Spelling Logs

 Donovan and Elliott just couldn't stay away from school during their break.  Here is the alphabet made from lincoln logs.

Cut! (Warning, gross pictures below!)

After a not so wonderful experience at the doctor's office, my doctor shot me!

 Just kidding!  I had to get a cyst cut out of my leg that had been bothering me for years.  The black color is really ok, the dr. had to use silver nitrate to stop the bleeding.  The bedside manner of this dr. was atrocious! (I initially went to see him about a bladder infection and he said it could have been caused by the fact that I have "too many children!" Really?  I don't think I have enough!   He even assumed I was ok with forceful needle poking because I had birthed 4 babes - he really said that!)  After this procedure I will look for another doctor.

Even though it looks like an odd eye is growing on my leg, it is healing well.   Being the mother of SO many children (ha ha), my children are very interested in mommy's flesh wound.  Even Avery keeps pointing at it and says "bo, bo" which in Avery talk means "That looks painful, may I please stick my finger in it?"  I look forward to the day when it will look normal!  Until then I will keep it bandaged up and be on the look-out for a better doctor for the next time.  :)  

Library at the Polar Express

I've posted in the past how awesome our little library is with its programs.  This time we got to go to the polar express.  The kids got to dress in their pajamas and we made a tree ornament, had some yummy cookies, got to draw and do games, listen to a reading of Chris VanAllsburg's Polar Express, and met with a special someone...

 The kids making their tree ornament.

 The special someone was Santa!  Avery was ok for a bit with him.  I was surprised.

 Donovan

 Elliott listening intently.

Roswell.

We had a great time.  The library staff did an awesome job!

Dono's Award

Donovan received a Summa Cum-Laude certificate for getting all A's on his report card!  What a smarty!

Getting the award from his teacher Mr. Vacha.

For some reason, most pictures in their gymnasium come out dark.  Donovan with some fellow smarty-pants.  Wonderful job Dono!  Keep it up!

First Snow Day of the School Year!

We love snow days!  This was the first real snowfall of the season and we got around 10 inches.  School was cancelled and Dan got to go in delayed to work, so we cleared the driveway and had fun!

 Roswell helping clear the driveway.

 Avery was a trooper!  She fell and couldn't get back up, so she crawled in it instead!

 And never cried!  Of course we picked her up though.

 Elliott shoveling.

 Donovan helping Mommy with the walkway to the front door.

 Dan working hard.

 Avery having fun and being cuddly.

 The kids loved eating the snow, only white stuff of course!

 Making snow angels.

 Ross wasn't really sure how to make one but thought it was fun to lay in the snow.

Avery didn't want to go in, but she was done playing in the snow.  She and Daddy watched as we made a little snowman.

Random Pics

We like to dress up around here, so there is always an assortment of things to wear.  Here's some pictures I found on my phone that show some cuteness.

 Avery kitty.  She is so sneaky now and growing big so fast.  For a while we were teaching her how to say "please".  With me she would just keep saying more in sign language and say "mo" but when Dan would ask her to say please, she would turn her head to the side like this and start to bat her eyes!  Lil' stinker!  She learned quick that Daddy is a sucker for a cute girl.  She has since learned to say please the real way.  :)

 She also loves to be a superhero/cowgirl.

 I thought this was cute.  She'd rather eat her plate than her sandwich.

This con has made his way into our lives.  I don't think I posted his picture for Halloween.

Happy Vegetarian's Veteran's Day!

Earlier this week, Elliott came home saying that they learned about Vegetarian Day.  We couldn't figure out what he was talking about, a day for meatless eaters?  We were unaware of such a holiday, so we asked him to tell us more about it.  Then he started telling us that they were singing songs for a special program for it. 

Hmmmm... 

Then we asked when they were singing their songs.  On Friday!  Ah!  Light bulb!  VETERAN's Day!

Dan and I had a good laugh.  We should have known, I think Donovan called it Veterinarian Day when he was in Kindergarten.  All day today they kept slipping and calling it Vegetarian Day.  So I made them a meatless lunch - just to be on the safe side.  just kidding.

