Happy Thanksgiving

We headed up to fridged Northern Utah on Wednesday.
We had planned to stay until Sunday, but due to a huge storm, we left on Saturday, with lots of tears from Karson.

Lindsay, Josh, their boys, and my Grandma Betty came out for dinner on Thanksgiving.

The kids frosted sugar cookies that night.

We also got to take a trip out to Antelope Island.

Saw a Coyote,

Some Ta Tonka (Buffalo)





And the Great Salt Lake


Took some family pictures

The "barn cat" would not leave us alone, he wanted to be in every picture.

The kids got to play with Porter and Bryson before we had to take off on Saturday.

When we got home, we had a "couple" boxes at our front door.

Apparently, Ryan got on the USPS home box delivery program unbeknownst to him.

Aubree

It's the 7th year in a row we've celebrated Nov 14th.
We have all the reason in the world!



Aubree wanted to get her ears pierced for her birthday, and I was all for it!

I had to wait clear until I was 12 and that was with lots of begging.
The girls at Claire's gave her a big bear to hold while they did the piercing.

Aubree choose to have both ears done at once, which is good because if you are not a fan of pain, you may leave with only one ear pierced.

She was a little nervous....this picture is so funny, she was trying to be so brave!

She also chose to have her beloved "rainbow lizard" on her birthday cake. We had a local bakery "Layers" do the cake from a picture of her lizard.
They did a great job and Aubree loved it! The lizard was made of white chocolate and was eaten immediately.


As most children, after every commercial on Nickelodeon came on, she would tell me that is what she wanted for her birthday. She was more recently persistent about a "mommy cat that has kittens" and I looked everywhere and couldn't find anything toy related. Finally I was able to see the commercial and laughed so hard, because it was a "I can be a vet" Barbie! NO mention whatsoever of the Barbie! Only the cats! Ryan and I both said she would get it and not even play with the Barbie, and that is exactly what happened. Funny girl!

We love this beautiful, smart, funny and talented girl SO much and are so grateful for Nov 14th!

Halloween

So if you are expecting a typical Halloween blog with two normal children dressing in appropriate Halloween costumes, then you have come to the wrong place.

If you would like to see a 6 year old girl dressed as a paleontologist and a 9 year old boy that would rather stay home and pass out candy, costume-free, then this is the place!

Strangely, there was not any paleontologist costumes for 7 year old girls any where to be found.

But if your daughter wants to be a fairy or a princess, or a fairy princess, then there's no shortage of those costumes.

Luckily, because there is not a standard to be held to, we were able to throw a few things together, give her a dinosaur hatching from an egg puppet, and we were official.

Karson's shirt says "I don't do costumes, now step aside you're standing on my invisible dog"

Most kids immediately go through their Halloween candy upon arriving at home, but if you are a paleontologist, then it is apparently more important to impress all the neighbors with your fantastic, creative and so adorable costume then the actual receipt of candy.

Aubree and I went out trick or treating while Karson and Ryan stayed home to pass out candy.

At every house Aubree would get them to pet her dinosaur and give her additional candy (that she didn't even care about) because she had the "very best and smartest" costume.

She also had her dinosaur tell every person "thank you" in the baby dinosaur voice.

One guy gave her a couple pieces of candy, then asked her what she was, when she told him, his eyes got really big and asked her if that was what she wanted to be when she grew up. She of course said yes and he then gave her 2 huge handfuls of candy.

This is a very good lesson for her to learn. Paleontology = Extra candy.