October adventures with Grandpa

Since we had such a great time at Linder Farms, my dad decided we should check out the Farmstead with the kids and see how it compared - and happily, Chuck had an open schedule that night and could come too! Holy moly, there was so much to do - the kids (and adults) had a blast. We started with the "Bee Line" and it was definitely one of our favorite attractions, especially when we all lined up to race:

Notice Jack winning on the bottom right, after having gotten a pretty great push head start ;).

Next up was the blasters, aka a pumpkin cannon and corn rifle. Probably safe to say this was one of Chuck's favorite stops...

Then we did some fishing! They have a little pond area that they keep stocked with fish for you to catch and release. Clyde was a superstar and made our first catch of the day.

And then we stuck around for a while so the rest of us could catch one too - here's Will:

He was so into it!

And Jackers, who got help from both Daddy and Grandpa, lucky kid:

Aaaand I even got in on the action! At the insistence of my persuasive father ;). I'm not really the outdoorsy type, but even I could handle this. And it brought back fun memories of going fishing when I was little!

We made a brief stop at the basketball/football arena; feel free to admire my form:

Some of the side attractions - corn pit is always a pleaser, the bouncy area was kind of fun, I am nice and hopped into a barrel with Carma for a ride, Will being on his hands and feet on the spider web kills me, and the PVC pipe 'slide' was a bust.

Quick photo ops on the big rocking chair...

... and in lock-up. 

Clyde's favorite thing was probably the 'Friendly Fire' where you shoot soft, foam balls at each other out of modified paintball guns. He and Chuck went back to that one a few times.

The potato sack slide was way fun, albeit a bit bumpy. 

My least favorite thing was the 'Creature'. I don't know why I went in but I did and nearly had a panic attack. I clung to Chuck pretty good until I saw an emergency exit and then I got the hello out of there. The kids loved it and talked Grandpa into taking them a second (and third??) time. Chuck and I stayed outside with Carma and took selfies :).

Towards the end of the night we headed back to the Bee Line for a few more rides, including this one with Grandpa and the older boys. Love!!

We wandered briefly into the corn maze but ultimately decided the 'Grain Train' was more our speed. We did find a nice passerby to take our picture though:

And then after some delicious mini donuts that were consumed much too quickly to photograph, we headed home where my children slept sooo solidly that night haha!

We got to have another adventure with Grandpa the next week, hooray! On Halloween afternoon we headed over to Boise and met my dad at a spot along the Boise River near his house. First we walked along the greenbelt and found different colors of fallen leaves...

and then we walked along the river and found Snickers bars hidden amongst the rocks! I'll tell you what, I could get more into the outdoorsy thing if I was always guaranteed chocolate...

Next up was a trip to Burger King for some general holiday merriment:

and then back to Grandpa's house to play with light sabers and pumpkins - such an excellent way to spend Halloween afternoon!! 

I really love living close to my dad and my kids love the time they get to spend with him - and it was fun to relive all of these fall adventures here in April haha!

October stuff that happened and was church-related

The oh-so-darling Kaliska (#4) played freshman volleyball and Tasha and Janell and I finally all got to go watch her play! Kiki was as spirited on the court as she is in real life and I was so impressed with her focus and effort.

(Her team was playing in support of awareness of domestic abuse, hence all of the purple!)

That weekend was general conference! We kicked off that morning with everyone piling into bed with me after Chuck left for work - I like that the boys are cuddling and Carma's on her own with the ipad haha. The favorite during conference activities were coloring on the dry erase boards and building with marshmallows and toothpicks:

And we headed outside between sessions and in the evenings to play and ride bikes! Will and Jack were very intrigued by the little snake we found on the greenbelt path. I was less intrigued, more freaked out ;).

And here are pictures of my daughter trying to eat roly polys (polies?).

EWWWWWWWWW.

Okay, ward temple night itself was wonderful as always. Buuuut when we got back outside we had several missed calls from Chuck's dad and two voicemails asking us to call right away - and Dave sounded hoarse/upset. I started freaking out and imagining the worst - something had happened to someone in the family, etc. Chuck tried to call back to no avail as I pulled up facebook to see if anything had been posted there. Fiiiinally Chuck's dad called back and it turned out he just had a cold and they were checking to see if they could come up that weekend. I was so relieved and so mad hahaha.

But once that we knew everything was okay we took some pictures and laughed at how photogenic we are ;).

The new Nampa Deseret Industries opened, yay! They asked for volunteers from our ward and you better believe that I signed up to be there Opening Day ;). It was so fun to see the people lined up outside and to watch the ribbon-cutting ceremony - especially since President Smith is our stake president! I usually try to lay low around stake people (I mean, I understand the principle with Jonah and the whale - you can't hide from the Lord but I also don't need my face/name to be on their radar) but I did say hi to President Smith so he'd know Nampa East was represented :). Sister Greener (top left) was there too from our ward and totally put everyone else to shame with her work ethic. Sister McLean (bottom left) was coming on shift as I was leaving that afternoon and Brother and Sister Piippo were there passing out balloons - they're hard to see in the picture.

