Halloween 2017

All my kids dressed up to go to school today. Its so fun. I really enjoy the dressing-up, make-believe part of Halloween.

In fact, every Halloween eve, I go out at night to fight trolls and ogres and then serve them up for breakfast. This year the kids caught me in my fighting clothes.

Eyeballs, ogre fingers, fried brains and boogers to drink.

Yummy breakfast.

Camille made her own costume.

Gum ball machine.

I helped Rachel make her peacock costume.

Bryce was so funny because he really wanted to be a ninja fell in love with a ninja mask at walmart. Its a long convoluted story but anyway, I finally purchased the mask and then Hash refused to be a ninja for school. He went as a soccer player. A very cute soccer player.

But then that night, he pulled some things out of his closet and went as a ninja, sans the mask. Silly boy.

"T

Parker went as Indiana Jones. 

And the BFFs went as hunters.

After school snack were these little cuties.

And for dinner, a delicious cheesy veggie coup in homemade bread bowls and fun candy corn jello for dessert.

One of my favorite parts of the night was seeing Parker ride off to go trick-or-treating on his unicycle. Indiana Jones on a unicycle. Someone should make a new movie!

My other favorite part was having Sarah and Dallin come with their boys to trick-or-treat. It was so fun!!!!

We came home to lit up jack-o-lanterns.

And LOTS of candy!

And also Happy Dia de Muertos

from our little Spanish speaker.

Random October

I took the younger girls and Emily out for a fun day!

First we used Camille's bday gift from Grandma (giftcard to Color Me Mine) and painted ceramic trinkets.

And then, because Rachel turned double digits, TEN, she got to get her ears pierced. In this picture she is demonstrating that one ear is ok and the other one hurts. 

And I'm not sure when this picture was taken but I know it was at Pace's Dairy Ann in Bountiful. One of our favorite places. Specifically for the Rainbows (slushie and ice cream).

Aunt Bryn let Rachel borrow her trumpet and she's been working really hard at learning how to play it on her own. 

Jack-O-Lanterns

We started carving our pumpkins at a family dinner at Grady's.

We finished them the next day at home.

Oh yeah. And Sterling was there too. :)

Hike: Meuller Park Canyon

Over fall break I took my kids to my old stomping ground, Meuller Park canyon and hiked them all the way to elephant rock!

I felt like I was walking back in time. 

It was gorgeous and I drank up every step, tucking it away next to my other most treasured memories.

There are sections of this hike, especially in the fall, that feel like portals into another world. While we walked, leaves fell on us like snow.

Behold, Elephant Rock. I remember hiking to elephant rock in time to watch the sunrise and eating life cereal with Scott Gardiner. 

"Life on the Rock" we called it. 

I didn't even touch the rock this time. It was steep getting down to it and I felt old. My, how time changes us.

I did feel quite old enough to take a nap on the soft bed of fallen leaves. They were just as soft as they looked.

And in true mom fashion, I ended up carrying my children's backpacks. I usually don't, actually, but those little string backpacks dig into the shoulders and I would rather carry the packs than listen to the complaining. Next hike, no string packs.

Leaves resting on the tree boughs, like snow.

We couldn't help but collect leaves, they were so brilliant. They would make a fine feather tail for any thumb turkey.

This is a map of our hike, but only the way down. So double the numbers to get the roundtrip.

This video is just a glimpse of our hike. I loved it so much!

You may even notice leaves falling like snow. It was magical.