Halloween Festivities 2013

I have a love/hate relationship with fall. I love all the weather, colors and the festivities, but I hate that it means winter is coming.  We have made the best of our fall this year.  During Fall Break, we met up with some friends and went to Cornbelly's.  The kids all had a great time.  I liked it too.  I enjoy being with my friends just as much as the kids do.

McKay invited his friend Parker along.  This was the only time that I saw them the whole afternoon.  Being teenagers, they went off on their own and found their own fun.  Their "fun" may or may not have involved getting kicked out of the corn maze. 

Josh, Josh F., Addie F. and Kayden all lined up begging to have their picture taken.

Kayden and one of his best buddies, Josh.

Oh Jaxon.  He is such a jokester.  He and his friend JD had a good time together.

Josh and his buddy Kaden C.  They had such a good time reuniting and rekindling their friendship.  It had been way to long since they had been able to hangout together.

Not sure what Josh is riding, but he had fun riding it nonetheless.

Then Jaxon had fun punching it.

Jaxon (who is acting way too cool) and JD going for a ride.

Josh F., Kayden and Trace loving their tractor ride.  I had a good time riding with them too.

Kaden C. and Josh returning from their tractor ride.

Our ward had a Fall Festival where the boys got to dress up.  We went down to the church and had some dinner and played some carnival games.  It was a lot of fun.

Josh dressed up as Jeremy Warner from Studio C.  He won an award for the best TV costume.

Kayden had a good time with the doughnut eating contest.

Kayden especially loved getting his face painted.

Halloween finally arrived and the boys had a great time dressing up for school.  I missed getting a picture of McKay before he left for school (he dressed up as Dr. White), but here is who I caught:

Josh (as Jeremy Warner), Kayden (as a BYU football player), and Jaxon (as Si Robertson).

Kayden sharing is Halloween love with Suki.

Our elementary school has a fun tradition of having a Halloween parade where the kids get to show off their costumes while they walk through the school.

Josh as he is walking by.

Jaxon walking by (doing what I am not sure).  Sadly, since Jaxon is in 6th grade this year, this was his last Halloween parade.  Sniff, sniff.

Kayden and his friend Iron Man, I mean Chase, all set to ride to kindergarten on Halloween.

Kayden in his school Halloween parade.  He was slightly excited to see me.

All my Halloween boys all set to go out and trick-or-treat.  Kayden, McKay (as Dr. White), Josh, Jaxon and Naohiro (he is our foreign exchange student from Japan that as been staying with us the last few days--more on that later).

Happy Halloween!

Studio C Signing

If you didn't already know, we are BIG Studio C fans at our house.  We have our Monday night ritual of watching the show without fail.  I found out that they were having a DVD signing at the BYU Bookstore tonight.  Jeremy and Jaxon are away at scout camp, but the rest of us piled in the car and went down to meet the cast, get a DVD signed and McKay threw on one of his Studio C shirts so they could sign it as well.  We had a great time!

When we arrived at the bookstore, we found that the line to meet the cast wrapped around the whole store!  The wait wasn't too bad.  We were in line for about 45 minutes.

Kayden couldn't wait to meet Matt Meese to tell him that he is his favorite Studio C guy.  Matt was flattered and said. "Thanks man!"

Jeremy and his infamous mustache signing McKay's shirt.

Josh was excited to meet Matt as well.  Matt is an obvious favorite at our house.

Natalie and Whitney taking a turn signing McKay's shirt.  He was blushing, but all smiles!

At the end, Kayden asked me if Whitney could sign his shirt.  I told him it wasn't a very good idea, but that we could take his picture with Whitney.  Whitney told him his shirt was too cool to sign.  Afterwards Kayden said to me, "Whitney is my friend, not my girlfriend, just my new friend."

The whole cast was so courteous and nice.  I am glad that my kids love a show that casts such nice people!  The only thing that would have made the night better was having Jaxon and Jeremy there with us!

Harvest Time

The Fall brings harvest time.  Only this year, I have no garden to harvest.  That didn't stop me from harvesting everyone else's garden.  This year I harvested salsa, jalapeno jelly, peaches, grape juice and applesauce all from other people's garden.
 

 Kayden helped pick grapes.  There were a lot of grapes!  He was a good helper.

 

Bottling grape juice.  So simple yet it takes forever.  For next year my friend and I came up with a plan to use two juicers at once to make it go by faster.  This year I used just her juicer, but I ordered my own.  Next year we will have two!

 

I have to show off my grape juice.  It is so pretty all sealed up in bottles.  The lighter pink bottles are from green grapes and it sure is tasty!  All that food harvested, what a sense of accomplishment!