We are very grateful for our Veterans!  Both of our Papa's served our country, we also have cousins and other relatives who have served or are currenly serving in the armed forces.  We are very blessed to have wonderful people helping to keep us free.

Here is my wonderful singer Elliott with the songs that his class sang for the Veterans today:

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
www.onetruemedia.com

Dilemma

I haven't blogged in a while, and back in early October I tried to download my memory card so that I could blog and also so that I could send pictures from a service project that we took part in (that I was the only photographer for our group) to the person in charge.  My memory card refused to download.  Now it says I need to format my disk before using.  I'm so mad!  I lost thousands of pictures!  Thank goodness I have been downloading pictures to the computer often, but I still lost about a month's worth of pictures.  The sad thing is that I know that the service project and other photos are lost forever.  The good thing is, I have forgotten my camera a lot lately and have taken pictures with my phone instead, so at least I have those pictures from the missing time frame.  I guess my absentmindedness was a blessing!  Without further ado, I will blog about the things I remember.  :)

Happy Halloween!

We had great fun dressing for Halloween this year.  The kids new exactly what they wanted to be, we just had to do a little switcharoo.

 Elliott the batman

 Roswell the courageous lion.

 Donovan as Mario (the mustache was huge!)  but a great costume I found for $5!

 Avery the ballerina with her pumpkin purse (she loves purses!)

 The gang all ready to start the festivities!  First off, to Dan's work to do trick-or-treating and fun activities.

 They got to trick-or-treat to each employee's cubicle, then we got to watch Halloween shows in one of the classrooms while we colored, made puzzles, and decorated pumpkins.

 The boys painting their pumpkins.

 All the UoP staff had fun coloring too!  Who says the party isn't just for the kids!

 Avery had fun being pretty and hanging around her convict dad.

The decorated pumpkins.

After Dan's work party, we had dinner and then went around to trick-or-treat.  The kids got quite the loot!  We only did a friend's cul-de-sac and they got tons.  And of course, they love to share.  :)

Elliott's 1st Field Trip

I got to go with Elliott on his first Kindergarten field trip.  We went to Peacock Rd. Tree Farm.

 My little energetic group: Jeremiah, Elliott, and De'Lisa.

 They each got to pick a pumpkin (one for me too!)

 They got to hear from a very animated guide all about the "old" way of living.

 Elliott and his whole class in front of the old cabin.

 He had to go to school for the field trip too!

 Elliott in his desk, yes it was very cold!

 Playing on a haystack. 

 Elliott went above and beyond to pet the horse.

 feeding a goat

 crazy kids!

 Elliott and Jeremiah

 Getting ready for the pig races.  They were playing really loud country music, I guess Elliott is not shy because he was the only one that stood up in front of the 4 kindergarten classes and just started dancing and getting his groove on.  It was hilarious!

A fun field trip!  Elliott sat with Caden on the way back.  She has such a crush on Elliott, and even kissed him when Dan was volunteering in the classroom!  Watch out Elliott!  He seems to have the girls' attention though because there's another girl, Mira, who just loves him and they are best friends.

Dan's 1/2 Marathon on Mackinac Island

Ever since Dan has started running and racing, his goal has been to run the Mackinac Island Great Turtle Race 1/2 Marathon.  He trained like a madman.  The day finally came!  Tom and Stephanie Smith wonderfully offered to watch the kids the WHOLE weekend so that we could enjoy ourselves on the island.  Since Dan's car needs a muffler fix (it gives quite the headache!) we decided to rent a car.  It was awesome!  It was the cheapest car, but it had plenty of room, cruise control, and Sirius radio!  That was fun! They had some great channels that never got static and hardly any commercials.

 I'm not good at taking self-pictures.  Beautiful drive though!

