Trick or Treat!!!

This year we had a belly dancer, and "Sally the car" quite the range of costumes. Matayia has always been our little princess she loves everything girly. Most of the time Matayia chooses a disney princess for halloween so it was nice to have something a little different. Miranda and Ian sent Matayia a belly dancer costume from Turkey for her birthday, she decided then that she wanted to use it for halloween. It was perfect for her. Thanks Miranda and Ian for making the costume choosing process real easy at our house this year!!




I always buy our halloween costumes really early. I have learned that if we don't buy early we don't get what we want so I started looking back in September. When i asked Kaitlyn what she wanted to be for halloween she said " a cirle or maybe a apple" So we went to the internet and started looking at pictures. As soon a s Kaitlyn saw "Sally the car" she didn't want to look anymore. So Sally it was. It is nice to have girls that are so different, Kaitlyn reminds me of myself at times, though I was never a car for halloween, but then Again I never really wanted to dress up for Halloween.

October Fun

This month seemed to go by so quickly. We were busy as always.
Fall is still here but I am sure that winter is on its way.

Pumpkins to Jack O' Lanterns

Carving pumpkins has not always been my favorite thing to do. I am not even sure that we have carved pumpkins every year. But Matayia won't let us get away without carving them now. This year she was "so brave" and even cleaned her pumpkin out herself. She said "I am six now, so I am big enough to do it myself" Boy am I glad that she is six because I hate to clean out pumpkins!
I was actually hoping that if I was slow enough Greg would clean out my pumpkin. So after he had cleaned out his pumpkin, and Kaitlyn's and Matayia's I asked him if he would clean out mine too. This picture tells you exactly what his response was. What do you think he said?!?!?



You guessed it he said NO. So I cleaned my pumpkin out all by myself. I think that the pumpkins turned out really cute this year. And I actually really enjoyed carving this time, maybe we will even do it again next year!!




After we were done carving Matayia informed Greg that hers was the best....





Mom's was next.....



Kaitlyn was "third best"....




And Dad's was last.....


Sorry Dad, I guess you win some, and lose some. This was just not your year!!
(according to Matayia)

Yellowstone in a weekend....

Once Again we just could not stay home. Stacey and Jon invited us to come to their family cabin in Island Park, Idaho for the weekend, and we just couldn't pass it up.
Just as we always do when we are with our family, we once again had a great time. The company was fun, the weather was super, and like always the food was great!!

It has been a long time since either Greg or I had been to Yellowstone so it was fun to go back and take our kids there. On Friday morning we drove up through Soda Springs, where we stopped at the "famous teeter toter park" and had a few laughs! (yep, mom you know what I am talking about) We then headed up to Jackson Hole, stopped for lunch and then drove to Yellowstone. The girls did pretty good for having a really long day in the car, they seemed to be excited to see the wild animals. Matayia didn't know what a buffalo was so it was nice to show her something new.






We stopped at Old Faithful, and timed it just right. It erupted about ten minutes after we got there so we didn't have to wait long. Matayia and Kaitlyn were excited to see the buffalo just "chillin" in front of Old Faithful. I will have to admit it made me as the mother a little nervous, thinking that the buffalo could charge us at anytime. After old Faithful had erupted and the crowd had started to leave, we walked over closer to the buffalo so we could get a better picture. As we got closer Kaitlyn picked up a rock and started to run. As she got closer she asked "mom can I throw this rock at the buffalo?" I just about tackled her right there on the boardwalk, I was already nervous and we didn't need her to throw a rock at the buffalo. But thank you Kaitlyn for asking me if you could throw the rock before you did it!!!





Greg is the resident photographer in our house and a pretty good one at that. I love looking at the great pictures that he takes. Matayia has decided that she loves to take pictures just like her dad. For Mothers Day Greg gave me a new camera, so I gave Matayia my old one. Everywhere we go Matayia brings her camera, and she actually takes some really good pictures. As we were getting packed to leave Kaitlyn asked where her camera was, so we packed her little plastic princess camera. You wouldn't believe how many pictures that camera took of Yellowstone. Every time we got out of the car she brought her camera and snapped a few pictures. She was so cute, she kept telling us "that was a great picture" It is great to see my little girls want to be just like their dad.

Kaitlyn grows up....

I have been trying to potty train Kaitlyn for months now, everytime with bad results. I knew she was capable of doing it, but she is one stubborn girl. (she takes after her dad) A couple of months ago we were in walmart doing some grocery shopping. I asked Kaitlyn if she wanted to buy some big girl panties or if she wanted diapers. She answered that she wanted one more box of diapers, so that is what we got. As we used these diapers we reminded her over and over that when they were gone we would have to go potty in the big girl potty. When the box ran out without a thought she just went into the bathroom and started using the big girl potty!!!! Of coarse why didn't I think of that, we had to make Kaitlyn think this potty thing was her idea. I am proud to say we now have a very well potty trained little girl and it was all her idea.




Along with the endless smarties that Kaitlyn eats when she goes potty, Greg promised her a big girl bed. So as he promised, we got her a big girl bed in her room. I think that Matayia was just as excited about this as Kaitlyn was. When Matayia came home from school Kaitlyn was so excited to show her her new big girl bed. And Matayia was so excited to lay on her bed and read her stories. They were so cute, Matayia kept telling Kaitlyn how proud of her she was for being such a big girl. Matayia is such a good big sister and Kaitlyn wants to be just like her.

We love our Family

We were so excited to have Miranda and her cute little Eli come to visit from Germany. Eli is the cutest little guy. The best thing about Miranda coming is that it gave us a good excuse to get together. We started at the state capital, my girls had never been there and I was surprised at how much fun they had there.





Next we headed to temple square and had lunch at the Lion house. Temple square looked as beautiful as always and of coarse we snapped a few pictures there too. Even though we live so close to temple square it never seems like we go there often enough. As we were walking around the grounds there was a couple coming out of the temple who just got married, the man was wearing a cowboy hat. Matayia was so surprised to see that there were "real live cowboys" still alive.



We just love to take pictures....




another picture....







and just one more....




After we spent some time on temple square we headed up to the Salt Lake City Cemetery to look for President Hinkley's grave. What a beautiful cemetery!! Once again my kids surprised me and had a lot of fun. So many of our prophets have been buried in this cemetery and it is alot of fun to go on a "hunt" for each one of them. It was a rainy rainy day but we had a great time with their umbrellas. For those of you who have never been to the SLC Cemetery, I highly recommend this, it is a great family activity packed full of history.

The weekend ended with a big sleepover at our house. We definitely had a full house. Greg just hid out in his "cave" the rest of the weekend, he wasn't quite sure what to do with all of us girls. Thanks for coming Miranda and thanks for helping us all get together.