As I bottled applesauce today, I sat and thought about my mom and grandma.  They were major bottlers.  Sure love them.  When I was younger, I swore I would never bottle food.  Too much work.  All it took was for me to inherit my grandmother's steamer and bottling equipment and I caught the buzz.  Never say never, eh?  Happy Fall Harvest!

BYU Game Fun

Grandma and Grandpa are out of town so they gave us their BYU tickets for a couple of games.  This was Kayden's first BYU game.  He got to sit by Josh, and Jaxon and his Dad.  McKay and I sat in Grandma and Grandpa's seats.  All the boys had a good time--as long has they had snacks.  Admittedly, Kayden wanted more entertainment by the third quarter and therefore played his Dad's phone most of the remainder of the game. He still cheered like crazy.  Go Cougars!

BYU Football Coach's Show

Jaxon got invited to attend the BYU Football Coach's Radio Show by one of his friends.  He got to see Coach Bronco Mendenhall along with JD Falslev in the press box at the BYU football stadium.  Coach Mendenhall and a BYU player record a live radio show there every week with KSL.  Jaxon loved it and couldn't stop talking about it.

Jaxon with his buddies in the press box.  Coach Mendenhall jumped in to join the picture!  I love that Jaxon is acting all casual about it.  The week Jaxon attended just happened to be the same week as rivalry week with the University of Utah.

Jaxon and his friends checking out the view of the field from the box seats.  Jaxon even came home with a bag full of BYU give-a-ways that he received for attending.  It was definitely a once in a lifetime experience and he loved every minute of it!

Crazy Weather

We have had an abundance of rain lately, but I won't complain. It is much needed rain. But just check out some of these storms we have had recently:

Josh and his friend out playing in the rain with umbrellas.  It was a downpour.

Another afternoon we were traveling through Orem to get to a BYU football game.  The clouds were spinning and looking quite scary.  We were beginning to wonder if we were going to be visiting the Land of Oz instead of Cougar Stadium.  So we swung by my parent's house to wait out the storm and what a storm it was!  Check out the waterfall coming off their roof just right of the trampoline.  It looked like Niagara Falls!

It caused a flood under the trampoline and in their garden as well.  I had never seen so much rain all at once here in Utah!  The roads were all flooded and parking lots had turned into lakes.  There was just no where for all the water to go!  We thought about not going to the BYU game due to the nonstop rain, but we called Jaxon who was at home and he told us, "You have to go!  You know "we will fight, day or night, rain or snow'!"  So we went to the game and had a great time thanks to Jaxon, and thankfully the weather had cleared up.  Crazy weather.

12!

Yesterday was Jaxon's twelfth birthday. Hard to believe this giant teddy bear has been part of our family for that long!  Yesterday was a busy day with soccer and football games, but we made sure we had time to celebrate!

I'm 12!

Presents and bonking on the head along with some pretty good wish giving.

Jaxon received some new ties to go along with his suit that he gets to wear now that he is a Deacon and passing the sacrament at church.  He wore his suit and blue tie to church today for his ordination.  He was so handsome he brought me to tears.  He also received a couple of much wanted video/Wii games.

Earlier in the week we had Grandma and Grandpa over.  Grandma had made Jaxon a birthday cake that was very tasty!  She had even hidden a coin in the cake just as her mom used to.  She did it when I was a kid too.  It was a fun walk down memory lane.

As part of his birthday we got to go to the BYU vs. Utah game.  We were all wearing new royal blue game day shirts.  Sadly, it wasn't much of a football game.  Thank goodness there were Dippin' Dots to make things better!

Twelve Things We Love About Jaxon:

1. His love for sports and staying active.  We just wrapped up soccer season and we are starting flag football season this week.  However, his true love is basketball.
2. Jaxon really knows how to clean a toilet!  As much as he hates it, he is good at it.  (You're welcome future wife!)
3. His tender heart.  He can't stand it when someone is left out, or when someone is being rude.  He is the first to jump in and make someone feel better and stop the rude behavior.  He is a great friend to all!
4. His imagination.  He likes to have dart gun wars, Harry Potter wand duels, build forts, have Lego battles and run around outside all while using his imagination.
5. He knows how to give a sincere compliment.  Just ask all the 5th grade teachers.  They looked forward to seeing Jaxon every morning just to hear what kind of compliment he would give them.
6. He is quick to get his homework done or quick to get his jobs done so he can spend his time having fun.
7. His contagious giggle.
8. He likes my cooking.  What mother doesn't love that? His favorite is Creamy Mashed Potatoes, which has been renamed "Jaxon's Favorite Potatoes".
9. He is self-confident and likes who he is.
10. His desire to serve and help others.  
11. People know that they can rely on Jaxon to do what he says he will do.
12. His hugs.  After all, he is my giant teddy bear!

Happy Birthday Jaxon!  We are so grateful for you and love you more than you will ever know!