The Zoo in November

The Utah Hogle Zoo has free days in the winter - the last Wed of each month Nov - Feb (I think).  The last Wed in November my friend Jenny reminded me of this and told me she was going to the zoo that day.  I had a lot to do that day to get ready for Thanksgiving and we had a big project to do cleaning out a bedroom that Paul was going to start remodeling that night.  But we had great incentive to get the work done so we could go to the zoo.  Jared and Kamryn hadn't been to the zoo since they were in kindergarten.  It was also a perfect day to go to the zoo, especially for late November.  

It was pretty crowded but that's not too big a deal at the zoo.  We had a great time!

Taylor and his friend Logan came with us.
Brooke did too.

Cool rooster just walking along the sidewalk with us

super creepy bats - YUCK!

Jared checking out the tiger

Skype with Elsa

Skype is a wonderful thing!

We in November we were able to skype with Elsa, our French daughter, who we miss so much.  It was so great to hear her voice again and find out how she's doing.  It was hard to say good-bye but we knew we would talk to her again soon - we look forward to introducing her to Justin and listening to her speak in french with Justin.

Paul was a good sport and held the ipad out so we could all see and she could see us.

Book Club 20th Anniversary Dinner

This wonderful group of ladies have been meeting together for 20 years to discuss books and life in general.  We've saved each other $$$ in therapy bills.  Book club night is sacred and we rarely miss getting together.  Thank you ladies for your friendship, love of good books, and each other.
We met at The Roof for our 10th anniversary so it was fitting to meet there again for our 20th anniversary in November. It was a lovely evening and a nice start to the holiday season.

Layton Christmas Party

Since i'm so far behind on posting, I decided to just catch up when and how I can, so things will be a little out of order and crazy for a bit :)

The Layton Christmas party is always a "must go" event for us - its a great dinner, always awesome entertainment, a chance of maybe winning a good prize in the raffle, and the super entertaining "photo booth"  For the last few years, this company, has been there with their fun photo booth, complete with props.  One of these years we might get all 4 photos right :)

Try to post more

I got a new laptop for Christmas - so hopefully that means I will be able to post more :)

6 more days

Only 6 more days

 until Justin comes home !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fall Fun

We've been having some super great fall weather

Mostly sunny and not too freezing cold a majority of the time.

We have had a little snow but it doesn't stick around, thank goodness

A week ago we had a great Saturday - no college football games to watch, no soccer, just a full day to get stuff done.  We did a lot of work in the yard.  Jared and Kamryn were great helpers to get all these leaves raked up.

 They wanted to rake all of them into a gigantic pile and then jump in them.

I love fall!

Happy Halloween

We had a fun Halloween this year - lots of chances to dress up.

Jared knew a long time ago that he wanted to be a zombie.  We looked up ideas on Pinterest and got some good photos to figure out his costume.  He found some old pants and a shirt that he tore up and got all dirty - that was fun!

Kamryn was trying to figure out what to be and I suggested she could be Mulan (because I had made that costume for Brooke several years ago).  Kamryn said "I don't want to be a princess anymore" - sad :(

I guess she's growing up.  She decided she wanted to be a vampire and we looked online for costume ideas and found some photos and decided she could wear an old princess dressup that we have and add a black cape that we have and some jewelry and make- up and voila - she was a vampire.

The first time they dressed up was for the ward trunk or treat.  My friend Julianne is AWESOME at doing makeup and was so kind to come over and do the make up for Jared and Kamryn.

We had a few cousins join us for trunk or treat.

Brooke even got into it this year and figured out her own costume, ordered the hat and mustache -

doesn't she make a great Charlie Chaplin?

Brooke and Andre (as an assassin) dressed up
to go to the Haunted Village at Heritage Park

Jared and Kamryn dressed up on Halloween day
ready to go to school for the parade

 Brooke filled in as make-up artist this time and did a great job too.

This is one of the greatest costumes I've ever seen
a 4th grader with his head in a jar. So cool!

Our principal always get into it and always has a fabulous costume!

On the way home from school Jared said he didn't want to be a zombie anymore and wanted to be a nerd.  We still had Paul's work to go to and night time trick or treat, so sounded good to me.  Luckily a nerd costume is super easy to come up with and he made a pretty great nerd.

At Paul's work they have trick or treating from cubicle to cubicle - a super great way to get candy fast and where its warm.  We never miss it.