 I've never been to the U.P. before, so we drove over the Mackinac Bridge into the Upper Penninsula.  This bridge is crazy!  It's a huge suspension bridge that is only held up by 2 tall posts.  The road is made of grates that you can see the lake below when walking across and when the wind blows, you will sway too.  Kinda freaky!

 Dan and I on the top deck of the ferry.  Did I mention that winter is coming?  It was freezing!

 A view from the ferry of the bridge we just crossed.

 We found a good deal to stay on the island at the Murray Hotel.  Thank goodness we were mostly going to spend time outdoors!  This room was TINY!  Just the necessities.  Here is Dan showing the width of the room.  He had maybe 1 1/2 -2 feet before he touched the other wall.  We figure that it was probably a 8x10ft room.  They did have a tv though.  Once we figured to plug it in there was absolutely no volume.  There wasn't much to do on the island once it got dark and the shops closed, so we asked the front desk (there was no phone in the room - guess that wasn't a necessity) if there was a trick to the tv, or would we have to read lips.  They were very eager to fix the problem.  First they thought that we must have been dumb or something and tried different ways to turn the volume on (which we already tried a couple times) and then nicely they took someone else's tv and gave it to us.  That was very nice of them.  We ended up watching all the Mackinac episodes of Dirty Jobs.  It was quite fun not having to read lips.

 What was also nice, was that they leave cookies by your bed at night and you can have all the hot cocoa that you desire. 

 While getting there a day early for the race, we decided to walk other parts of the island that I've never seen (for parts I have seen, please go to our last trip to M.I. here).  Here's a view of a hunk by the shore.

 The fort.  It was closed (we always seem to come when it's closed).

 The old fort on the highest spot on the island.

 Arch Rock.  This all used to be under water, then when the water receeded, this hole was left.  It had been filled with a different kind of rock that wasn't the same as the rest (Dan the geologist can explain this tons better, sorry) and it eroded (? don't know it that's the correct term) leaving the hole.

 View from Arch Rock

 As we were walking (we walked several miles), through the forest we saw a lonely lamp-post.  It was awesome!  It made us think of the lamp-post in the Narnia series!  We searched and searched then found that it was actually to light up a road on the other side.  But from this point of view it was so cool!

 Race Day

 Pre-race!  It was really cold.  After this picture I put on my jacket and gloves.  I knew it would be at least 2 hours before I saw Dan again, so I bunkered down in nice beach chair right by the shore to finish working on and reading for my sacrament talk for the next day.  A beautiful place to do it!

In the mid-right of the picture you can see Dan in his maroon shirt.  Off he goes!  The neat thing was that his special number tag had electronic readers on it to calculate when you actually start and finish the race lines.  That was really great, because there were almost a thousand crazy people running the 1/2 marathon, and it takes a while to get them herded to start!

 Dan heading for the finish!

 Dan crossing the finish, you can see the time when the race started, but his official time was 2:25:22!  He did an awesome job!

 Dan was wiped out!  He ran the ENTIRE 13.1 miles!  No walking!  I'm so proud of him!   This course had huge steep hills and dirt paths in it.  He kept saying "People who do marathons are CRAZY!"  He couldn't see turning around and doing it again.  Yet a day later he tells me another 1/2 that he'd like to do, or to train for a marathon.  I remind him what he told me about being crazy!  :)  Speaking of crazy, Dan told me that during the race there was a group of people running with silly hats.  One of the guys during the first few miles of the race was acting silly and dancing about swinging his arms and totally whacked an unsuspecting runner in the face.  Her nose started bleeding and wouldn't stop.  The guy just says "oops, sorry" and takes off to finish the race.  Dan asked if she was ok.  She wasn't, she had to stop and turn around and go back to the start and quit.  How sad.  It's great to have fun, but not at the expense of others.

 Dan with his race jacket and medal.

Dan did an awesome job!  We are so proud of him and his accomplishments!  The kids also had a great time (though Avery was sick and got Stephanie sick too), I'm sure the Smiths were happy to have the quiet of their home back.  :)  We love them and are so happy that they love to watch our kids.  It was a great weekend.