Major props to my mother in law, who teaches kindergarten, and to my son's teacher!

UEA Weekend

Every October the Utah Educators Association holds a big conference, so every year all the students get an extra long weekend sometime in October. In the past it has always annoyed me because I never knew when it was, and inevitably I would be trying to do some fun outing with the littles and for some reason everywhere was crowded with rowdy school kids!

This year was different. I have one of those rowdy school kids. And I was excited to have him home for a few days. We had a great time. On Thursday we went to the dollar store and picked up a poster board. Weston had borrowed a book about space from his kindergarten teacher. We read it and then were planning on doing some sort of project with it. We put together a poster with information and pictures. I cannot believe this, but I didn't get a picture of it. He did a really good job with all the writing and was so gung ho about doing this project. That took most of our morning. It was a nice day home relaxing with my kiddos.

Friday was our big outing day. We had made plans to meet up with my friend Tara and her kids to see the witches at Gardner Village. We go together every year. Usually we go early in the month, but with our older children in school now it's harder to find a time that works for everyone. Well we were sad that we hadn't found a time to go earlier in the month because Gardner Village was a madhouse. It was packed. We had to park in the back of this field and hike to the shops (seriously I had to carry Talia's stroller part of the way). There were so many people it almost wasn't fun. We couldn't get too close to the witches, and we didn't bother trying to get into the candy shop. We did wander through and see a few of the displays and the kids had fun together, but next year I will try to plan ahead better.
The kids were kind of bummed that we didn't stay at the witches for very long, but it was long enough and Talia was getting tired. We headed home and rested up for our next Halloweeny outing. That evening we met up with Ian at the pumpkin patch. It was wonderful. The weather was perfect and we found fantastic pumpkins. Thanks for another good year Mabey's Pumpkin Patch!
We worked up an appetite picking out our pumpkins, so we ate dinner together at Kneader's after the pumpkin patch. The rest of Friday night was filled with exciting furniture buying and arranging (see previous post).

Saturday morning I took Weston to karate while Ian took Davin to the stake center for a cleaning assignment. It was a productive morning. Then we switched. Ian took Weston with him to the BYU football game while I hung out with Davin and Talia. My big boys had a blast at the game. It was absolutely perfect weather, about 70 and sunny, for a middle of the day game. Plus BYU killed Idaho State 56-3!
Davin and I ate lunch and watched the first quarter of the game at home, then we hopped in the car and went to Chuck E. Cheese to play. Davin is getting big enough to do the games by himself. He had fun and was ready to pick a prize before we even finished using our tokens, which was fine by me. Talia was a trooper and only fussed a little even though she was pretty much ignored in her stroller the whole time we were there. I took Davin to Paradise Bakery for some cookies before we went home. It was a fun Davin date.
Saturday night was the adult session of stake conference. We went with friends and went out for shakes afterwards. It was a nice evening. Sunday morning I almost panicked thinking I had overslept and missed my Monday morning swim with my friend, Lori, before I realized that it was actually Sunday. It had already been such a long weekend I thought for sure it was over. Anyway, the broadcast of stake conference was very nice. We heard wonderful talks from Sister Dalton and Elder Bednar, two of my favorite speakers.

I even remembered to take a picture of Talia in her cute church dress! I have been feeling sad that I don't take more pictures of my kids dressed up, but Sunday mornings are usually so hectic getting ready and out the door by 8:45am that I don't have time for pictures.
Needless to say we had a lovely, long UEA weekend. Thank you teachers for having a conference so I could spend more time with my family. :)

Farewell

This weekend we said goodbye to the big red couch. It was bittersweet. I LOVED my red couch. I fell in love with her just over 7 years ago when we were still newlyweds living in our teensy basement apartment. We had inherited a hide-a-bed couch from Ian's parents when we got married, but it was not exactly my style or up to my preferred comfort level, so we bought a new couch. This was our only couch for many years. We added a loveseat in the den a couple year ago, but still the big red couch was our main place to sit and relax. It was also my escape at night. I slept on the big red couch often. Almost every night for the last few weeks of my pregnancies and many other nights when Ian was snoring or I was having insomnia I could always get a few good hours of sleep on my couch.

