Carving Our Pumpkins

We carved our Pumpkins on Monday night. Caleb was so excited and Bailey enjoyed walking around with her little pumpkin in hand. Caleb has been coutning down until Halloween and trick or treating, he is a little excited this year.

More Halloween Fun

We have had lots of fun baking and creating these fun and yummy treats and dinners.

Pumpkinland

Saturday afternoon we took Caleb and Bailey to get their pumpkins. Caleb was so excited to go and FINALLY get his own pumpkins. It was so fun and a beautiful day. We also got our family pictures taken over the weekend. She took over 400 pictures, there are bound to be some good ones, right??? I can't wait to get them back and see how they turned out. We had such beautiful weather this weekend and it was gorgeous to drive up the canyon and still see all the changing colors. Of course I didn't take my camera up to take any fall pictures myself, duh. It was beautiful! It is not to late to drive up and enjoy.





A quick side note (mainly for myself to remember) we are driving up the canyon and jamming to our music and Caleb yells out, "Mom, Dad look at Bailey's little feet..they are dancing." It was so cute!!

Witchapolooza

On Friday afternoon my sister Stephanie and her kids, my sister-in-law Jamie and her kids, my mom, myself, Caleb and Bailey all headed up to Gardner Village for the Witches Festival. It was very crowded and surprisingly very very hot!! However, that did not stop the kids from having a blast running around finding all the witches on the scavenger hunt followed by their reward of a chocolate chip cookie. We then headed over to the petting zoo and pony rides. Caleb absolutely LOVED his pony ride on "his mini" pony. If you can't tell by the ever cheesy grin. Caleb was in heaven being with all his cousins!! He was so excited to be with all of them. Even though it was crowded and according to Stephanie, not as fun as past years that she has been, I had a lot of fun. I would like to start making this a new tradition each year. I don't think the kids noticed or minded how crowded it was, they had a blast! It is such a fun and cute atmosphere. Thank you Steph for the invite. It took Caleb over five minutes to thank me after prayers for all the fun he had seeing the crazy witches, being with his cousins and riding the pony. Yeah for a fun day.

Jaycie, Caleb, Bryce, Josh, Maddie, Stacey (Maddies friend) and Alyssa

Bryce and Caleb

Bailey was so content and loved the music.


Bryce, Devan and Caleb checking out the horses
Patiently waiting for his turn.
He LOVED his pony ride!!

Oktoberfest

This is a long running tradition in my family. Every October we get together and celebrate the Oktoberfest. This year we decided to combine it with my brother Colby's birthday and (dare I say) the BYU game. We had sooo much food. My camera was dying so I only got 2 pictures and it just does not do justice to the amount of food that we had. It is so much fun to once a year eat all sorts of different cheeses, meats, sauerkraut, etc. Dad even went all out and had some Apple strudel shipped in from a German bakery in Texas. All we were missing was the beer...maybe next year.

As Requested

Here is the recipe for the Frankenstein Monster Toes

1 pouch Betty Crocker Sugar Cookie Mix
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup butter or margarine, melted
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
7 drops neon green food coloring
36 whole blanched almonds ( I couldn't find these so i just used sliced almonds)
1/2 teaspoon red food color

In a large bowl, stir cookie mix, flour,melted butter,egg, almond extract and green food color until soft dough forms. Cover; refrigerate 1 hour.

Meanwhile, place almonds and red food color in resealable food-storage bag; shake bag until almonds are evenly coated with food color. Place on waxed paper to dry.

Heat oven to 375. For each cookie, roll heaping teaspoonful of dough into 2 1/2 inch finger shape. On ungreased cookie sheets, place about 2 inches apart.

Press almond into one end of each "toe" to look like toenail. About 1 inch from each end of "toe", squeeze dough slightly; with knife, gently make lines in dough to look like knuckles.

Bake 6 to 8 minutes or until set. (Cookies should not brown around edges.) Cool 1 minute then remove to cooling racks.

*Obviously you could also use any sugar cookie recipe of your choice.

This is Halloween...

Tommy LOVES Halloween and Caleb is following suit. I too have grown to love the holiday. Each year I start the month off early by making special Halloween desserts and meals. Caleb and I made these Monster Frankenstein Toe cookies yesterday. He thought they were so cool. I had lots of fun making them with him.

Provo City Fair

Yesterday, we took the kids to the Provo City Fair. My best friend Lillian let us know about it and we met up with her and her husband Mike and there little guy, Mikey. We had to watch the helicopter landing from our car cause we didn't get there soon enough but Caleb was still super excited to see the helicopter that close coming in to land (we say "hi" to the Timpanogos hospital helicopter daily). It was really fun for Caleb. He had fun checking out all the firetrucks, ambulances and buses. He has been playing with his firetruck hat and "bob the builder" hat all day today. He even did a little relay race that he thought was so cool. It was fun to quick stop by and check it out. Thanks for letting us know Lil.

Caleb in the Firetruck


Putting the fire out

Caleb's favorite...seeing the helicopter land and getting to sit inside
Tommy, Bailey and Caleb with Princess Power (Lil's mom)
Caleb and Mikey on the bus

The Changing Seasons

I love Fall!! October and November are my favorite months of the year.

The leaves start changing, you can feel the air starting to get cool and crisp, football season,
pumpkins start popping up everywhere, the scents of cinnamon and pumpkin spice and my all time favorite....
Great Harvest pumpkin chocolate chip bread or Kneaders pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. Can we say yummy!!! Tommy brought me home a loaf of the bread on Friday and it barely lasted until Monday morning (Bailey is a huge fan as well). Halloween is around the corner, then thanksgiving, then Christmas. Ahhh, I love this time of year!!!