Thanksgiving Dinner

Spent Thanksgiving Day with the Broadhead Family in Bountiful. The smoked Turkey was fabulous and we played a bit of 500 with Jaxson's new football. Jaxson tangled with Ainsley's trike and there were many tears. The ball ended up in the street quite a bit, but the kids had a blast just being with each other.

No Need for Talking

The other night at dinner Jaxson was being grumpy and didn't want to talk. He poked me in the side and pointed to his burger! Guess he had a rough day.

Reality at our House

Okay, so I have been a bit obsessed about a few sewing projects lately and had borrowed a sewing machine and a quilting machine. (my machine skips most stitches and won't even zig-zag) I have both machines set up on the table and the kids claimed the countertop for homework. So when it came time for dinner there was no place to put our plates. I told Jaxson we could have a picnic and he set it all out for us, starting with the tablecloth. It was actually quite fun, but I am not proud of the reality that I was too tired and didn't care enough to clean off the table or counter top so that we could eat like normal people. The kids loved it so hopefully that is what they will remember and not the messy house.

This was also Jaxson's celebration dinner - He passed off the red books at school and can now start reading the orange ones. It was a big day at our house, after reading those red books with each of the 4 kids we are done with them. Jaxson chose spaghetti for dinner and ate 5 servings before he was satisfied.

Halloween 2009

Sent Maggie and Sophie off to school on Friday in their costumes. Sophie as a mad scientist and Maggie as a pirate, on Saturday I joined her as her larger twin. Jaxson had spent the night before vomitting on our bedroom floor and was still drifting in and out of sleep when the girls went off to school. He was sad to miss his class party, but really could hardly stand up straight so he lay on the couch and watched TV all day long with Mom.

On Saturday we took Keysha and Meredith Trick-or-Treating in Logan during the day and got tons of candy at the mall, Lee's and downtown. We hit the neighborhood for traditional Trick-or-treating once it got dark. Sophie accidently knocked Keysha in the eye with a stick before we headed out so she was a cheerleader with a black eye. Madelyn, Maggie and Olivia were with us also and enjoyed getting candy as much as the little kids! They weren't around for the picture because they had already gone out for more candy in the neighborhood when I realized we needed photos of the day. Jaxson was pretty pale and looking sick by night and judging from the size of his candy pile compared with everyone else's we could see that he had inhaled his candy as soon as it hit his bag.

Sunday afternoon was count your candy time and give all the stuff you don't like to mom. As well as the stuff that is not allowed in your mouth with braces on your teeth. I didn't get on that one quick enough and Jaxson was working on a laffy taffy. I told him that if he ended up pulling out his space maintainer that he would have to pay for it himself. Well, not five minutes later he said, "I guess I am paying for it". Seriously! I was so mad, he had managed to distort it and pull it off the back tooth. It had taken two trips to the dentist to have it put in to begin with. They had ordered the wrong one the first trip in and it didn't fit. We were able to get right into the dentist on Monday afternoon and all is well now, except the dentist noticed that part of another filling seems to have fallen out. I guess we just eat soft chocolates from now until they pay their own dental bills.

Pigs!

I was just looking over my blog and realized I had never mentioned that we no longer have pigs at our place. Blake took them and their friend out to Lewiston in mid September and we now have Bacon and Eggs for breakfast. I thought it would bother me, but it is really delicious! We cleaned out the pig pen and it was stinky! Had to wash every item of clothing that we wore that day, even the shoes! We spread the manure out on the gardens and now the entire yard stinks, maybe should have thought that one through a little longer.

Cutting Down Trees

We had a few small junk trees around the yard that were blocking the growth of some great pine trees so we set to work on Saturday to remove them. Now lest you think ill of us, we have planted over 20 new trees in our yard since we moved in, so hopefully that will offset the damage we have just done to the environment. But we did it all without the pollution of a chainsaw so maybe that will keep us in good standing with you all. Although we do plan to burn the wood next spring and thus pollute the air then. But we promise not to burn it this winter when we are having an inversion. Jaxson was very excited about getting to use an ax for its real purpose and went to work on that little tree. It took Blake and each of the kids taking a turn to bring that tree to the ground. It is true we put a gate to the horse pasture there and meant to take that tree out long ago

The kids worked really hard and cut up the tree trunks into pieces that would fit into the fire pit next year. We kept lots of the little stuff too so it will be easy to start a fire when it is all dry in a year or so. The kids wanted to have a fire that night, but Blake explained that green wood does not burn well.

The kids all decided that they are glad to live in modern times with power tools, houses built by other people and they would not like to do this project ever again. But we do have two plum trees that need to be taken out so we may get the chance to use what we learned on this first experience. Jaxson wanted one of those cool two man saws that they use in church history movies. All we had was this one man saw, but it did have a very sharp blade.

When we arrived at the ward soup and scone night the kids wanted to know why they didn't get to bring carved pumpkins for the contest like some of the other kids. Then they realized it was because they had to work all day long out in the yard chopping up trees. But it is also because their mother forgot about the contest.

Fall Hiking

We took a hike with the cousins up to Elephant Rock in Bountiful. It was a gorgeous fall hike, with a little snow and mud thrown in for good measure. Didn't realize it was 7 miles round trip, but we made it there and back without losing any of the 8 children. There is Jaxson on the top of Elephant Rock, I was holding my breath until he was safely back with us.

The hike was a bit chilly in spots, but it was a beautiful day for hiking. Jaxson had me carry him for quite a bit of the final ascent and most of the trip down. He complained that he couldn't sleep because I was jiggling him too much! Well pardon me! My hips and legs are so sore today, I think it is from carrying him and squatting down to get him on my back after he would count to 100 while he walked.