The big red couch the day we got her (Sept. 2004)

Then something sad happened. The frame on the red couch cracked during Davin's blessing weekend. I tried to get it fixed, but the furniture company had gone out of business and the manufacturer was downsizing and wouldn't answer my repeated calls. Finally I gave up on getting it fixed and accepted that we would be replacing it. I have pretty much been looking for the last 2 years. I wandered furniture stores, looked at store ads every Sunday, but never found just what I was looking for.

This last week I saw this cute gray set on sale at Smith's Marketplace. Weird to buy furniture from a grocery store, but whatever. I took the kids to check it out. I sat on it and I knew. This was the one. The color was right, the design was right, the price was definitely right. I texted Ian this picture and told him he had to come see it.
That night after we went to the temple Ian and I went back and looked at it again. We sat on it and chatted about where we would put the pieces (we've never had an actual furniture set before). It was fun. Last night Ian and our friend, Kerry, went and purchased the set and brought it home. It took 2 trips in the van, but by 11pm we had new furniture! Our big red couch went to a good new home. I am very happy with the new set (and it ended up being an even better deal than I thought with some last minute coupons!). I think we will take the chair to Ian's work until we move to our next home and have a place for it. In the meantime we are all enjoying hanging out on our new furniture!
Before:
After:

So the next time you come to visit us you will have a nice, comfy place to sit. Welcome to the big gray couch era. :)

Exploring

I'm a few days late, but Talia turned 10 months last week! She is getting so big and cuter than ever. She is still not crawling, but she manages to get around by scootching on her bum. Davin is learning the fine art of protecting his toys or moving to higher ground. Talia is such a great eater! She is by far the least picky child we've had so far. She also sleeps wonderfully (almost all of the time). She has three teeth. I think there is a fourth coming in on top too. Talia babbles constantly and likes to "sing" with me. I'm impressed with her pitch matching skills. :)
Our fun thing this weekend was that Ian and I got our new iphones! This is my first smartphone and it was a few months overdue. I was scraping by with Ian's old old Sony Ericsson since mine died a couple weeks ago. I love my new phone! It's so much fun and so convenient to have music, directions, people, games, and info right at my fingertips. I am very impressed with Siri so far too. She is quite good at understanding what I ask and doing it. So obedient. I like that.

Our phones came on Friday, so we spent the evening setting them up and playing on them. I'm always up for a game of Words With Friends, so look me up! We also took the kids to the park to enjoy the fantastic weather.
Saturday morning I had my MRI at the University of Utah hospital. I was a little nervous, but it went fine. I had an MRI on my knee back in high school, so I remembered the big machine and the loud noises it makes. Apparently it's a little different when you get your brain scanned though. I had to wear a hospital gown with weird hospital issue pants and a robe. The MRI machine was in this crazy airlocked room. Seriously the door was huge and rimmed with green lights and made a big whooshing sound when it opened. It was intense.

I got all situated on the table with my head in the headrest and then the nurse says she's going to start an IV. What?!? I didn't know this was part of the deal! I do not like needles, especially IV's, so I panicked a little. I asked why and she explained that halfway through the MRI they tested for changes. I have to admit this nurse was the best at putting an IV in that I've ever had, so that was good. She gave me headphones with classical music playing and then put this plastic cage like thing over my face. In the first few minutes I thought I was going to throw up and I was pretty anxious, but once I willed myself to relax I was fine and it was over in about half an hour. My hands went to sleep and I was pretty dizzy when I tried to stand up, but it really wasn't too horrible. And now it's over and my doctor just emailed me this morning to tell me that the results were all normal. Hooray!

Saturday afternoon Ian took Davin with him on a walk to do some Friends of Scouting fundraising. They saw this cool butterfly on their walk!
We spent the rest of the day watching the BYU v. Oregon State game on TV. Ian's parents were there sitting in the midst of the Oregon crowd, but we didn't see them. The game was a fun one to watch and BYU won! Go Cougars! For some reason Davin insisted on cheering for the Beavers. Weston even helped him make a "B" for Beavers sign. He was sad at the end when his team lost. It was pretty hilarious. He was walking around all Charlie Brown style hanging his head. Silly boy.
After the game we went outside to BBQ some burgers and zucchini. We ate outside for the last time this year. It was really nice out and we all enjoyed hanging out in the backyard and playing some ladderball after dinner.

