Halloween

For months I looked for good looking Else and Anna costumes for the girls. Ones that they could continue to dress up in after Halloween was over. I found an Anna one but it was Ellie's size not Sammi's. Then about 2 weeks before Halloween, Ellie tells me she doesn't want to be Elsa. She wants to be a mummy. (Apparently while playing with her friend Hazel, they pretended to be mummies.) So I showed her some mummy costume pictures online. That changed her mind. So we looked at different costumes for about another week before she settled on a witch. Done.

Then I had a thought, "maybe I should try the Anna costume on Sammi just to make sure." After 3 different attempts, she was decidedly not going to wear the Anna costume. So with just a few days left, we started looking for a costume for Sammi. Luckily for me, she decided quickly on a Sofia the First dress that instantly became a regular dress up costume and has already needed to be sewn back together because she wears it so much.

This is also the first year we didn't do most of our trick or treating at a trunk or treat. I think I was more excited about it than anyone. Jake took the girls first around the inside circle in our neighborhood. I took the latter, 2nd circle. We were home by 7:30 but were the youngest family out walking the latest. Then about halfway through my loop I realized that while I was growing up and out trick or treating, we never knocked on doors and waited for an answer to say "trick or treat". We walked up to a door and yelled "TRICK OR TREAT" as loud as we could. After one yell, if there was no answer then we might knock. I began to wonder, what happened to that tradition? Was that just something our neighborhood did? All of the kids who came to our door knocked first.

The kids got a good amount of candy and because I am a bit of a candy nazi (they can only have 1-3 pieces a day and only if they ask, I don't remind them), they still have Halloween candy that is now mixed with Christmas candy.

I wish I had pictures available that I could use, but they are all on Jake's phone which I don't regularly have access to in order to retrieve pictures.

Ellie's 5th birthday

I guess with the holidays, the blog gets ignored. Yes, Ellie turned 5 years old. Because of her late birthday, she only just started preschool but has loved every day of it. Also, because it was her 5th birthday, she had to receive booster shots at her annual check up. She hated those and had stiff legs but she rode her bike to help ward off the stiffness. Based on the child growth charts, she is a tall (43" 73%), skinny girl (37 lbs 36%).

She has grown so much in the last year that it is hard to believe. She has started walking to friends' houses to play. She learned to ride a bike and to hula hoop. Ellie also loves to try new things. Sometimes she becomes discouraged quickly and other times nothing will stop her. She has been learning letter sounds and how to write those letters. She loves her sleep so hasn't completely given up taking naps but I feel that day will come all too quickly. 

Ellie is a wonderful girl. She is kind-hearted and tries to make friends with everyone. She is very curious about things and I encourage her to ask before trying stuff but there are plenty of time curiosity wins out before she can ask. Then she learns about dealing with consequences, like having to finish drinking punch with salt in it. 

I love watching her grow and learn. I love trying to see things the way that she does. I don't have any super good pics to go with this post because as I play and do things, I often forget to snap a picture. 

Happy super belated birthday Ellie. 

Tough Mudder Utah

So after all the ones that Jake has run, I finally decided (after I got a discount code) to run one as well. I wanted him to know that I am as tough as he is and more. (I'm really not, but I like to pretend I am.)

The race was in September in Cedar Fort and we had a great group to run with. The morning started out a little chilly, around 40 F but quickly warmed up. 

Morning group.

 The first group ran first thing in the morning. The girls, Lisa, Jessica, Cassie and some other wives took pictures. Since pictures tell a better story, I'll let them do most of the talking.

Pre-race family pic.

 While Jake, Jeff, Marc, Cassie and I ran/walked the event, Lisa, Jessica, and Justin watched out kids. Luckily there was so much dirt, all they really had to do was feed them and make sure they followed along.

My little dirt hill climber.

Me, Jake, Cassie, Marc and Jeff starting the event. 

Enough mud for you.

 When the first group ran, they were some of the first through Arctic Enema. There was ice floating around in bright pink water. Check out the pictures below.

Yes, it was that cold.

 What you can't see is that there is actually about 6 inches of ice on top of the water.

Celebrate how cold the water is.

Warrior Carry

It may have taken forever but I made it across on my first try.

 Shortly after this, about mile 8 of 11 we came to a hill and my knee did not like that idea. Knee problems are what kept me from doing this before. We slowed down a lot. Jeff wanted to get some real exercise so he ran ahead.

Jeff in electro-shock therapy

All together at the end, minus Jeff. 

Eventually, we all made it. The only obstacle I didn't attempt was Electro-shock therapy. I have no desire to be shocked. Too many bad experiences as a kid. Did I enjoy it? It was fun. I could do the obstacles anytime. Combined with that kind of distance, I don't think my knees would handle it. I enjoyed being able to do this with Jake. He was so loving and supportive through the entire thing. He would rather carry me than have me sit down or quit.

I have such a loving and supportive family and I love spending time with them, although I don't enjoy living with the knee pain for a few weeks after the event.

Stefanie got married!!

I am really behind. My sister Stef got married 2 month's ago, but I love her and didn't want to miss sharing my love and excitement by blogging about her wedding before she did. (Ha ha, love you Stef. Hey I gave you 2 months.)

She had a wonderful rehearsal dinner at Archibald's Restaurant in Gardner Village. JT's really good friend and business partner needed a baby sitter and our sitter is so awesome she said she would watch their girl too. His friend and wife needed to follow us to the restaurant since they are from out of town. Hilariously, Jake took a wrong turn and had them all confused as we flipped around to head the right way.

