I am thankful for....

My FAMILY that is coming into town tonight. I am so excited to have everyone together. In fact, we are even taking Craft Family pictures because we will actually have everyone in one place! Wish us luck...
Am I allowed to also be thankful that they are coming to ME this year? We usually travel to California, but this year they are coming to us! Yay, no 5 hour drive with the kids! This will make traveling for Christmas so much better. Can't wait. Games, golfing, shooting, shopping, EATING, late night talks, all the sisters in my bed....we have too much fun. Happy Thanksgiving!

The good life

Am I not the best Mom? Letting my kids watch a movie in MY bed with sippy cups and marshmallows and NO pants! What could be better than that? Actually there was a selfish reason behind this.....the adults were trying to play some games in the other room! Whatever works right? And it is pretty awesome to crawl into bed at night and find marshmallows in your sheets. Ahh the life I have.

Funny girl

"Just going to a meeting, Mom." This is what Ella said to me when I noticed her walking around in my boots.

Fort McLaws

I came home from a meeting one night and walked into a giant fort. Matt is always doing fun things for the kids (they are bored to death when I am home) and forts are a favorite. A time before this I found all three of them in a fort, lights out, and Matt had a flashlight and was reading them "Good Night Moon" because he thinks that book is really creepy!haha But anyways here are some pictures of all of us playing in the fort....except Matt who had his shirt off and I didn't think that was appropriate for the blog!(building forts is hard work I guess).

I don't know why Ella is making this face in all of the pictures...

I thought the next 2 pics were funny because you can see the size difference in Ella and Kash...one of them takes up much more tunnel!

They sure have a pretty fun dad! We are pretty lucky.

ALL BOY

Kash is a little obsessed with cars. (and trains and airplanes and bikes and motorcycles....:)) It is so funny to me how he is seriously ALL boy. I don't teach him to like these things, he just does. We will be driving in the car and he will absolutely freak out when he sees a bus, or a diesel truck, etc. People are always asking me if there is a difference with having a boy and a girl, and there definitely is! Ella will want me to hold her while Kash will growl at me and jump on my head. Ella will sit and color while Kash will throw his cars at the tv. And of course Kash is physically enormous while Ella is very petite. And boys arent nearly as dramatic as girls, although Kash does love to sit and pout with his big bottom lip hanging out! One similarity with my kids though is they like to take their favorite toys to bed with them. Ella will be buried in stuffed animals and Kash will not lay down until he has a car in each hand. So this is how I found Kash when I went to check on him during the night:

And as I walked down the hallway I stopped when I saw this:

I am so glad I've had the chance to have a boy and a girl! I feel pretty lucky!

Introducing...

Pebbles and Bam Bam

Here is a full body shot:
My dear friend Corinne made their darling outfits. Are they not the cutest? She did everything, all I had to do was accessorize them! How lucky am I? Originally Ella insisted that she wanted to be a butterfly, but I couldnt pass up the opportunity for them to be pebbles and bam bam. They just fit the part perfectly this year! Kash with his club was hilarious! Maybe next year I will actually let THEM pick out their outifits...maybe. :) Anyways sweet Corinne sewed a secret butterfly on the inside of Ella's costume to make her feel special. (Ella ended up loving her outfit but I still can't believe Corinne thought to do that!)

We had a lot of Halloween activities this year. Ella had to dress up for her preschool party, and for dance class, we had our ward party with the trunk or treat, another party and actual Halloween. This collage is of Alek and Corinne's 2nd annual Halloween party. Check out the festive food and especially the cupcakes that we had so much fun decorating. Kash and Ella LOVED painting thier pumpkins, Ella literally painted hers the entire time.

Also my mom and sisters came into town! The best was that they totally surprised me and dressed up like Safari girls to match Kash and Ella's outits. I didn't want to be left out so I attempted to throw an outifit together but ended up looking like a weird cowgirl! But we had so much fun and I just love that they did this.

