Halloween......

For Halloween this year Logan was super pumped to be the Blue Ranger from Power Rangers Samurai. It's all he talked about for the whole month. As you can see below, being the Blue Ranger is serious business. 

I happend to find Logan's very first Halloween costume, the giraffe. I had quite the internal debate with myself about whether to give in to my more girly side and buy Izzy a cute, delightfully pink costume or be more economical and have her wear the giraffe one. The economical side won out, but I can assure you it was a close call. :-)

 Poor girl had a cold all week long and wasn't feeling very well, but she was a trooper.

This year was our first year of actual trick-or-treating.... or should I say trunk-or-treating. My dear sweet son is so shy that he hasn't wanted to trick-or-treat in previous years and we didn't want to make him do it and turn something that should be fun into a negative experience. This year we went to Alicia's wards trunk-or-treat. I think it was a good way to break Logan into the candy orgy that is Halloween! 

Fall Shenanigans......

One of the very funnest things I remember about my childhood is my neighbors backyard. In their backyard was a GIANT tree that produced an insane amount of leaves. Every autumn us neighborhood kids would rake all those leaves into the outline of a giant house and then proceed to play house for hours. Either that or rake them into a huge pile and jump into it (of course!!). 

Fast forward to the present. Our house is in a mildly new neighborhood with not very many mature trees. We've planted a few but they are far, far away from becoming good leaf shedding trees. So, I was  quite disappointed that my kids weren't going to have the same fun leaf pile jumping memories as I do. Luckily Alicia and Ben recently moved onto a beautiful tree lined street. It's one of those streets where the trees make a canopy over the road so you are driving in a kind-of tree tunnel. I love it. It's beautiful. It make me feel like I'm driving through a movie set. It also DUMPS leaves. Soooo...... the kids and I invaded Alicia's house to make some leaf jumping memories. 

Izzy didn't like the leaves so much... but she did like walking up and down the path. To each her own.

The kids were having so much fun, it was impossible to get them both looking at the camera at the same time.

I feel like this shot captures the spirit of leaf jumping perfectly. :)

Do I look tired in this pic? It's because Luke has been on a business trip all week and I AM tired. Single parenting is hard.

In other news...... my kids like to play this game called, "Let's take all the cushions off the couch and throw them around and then lets scatter as many toys as possible around the room and then see how long it take's mom's OCD-like need for order and cleanliness to rear it's ugly head and freak out." I'm sure your kids have a similar game. Well, here are they playing that very game and enjoying themselves thoroughly. 

**Please excuse my daughter's lack of proper attire. Lately she's had an objection to wearing a shirt. She's going to be one of those kids that start taking their clothes off in inappropriate places... I just know it.**

Black Island Farms.....

Wednesday we made our annual trek out to Black Island Farms where we went on the hayride and picked out awesome pumpkins. Then we let the kids run free. Mostly just to tire them out but partly because they love it. ;-) This was Izzy's first trip and she loved every minute of it! She's turning out to be quite the adventurous little lady. Logan and Jackson finally get along well so that's nice.... although Logan still calls him "The Evil Genius" but I prefer to think that's an affectionate nickname. 

A Run Of Crappy Luck.....

Some of you (if anyone still reads this!) may have noticed I haven't posted anything new in quite a while. Well, there's a reason. Near the beginning of the summer we updated the OS (operating system, for those not familiar with computer lingo) on our Mac. It turns out the Canon picture downloader is not compatible with the new OS so I couldn't download my pics to the computer. I kept meaning to get a card reader but I kept putting it off/forgetting as I am inclined to do. :-) The pictures kept building and building.


Fast forward to my card reader arriving fresh from Ebay. I insert my CF card into the reader. Nothing. I unplug the USB and try again. Nothing. I try an SD card from my little point and shoot. Works. Now I'm getting worried. Our Playstation 3 happens to have a CF card reader so I give that a try. The Playstation can see the CF card is there and can see the folder but there are no pictures in it. Now I'm considerably more worried. I plug the card back into my camera. Yup, there they are, my entire summer's worth of pictures, so why isn't any device reading that they're there????


Next I drive to Inkley's and talk to some dude there. He says they can try a picture recovery and then, should he recover any pictures, burn them to a disc. It takes a couple hours. Great. Call me when it's done.  On to that evening. He calls and tells me he retrieved a bunch of pictures! Wahoo! I get the disc home and start perusing the pics. I start seeing our Easter pics, our trip to Europe, and Logan's birthday. These are not the pictures I was expecting. I have all of these pictures all ready.