The wedding and reception took place at Louland Falls up Parley's Canyon. Absolutely beautiful location in the mountains, with little parking and kind of a pain to get to from Salt Lake Valley (you have to go to the next exit and turn around). However, the beauty of it (maybe it was just the beauty of the day and what was taking place) made up for it.

The lovely flower girls.

Ellie and Sammi were flower girls. They only wanted to drop some of the flowers, because others were too pretty so they picked them up if Macy threw them on the ground. Our nephew's were the room bearers although I think only Braden carried them. Tanner was still getting use to the whole walking thing.

It was a wonderful and short ceremony performed by JT's friend. Very sweet and heart felt.

Of course, there were plenty of things to do and places to play around for the kids. The weather was perfect. And there were pictures galore to take.

JT flying Sammi

Family Photo

Swinging Sammi

Playing with Jeff

If you can't tell, we have an awesome family. My girls love their aunts and uncles (as do I). Of course there was food, cake, dancing and go times. I don't have all the pics (those are just from a family friend) and I will let Stef talk about it more. Sammi was a little upset because Stef and JT didn't give her a piece of the cake immediately after they cut for each other but they quickly fixed that. 

We had a great time dancing and chatting. It was so good to see so many family and friends. Sometimes it makes me wish we had more things to celebrate and more time (and money) to have good times like this. 

Stef looked gorgeous and had a giant princess dress, because we wouldn't expect anything different from her. There was only one down side. (Watching her climb into the car was awesome. JT did pick her up and set her in.)

It was such a good day and we are so glad that Stef found someone who is tall, wonderful, and loving. I am so glad that JT is now officially part of our family. He had been like family long before. They have already had good times and hard times and they are bound to have more but I know that if they try to work together then things will work out. Love you guys.

Love those kids.

It's been a while since I blogged about the kids, so enjoy this bunch of randomness. Here's a few of the things we have done recently.

The girls and I traveled down to Odgen for the Odgen Temple open house before it's re-dedication.

Visit to the Ogden Temple open house

Ogden Temple open house

"I love Him." said Sammi when she saw this statue.

Ellie started preschool. She loves going. She has made many friends there and is learning lots.

Ellie's own hair style

First day of preschool.

Sammi is sad when Ellie goes to preschool.

It took Sammi about 3 weeks to not cry or pout like this whenever we dropped Ellie off at school.

We got out our Halloween decorations and the girls wanted to be witches.

Yes, one rides a broom and the other a mop. 

Over the years (especially teen years) my knees have taken a lot of abuse and don't work the same. So I wear these knee supports whenever doing physical activity. Sammi wanted to be like me.

"I doing exercise." 

These kids just crack me up. I wouldn't trade them for anything, most of the time. Just kidding. They are one of the biggest reasons my life is happy.

Our Nephew, Ben

I have one of the cutest, most loving nephew's out there. Actually, we are lucky because all of our nieces and nephews are pretty amazing but I may be biased.

However, right now I want to talk a little about Ben. He is such a cute kid. His parents were excited to know they were having another child. Ben seemed like a needy child. He always wanted to be held, be close to someone. Knowing him now, I believe it is because of his loving nature.

Ben loves to play with other kids. He loves his family. One of my favorite things is to watch how excited he gets when Sammi or any other cousin comes to play. I love when he runs over to give me a hug.

Ben is a little older than Sammi. Sammi started making noises, sounds, and speaking what is considered about average for her age. Ben would make a few noises but really struggled when it came to forming sounds and words. I know it was hard for his parents, especially to hear Sammi ask for things and express herself and not have Ben do the same.

After a lot of stressing, worrying, tests, and doctors' visits, he has been given a preliminary diagnosis of Childhood Apraxia of Speech. "Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS) is a motor speech disorder that first becomes apparent as a young child is learning speech. For reasons not yet fully understood, children with apraxia of speech have great difficulty planning and producing the precise, highly refined and specific series of movements of the tongue, lips, jaw and palate that are necessary for intelligible speech. Apraxia of speech is sometimes called verbal apraxia, developmental apraxia of speech, or verbal dyspraxia. No matter what name is used, the most important concept is the root word “praxis.” Praxis means planned movement. To some degree or another, a child with the diagnosis of apraxia of speech has difficulty programming and planning speech movements. Apraxia of speech is a specific speech disorder. This difficulty in planning speech movements is the hallmark or “signature” of childhood apraxia of speech." (www.apraxia-kids.org)

Ben says very little. There are stories of success and hope that one day he will speak like other kids.  However, there are some stories with a different outcome. Whatever happens in Ben's life, I know that he will be loved and he will be giving love to others because that is the kind of boy he is.

I hope Ben and his parents know how much they are loved and I want to do what I can to help so I wanted to share a little with you and ask that if you can help, go to www.apraxia-kids.org to learn and help.

The easiest way to donate to the group is to shop through Amazon using this link. Please help as they continue to search for ways to help these kids looking for ways to best express themselves.

Helping out

Here is my annual post about helping out in the community. I have added to my donation and volunteer website list. I haven't added it but if you have ever attended the Festival of Trees and wanted to help out, here is the link to see how you can help.

Side note: I heard from one of the events organizers that the Utah Festival of Trees for Primary Children's Hospital is the only one that runs on all donations and volunteers. Other states and locations have trouble receiving support and many times have tried to see what this one does and offers that makes it so popular.

I think now it this perfect time to start thinking about this stuff. You still have plenty of time to work any costs into budgets or plan or whatever. I know that Thanksgiving and Christmas are the big giving times but shouldn't we always be willing to help out.