We went trick or treating with Mike and Gina's fam and us girls had just as much fun as the kids! We couldn't stop laughing and striking poses. Embarrassing, I know. Both Ella and Kash really got into trick or treating, they were all for that candy! After every house we went to Ella would say, "can we go to the next house?" It got pretty old. :) And it was all we could do to keep Kash from grabbing ALL of the candy, not just one piece! Afterward we headed to my grandparents house for potato soup and apple cider. It was such a fun week.

More TrEaTs!

I had Gina come over so we could make some Halloween treats. It was crazy because we had so many different things going on at once and the kids were eating/throwing/smearing chocolate everywhere! Somehow we did end up with some spooky looking Halloween goodies though. Here are the spider cupcakes:

Can you tell what these are? It's my attempt at spiders in a spider web. Matt kept saying they looked like little egg sacks...:)

Gina made the candy apples. They turned out even with holding baby Eme the whole time!

The "helpers".

By the time we were finished the house was destroyed, the kids were covered in chocolate, and Gina and I were ready for a nap! But we will totally be doing this again!

I LOVE traditions!

Every year we decorate Halloween cookies at my grandparents house. It is always fun and always a HUGE mess! This year was especially fun because we had lots of cousins there:

Just look at the concentration....

There was a lot of tasting going on...

Showing off her finished product.

Syd and Ella are best buds!

Julia and Madeline are little artists! They were the last ones at the table hard at work!

Even the simplest of traditions is so fun and I love that they will always remember things like this.

Staheli Farm

Staheli Farm was tons of fun for the kids. They LOVED this horse swing, they went on it a ton and could have stayed there all night.

The slides were hilarious because the kids went FLYING down them! They went super fast and landed into a pit of corn.

Kash was especially excited to go on the train! Gina even took baby Eme for a ride.

Kar and Ella checking out the animals. Kash actually got bit by a turkey...I guess thats what happens when you choose to ignore everyone telling you to NOT put your fingers in the cage!

Before I knew it Kash climbed up here to go on the rope swing! Luckily I talked him down before he tried it.

Adam, Ella, Kash

Once again Ella surprised me with wanting to go on the horse. We asked her if she wanted Dad or Kash to go with her but she insisted she wanted to go by herself! As soon as she got on there she said, "yee-haw" with one hand in the air. Her Papa would be proud of his little cowgirl!

Baby #3!

I really thought our next big purchase would be a house. It's what I've been hoping and praying for. And we have been working really hard at finding "the one." Well when Matt gets an idea in his head he just goes for it. He isn't one of those people that researches every product before buying, he is one of those people that goes with their gut! So he came home the other day with this in the driveway:

The only discussion we have had on a new vehicle has been that when we decide to have a third baby, we will have to make an upgrade. We were not going to fit 3 car seats in the back of my car, so yes, when we decide to get pregnant we would start looking at bigger cars. Well as far as I know I am NOT pregnant. Hmmm I guess my Denali will be my baby #3 for now.

First day of dance...

Ella had her first dance class and she had to be the cutest thing ever! She was so excited and LOVED wearing her dance clothes! She kept spinning around the house saying, "look at me, Mom!" I can't wait for their Christmas recital so I can check her out in action!

Kash didnt want to be left out...

Fall is here!

It is really starting to feel like Fall and I love it! We have picked out our pumpkins and Ella and Kash get so excited when they see anything related to Halloween. If we are in the store and we pass Halloween decorations Ella screams and says, "It's almost Halloween! It's coming!" I have really been wanting to get in the kitchen and bake pumpkin bread and pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. As soon as it starts cooling off I immediately want to make Soup which has been so yummy on cooler nights. Anyways my sister Karlee came into town and we made caramel apples! It was so fun and they were SO good and turned out really cute. I had never made them before so it was a learning process but a way fun fall activity!

I ended up wrapping these up and taking them visiting teaching...fun little treat to give away!