Happy 80th Birthday Grandpa Paul!

My Grandpa Paul (my Dad's Dad) turned 80 today and to celebrate such a milestone his kids put together a surprise birthday party for him in Ellensburg. He was really surprised and LOVED every minute of it. He's a friendly guy so he had lots of friends come to visit and eat all the yummy desserts. My grandpa farmed with my Dad so I grew up with him around. I drove his truck (I even wrecked it!), played at his house, watched picture slides with him, drank his cold pop and loved having him come to my sporting events. Happy Birthday!

My family with Grandpa and Grandma

Random picture- my Mom with Preston :)

We're Not in Kansas Anymore!

Here are the kiddos in their Halloween costumes. Let's just say it was crazy on Saturday. Kyle left around 3:30 to go set up the Spook House at the Church and wouldn't be back home (the ward halloween party started at 5 pm) and so I had to get both kids ready on my own. I had no idea how I would do Preston as a scarecrow so I made it up as I went. He screamed the entire time I was stapling raffia to his clothes. Then he coughed, gagged and threw up on his overalls. Totally stressful for me. Then I forgot about the cornbread cooking in the oven and raced downstairs to pull it out, luckily it wasn't too overdone. I loaded the kids up, the food, the candy, the hula hoops (for a game) and the prizes. We made it and Preston was super good the rest of the night and didn't even pull at the raffia until right before we were leaving. He even left his hat on- miracle!

Kate and her friend Alyssa. There was black wig hair wrapped around that carmel apple sucker of Kate's. DISGUSTING!

Jackson (munchkin), Preston (scarecrow) and Dallin (monkey)- the three boys born last October.

I love this picture of them checking each other out. My friend, Jeanne, handmade those munchkin shoes!!! Impressive. (Jeanne was Dorothy too!)

Our latest

Tonight is our ward Halloween Party (it's called Boogly Nights) with food, games and trunk-or-treating. I will probably put on my awesome bowling outfit complete with shoes (not sure if Kyle will again) for the party tonight. Kate is "Dorothy" and I'm going to try and make Preston a scarecrow.

Yesterday was busy, but fun. We went to a friend's house for lunch, made roll-out sugar cookies shaped liked pumpkins, bats and moons then, frosted and decorated them with Darbi and her kids in the afternoon. I also watched a friend's kid in the afternoon (he slept for 3 hours! Where can I get a kid like that?!). That was the easiest babysitting I've ever done. :)

On Wednesday, my parents and sister, Sara, came over to trade in a car and buy a car in Bellevue so they swung up here after buying the car and I had yummy taco salads ready for them. I made the taco shells homemade- so easy and so good. Then my ultra kid friendly Dad (for real- he is so patient!) stayed home with Kate and Preston while my Mom, Sara and I hit the mall. We found lots of great shirts for my Mom and Sara found plenty of things to buy too, of course. After Kyle got off work, we all headed down to Southcenter to meet Marci at Cheesecake Factory to have dinner. My Mom had made these cute pumpkins out of a paper bag and filled them with candy. When she gave Kate one, Kate said, "ohhh" all tenderly and went and showed my Dad and said, "it's so cute!" We thought that was pretty funny how she reacted to it. I'm glad she appreciated it so much. It was a fun day.

To Bowl or Not to Bowl...

We are so not the type of people to dress up for Halloween, but we were invited to a couples Halloween party and decided to be brave and dress up- gasp! Kyle's work has put on two bowling tournaments in the past couple of years and has made bowling shirts for each team. He has 2 lovely bowling shirts now in his closet and we decided to put them to good use again and be bowlers for the party. I really wanted to find bowling shoes to complete the ensemble so I thought of asking bowling alleys if they had any old shoes they were going to throw away or are needing to get rid of. After calling three different bowling alleys, the last one I called I talked to a lady who was SO nice and said "oh yeah, we can definitely find you some. What sizes did you need?" She was so giving and super friendly about it while the other places were "no we don't have any old shoes" and "I'll have to see, we are getting new shoes in and will be throwing out some old one's, but I don't know..." Needless to say I was excited with this lady who was so willing to help me out! She didn't even charge me. Our costume was complete now! We put a fake mustache on Kyle and slicked his hair down. He looked so funny and I couldn't stop laughing and if he rubbed or itched his nose he would smear the black eyeliner. We were both cracking up. I put my hair in pigtails and put my wrist brace on that I have for when I get tendonitis. People at the party were like "what did you do to your wrist?" And I said, "oh, I'm protecting my bowling hand." I'm such a good actor. (HA!) It was fun to go to the party to see everyone else that dressed up. Some people are so creative with their costumes. It was a good night out with good food and good friends.

Quirks

Wandering Nana tagged me to post some of my quirks. But hey, I think these are all normal things. :)

1. I have to have the perfect bite when eating. I have to carefully put a little of each food on my fork before taking a bite. My sister, Marci, tells me I enjoy my food a lot.

2. I can't stand when people smack. It is really annoying and very obvious to me. When Kyle and I were dating he was smacking his gum and we were on a long car drive. It took me several hours to build up the courage to tell him to stop smacking his gum. It was either that or I was going to jump out of the car!!! Very extreme, I know.

3. I write lots of lists. I'll write a list to tell me to write a list (not really...) I don't like to forget to do something and it's much better when I write it down before I forget it.

4. I have a loud distinct laugh and I can thank my Mom for that one. :)

5. It really bothers me when people don't even drive the speed limit. Come on... they can legally go faster and they don't?!?!

6. Before I curl my eyelashes, I get the eyelash curler hot with the blow dryer. I think it helps curl my lashes better.

There you go. I dare Marci, Jeni, Melanie and Dee Ann to do this.

Happy 1st Birthday Preston!

Happy Birthday Preston! You are such a big boy turning 1!!!

(Only a couple of days old- so little)

Even though he's probably had enough cake this weekend, I wanted him to have cake on his real birthday. So I made some and after dinner we had him open our presents- one from Kate and one from us. Then, we had cake and ice cream. I think he liked it. :)

Football Game, House Painting and Birthdays

We went to my parent's house this weekend. It was a lot of fun. Here are some highlights.




FRIDAY: Watched Jared's high school football game in the pouring rain and they won!, eating tri-tip steak dinner at the game which was oh so good. Seeing all my brothers and sisters.


SATURDAY: Painting Kyle's grandmas house from an ugly blue (right family?!) to a much nicer tan with white trim. The neighbors are already thanking us! :) (We had resided it this summer so we are now just painting it and it's still not done in the back, but from the road it looks great.) Making cupcakes to celebrate Preston's soon to be first birthday. Getting my hair cut by Melanie, eating Cafe Rio pork for dinner- yum and making adorable cards at the girls' only stamp camp with my sisters and soon to be sister-in-law.

Kyle taking one for the team and painting from the roof!

Preston and Reed chillin' in the grass

Preston's sport ball cupcakes. I found the idea off the internet and I thought they were so cute.

Preston devouring his cupcake, love the squished frosting between his fingers.

My Mom's barn cake she made to celebrate Aubree and Preston's birthdays this week (we have 4 birthdays within 6 days- 2 are on the same day!) My Mom had farm themed games for the kids to play. It was her little party for the kiddos.

SUNDAY: Watching General Conference, watching Preston open presents, going for a walk and visiting with neighbors and celebrating Sara's 19th birthday!