Sunday afternoon found me in a grumpy mood. Not entirely sure what my problem was. We decided to go for a drive up the canyon and see the Fall leaves. It was a good idea. We went up to Snowbird and did the Barrier Free trail up to a lookout point. It was really fun to be outside in the crisp air and see the amazing Fall colors. The boys loved it too. We saw a squirrel and a fuzzy caterpillar and got caught in some leaf rain. I love hanging out with my little family.
Last night I noticed Davin's eye was all red and swollen. It didn't look any better this morning, so I took him to the doctor and confirmed he has pink eye. Blah. We already started his eye drops, so hopefully no one else will catch it. In the meantime we are taking it easy and doing laundry and watching Toy Story. Also it is sunny. I like it when it's sunny. The end.

The Folks

Friday night we got a babysitter and went on our first date in a long while. A co-worker and friend of Ian's got married and we attended the wedding. It was very beautiful. We had a nice time visiting with the work crowd. The plan was to go straight to the airport to pick up Ian's parents from the airport after the wedding, but alas their flight was delayed, so we decided to take advantage of the babysitter and go see a movie. It was a fun date.

Ian's parents got in pretty late Friday night. I was already asleep when Ian got back from picking them up. Saturday morning they came over from the hotel and went to karate with Weston. There is video of almost his entire class, but I'll spare you. For now.
After karate the boys made paper rockets and a PVC pipe rocket launcher. They had fun with the project. Then we bundled up and went out for lunch at In N Out and over to the park to launch rockets! It was a blast (pun intended). The rockets went really high. Ian and his dad almost got more of a kick out it than the kids. Ian is working on putting together a fun little video montage of the whole experience, so I'll be sure to post it when it's done.
After we were done shooting rockets I took Talia home for a nap while the rest of the group went swimming at the hotel. I hear it was great fun and that the boys were pretty good little swimmers. :)
After dinner we got a babysitter again and the adults all headed down to Provo for the BYU football game. It was chilly, but I kind of enjoyed bundling up for the game. It was a late game. Kickoff wasn't until 8:15 and we got home close to 1am. BYU played a good game and we won! We had such a great time in our great seats! Thanks Mom and Dad!
After about 4 hours of sleep it was time to get up and bathe kids and get ready for church. I had to teach, so I couldn't even be late. :) It was a nice Sunday and we enjoyed some down time with Grandma and Grandpa after church before they headed back to Portland. Thanks for the fun visit! Come again soon!

Date Day

Confession: I may have gone a little Groupon crazy for a few months awhile back. I have since found a little self control.

Yesterday I realized that one of my Groupons was about to expire. That day. I had originally bought the bowling for two Groupon thinking it would make a fun date for Ian and I, but life has been so busy and crazy that we haven't had time to go on a date for several weeks. I do get to spend a lot of time with a different guy though, so yesterday Davin and I went on a date. Talia came too.

We went bowling. It was kind of a ghetto bowling alley, but they had bumpers and 6 pound balls, so it worked. They did not, however, have ball ramps, so Davin had to just push his ball down the lane. I gave it some extra oomph almost every time it was his turn, but if I didn't get there in time then it was a looong wait for that 6 pound ball to make it's way down and knock over a couple pins. Davin loved bowling. He did special moves and celebration dances after he knocked over pins every turn. He did pretty well too. He got 80 in his first game! I wasn't too bad either. 119 in our second game.
After we worked up an appetite we drove over to Murray and used another Groupon for some Subzero ice cream. Subzero is one of those places that uses Nitrogen to freeze your concoction. It was kind of weird. Davin wanted rainbow swirl, so he put strawberry, banana, and watermelon flavorings into his cream and threw in some gummy bears for good measure. He thought the freezing process was pretty cool. I ordered one of their pre-invented creations. It was delish. I don't know that I would go back. I like regularly frozen ice cream better. It's creamier, but this was a fun little treat too. Davin was a perfect gentleman and even opened doors for me and let me spoon feed him. :)
Talia was really quite good during the whole date excursion. She got a little fussy when she was ready for a bottle, but who can blame her? She also enjoyed some of Davin's fruity ice cream. Today she is wearing a new outfit. I bought her Fall wardrobe last week and I'm kind of excited that the weather is cooling off enough now for her to wear it. I can't get enough of her cuteness! She is getting pretty close to crawling and can mostly scooch wherever she wants within a few feet. My baby girl is growing up!