Two nerds together :)

 Taylor had Juliane do some zombie makeup on him for Halloween and it turned out fantastic.  I'm just sad I didn't get a photo of him in his full costume.
It was great weather for Halloween - not too cold and fun to be out in the neighborhood.  Kamryn's friend Olivia even came with us this year.  The kids got A LOT of candy.

When I got back from exercising the morning after Halloween this is what i came home to - all of Jared and Kamryn's candy all sorted out.  They picked out their favorites and made their Christmas countdowns that day.

New Glasses

Jared didn't pass the eye test at school. We weren't too surprised.  He'd been complaining of not being able to see the board for most of this school year.  So I took him to the eye dr and sure enough - he needed glasses.  Not too much of a prescription, just -1.5 or so but still enough correction that glasses would help a lot.  We went to Shopko and he picked out these really good looking glasses.  I think he looks super handsome and SMART!

Family work day

My brother organized a family work day at my parents a couple of Saturdays ago.

It was a beautiful warm fall day and nice to be outside. 4 out of my 5 siblings were there with their families.  The main project was to split and stack all the wood from their big pine tree getting cut down. We also did a lot of other yard work.  All of the grandkids were great at helping on this big project.  Granddad had promised them dinner at Golden Corral after all the work was done - I'm sure that helped all of us work hard.

 All of the grandkid helpers in our newly cleared corner of the yard.

Kamryn enjoying her chocolate dipped strawberries
 at Golden Corral

New Room Update

Soon after Justin left on his mission we started on some home projects - namely finishing this bedroom from an unfinished area in our basement.  At first it was going to be an office/craft room for me but as its getting closer for Justin to come home I decided it should be his bedroom.  I'm sacrificing and letting him have the brand new and nicest bedroom in our house - nicest because Paul has done the work on it and he is a perfectionist. (plus the room that will be my office is bigger but 1/2 full of a lot of stuff and it was easier to think about getting a room ready for Justin that isn't full of stuff).

Its taken quite a long time and Paul promised me it would be done by the end of the summer - but we had too much fun during the summer and played a lot.  So now that we have a real deadline coming up Paul has been working on this room a lot.  Luckily his work has mellowed out for awhile now and he's had some free time finally.  He's been up until at least midnight every night this last week working on this project.

The painting is done and the lights are in.  Tonight he is working on the trim and we still need to order some carpet.  We should be able to make it.

he's amazing - he's done ALL the work on this project
drywall, tape and mud, painting, electrical

He did all the framing and created a closet where there wasn't one

 I got the funniest text from him the other night.  The night before we had been to Home Depot to pick out paint.  We agreed on a color we both liked - kind of a goldish tan named Crepe.  He sent me this photo and said "were we on drugs when we picked this color?"  He had just started cutting it in but could already tell it was going to be bad.  I said just paint that wall and we will see how it looks.  By the time I got home he'd painted almost the whole room.  I walked in and at first it didn't seem too bad but the longer i was in the room the more I didn't like it.  He hated it. The picture below doesn't do it justice at all - it was a PEACH room.  At the store we'd looked at several colors and I said I didn't want peach but that is still what we got.
Luckily Paul doesn't mind painting and paint is relatively cheap when its comes to decorating.
So he's repainted the room and I will add more photos when the the trim is all up.

Happy Birthday to me :)

I had a fabulous birthday this year!

It started out with subbing at BHS for my one of my favorite teachers and friend.  She teaches 3 english classes so I was done by noon - perfect.

Paul and I met at Einsteins for lunch and then went golfing at Mulligans.  I actually had some decent shots which made me happy.  It was a gorgeous fall day and it was so great to be out in the sun with Paul on a weekday afternoon.

After golfing we went to Kohls and did some shopping (mostly for Paul but I got a few things.  I have to take advantage of getting him in a store which he only does about once every 2 years).

In the evening I met one of my sisters at Jordan Commons to see The Saratov Approach and have dinner.  It was a real treat to go to a first run movie AND to eat in the theater - something I've never done before.

And then to top off an awesome day - I came home to many gifts on the table that had been dropped off while I was away playing all day.  I have such great friends.

Paul even had a gift for me - he told me it was something I had asked for. I couldn't think of anything I had asked for.  It was a collapsible garbage can - mostly to take camping.  I LOVED it and was so excited.  I had asked for one but it was in the summer of 2012.  Impressive memory he has.