The bottom right picture is the group of women I got to work with as we manned the fitting rooms. We were seriously hopping the entire five hours I was there - keeping the line organized (and separate from the checkout line THAT WAS SO LONG IT WOUND THROUGH THE ENTIRE STORE!!), getting rejected clothes back on hangers, helping direct shoppers to the areas of the store they needed, etc. It was so fun! The new store is really nice and big and is housed with LDS Social Services and Employment Services and the Nampa Idaho Mission offices. I do miss having D.I. just a couple minutes from our house, but I've managed to maintain my once-a-week trips, so that's good :).

Fun Sunday pictures! My mom stopped by one day after her church and before ours and so we took a picture of her with Willy Boy since they matched and one with Carma even though they didn't ;).

And then some blurry pictures at church - we did a Sunday School class pic, and one of me and Carma and Raquel since we were all wearing purple and black. The bottom right is Sister Curtis and Carma - Grace was heading in to nursery and asked Carma to go 'help her deliver a paper' and Carma was alll over that. So cute!

Towards the end of the month I got to go back to the temple, this time to help clean! The temple closes twice a year for a couple of weeks for deeeep cleaning and it was so fun to be a part of; most of my time was spent gently wiping down delicate chandelier crystals whilst perched on a ladder.

I got to work with some really neat ladies (my cohort on the big chandelier was a cute recently returned sister missionary) and I also came up with a pretty profound metaphor involving lightbulbs and crystals and the gospel and once I remember exactly how it went y'all will be the first to know ;).

next up: lots more October! I have mint brownies promised to me if I catch up to the end of December by the end of May, soooo I'm a pretty motivated blogger at this point!

September everything else!

Carma is definitely our little night owl; this particular night she was adorably cuddling with this blanket that my Grandma Carma made when I was a baby and her bear that Grandma Pam gave her for Christmas.

 If we want to continue the animal comparisons, Carma is allllso a little fish and looooves bathtime. Even if it's not, you know, supposed to be bathtime. Even if it requires her to dive in, fully clothed, during Jack's bathtime... GRRRRR. That face though!! Saves her little life :).

 Random pictures: this was back when we discovered Carma's love of markers. We've since had to hide all the markers in the house because she also loves coloring on herself... walls... carpets... homework... etc. Also we continue to marvel at her flexibility, especially when she's asleep. Does that look remotely comfortable? Anyone? Jack meanwhile is my cutest sleeper.

 

 Carma and Jack got comfortable during one of our many trips to DI in September, the one a few minutes away from our house was getting ready to close so we hit it up frequently as the discounts got steeper ;). And a little brother piano duet picture! I usually don't go in during their lessons but I sneaked in at the end of this one; Sister Christensen is so good with them.

 Also during September, we made sure to keep tabs on the progress of the new DI haha:

So pretty right?

 Chuck's work had their annual softball game - juvenile detention vs. juvenile probation. Carma kept tabs on Daddy on the field...

 and cute little Elias off the field ;).

 The boys stayed occupied with a huge dirt pile and running around playing tag!

 And very happily Detention pulled out the win! Obviously I'll give all the credit to the super cute coach ;). (Chuck was the coach... in case that wasn't clear...)

Team Picture:

 This was the 14th year of the detention vs. probation softball game and the 10th win for detention!

 And as proof that my husband is a scholar as well as an athlete, here's a darling picture of Chuck and Will reading some Encyclopedia Brown: 

 

 I mean, I don't remember the circumstances of this picture of Carma but how cute is she???? (answer: very.)

 Sometimes you glance down and realize your son is snuggled up next to your feet on the kitchen floor... he's just a little attached ;).

 And here's Jack, warming up his birthday boy shirt a few months early. Spoiler alert: he refused to wear it when the day actually rolled around hahaha.

I found Carma a little BSU cheerleader outfit a while back at Savers and even though I knew it would still be too big, I couldn't resist sticking her in it for one of the early games of the season - which necessitated the boys getting their jerseys on too and a photo shoot with stelllllar results:

Cutest little Bronco fans ever!!

 It's possible Carma figured out how to take a selfie...

Jog-a-thon time! One of our favorite Park Ridge traditions, aka excuses to bust out the spray hair dye.

Clyde and Will both did great, and if I had blogged about this in any kind of timely manner I'd probably remember how many laps they each got!

I opted not to jog along this year (I didn't want to accidentally burn any calories) and instead focused on cheering for all the cute kids as they passed - here are some of the kids' friends from class and church and scouts!

 Chuck and I went on a date to someplace other than the temple or Costco! We were all shocked. The occasion was a library fundraiser lunch at Texas Roadhouse. We are grateful to the generous Annette for the tickets, my awesome dad for babysitting the wee ones, and our attentive waiter (on loan from the library staff) who kept the rolls and honey butter coming. That stuff lived up to its reputation!

 I'm not sure who loves legos more: me or the boys. They keep them entertained for hours on end - this was a base that Clyde built and I just thought was the cutest thing ever.

 At the end of September my dad treated the kiddos and me to an afternoon/evening at Linder Farms (Chuck had appts at the church) and we had soooo much fun... as the next five hundred pictures will verify ;)

 Turns out my dad is a bull-riding champ!

We had such a great time, thanks again Dad!!

 And just for fun, I found these pictures of me and Carma taken seriously 12 hours apart, one from 11:15 in the morning on September 10th and one at 11:15 that night when she blessedly finally passed out.

Aaaand thus concludes September which means I'm onto October which means I'm only six months behind! Booyah! (fun fact: I don't think I've ever actually said... or written... 'booyah' before... I kind of like it!)