So, to make a long story longer :), most of our summer pictures are lost forever. These include Izzy's first birthday and Logan's first day of Kindergarten. I'm pretty sad but I have learned a valuable lesson.


A few days later, my garbage disposal takes a giant crap and dies. The next day it's the Playstation 3's turn. It displays what Luke refers to as, "the red light of death." ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?????? It seems that the appliances and electronics in our house are rebelling. I'll let you know if they gain artificial intelligence and form an army to take over the world. That is unless my computer decides to join them. Then you're on your own.............

Weekend Adventures.....

This past weekend we went with the Berlin's to the South Ogden Days carnival. It was super hot but not too busy to the kids got to have some fun. Izzy was soooo good just chillin in her stroller watching everyone. Logan and Jackson had some good times on the kiddie rides. 

This slide was really tall. I jokingly asked Logan if he wanted to go on it with me, thinking he would say no. To my immense surprise he said he wanted to go on it. All righty. 

So we walk up these metal steps, you know, the ones where you can see between the steps. We're walking higher and higher and I'm starting to freak out a bit from the height. Of course, I don't want to alarm Logan so I'm just repeating in my head, "Don't look down, don't look down, DO NOT LOOK DOWN!" We get to the top and Logan has yet to freak out. I sit down and put him in front of me. This is when he gets a good look at the slide and how far up we are. He grabs onto a bar with an iron grip and won't let go. I thought about letting him up and walking back down the stairs and then I figured, screw it. Every kid needs at least one terrifying childhood experience, right?? I pried his hand off, said Let's go, and pushed off. Needless to say he was not pleased. He screamed all the way down. He eventually got over it and now I have a funny story to tell. ;-) 

On Sunday we went to the zoo. We had some fun times there as well. Although, I was less than impressed by all the big breasted women with their sweaty cleavage swinging everywhere. I know it's hot but that stuff needs to be put away. There are children present!! 

June Happenings......

June. The month of graduations and birthdays. Fun stuff. June started off with Logan's graduation from Preschool. He want to the Bravo Arts Academy in Washington Terrace. It was a really great school and it really helped bring Logan out of his shell. 

As part of the curriculum, they learned notes and simple songs on the piano. Logan played Hot Cross Buns. This was a really proud parenting moment for me. Logan got up in front of 30 or 40 parents and played his song. He's so shy I really thought he would be too intimidated but he did it!! Yay!  

This is what he would do whenever he noticed I was taking his picture. 

At the end of the program they all got a little medal, a book showing their progress and a graduation certificate. 

Again with the face. 

A random pic of Izzy. She generally gets food all over. I think it's funny. 

My sis-in-law Kristin, graduated from High School this year. Luke and I started dating when she was like 6 or 7.... it makes me feel old. :)

Kristin, or Kiki as we call her, and her boyfriend Tanner. Logan adores Tanner. He's always willing to play with Logan. It's nice because he has just about as much energy as Logan does so he can keep up with him. :)

The in-laws. 

Next up is Logan's birthday. As I mentioned before, he's shy and he really hates being the center of attention. In the past we've always had his b-day parties with both sides of the family. He generally does well until he gets to the opening presents part. He gets really uncomfortable with everyone's attention on him and then he refuses to open presents and gets all ornery. Oh, he also hates to blow out the candles and have Happy Birthday sung to him. 

Anyway, because of that we decided to do a party with each family separately. It worked out quite a bit better. He didn't get all weird and run away and he seemed to enjoy the parties. Of course, this was quite a bit more work for me. Two separate parties means two separate dinners and two separate cakes. Logan wanted a Mario cake and a Superhero cake but I talked him into Superhero cupcakes instead. It was quite the production making a cake and cupcakes and organizing a BBQ but I think I did a pretty good job!

Celebrating opening Super Mario Galaxy 2. He's obsessed with all things Mario these days. 

Whenever anyone would ask him what he wanted for his birthday all he would say is "a Captain America shield."

The Super Mario cake I made for him. I searched SEVEN stores to find those Mario figures on the top. The things we do for our children! 

Teri and Izzy

The Super Hero cupcakes. I made those Super Hero emblems on the top of them. A few are a little wonky but Logan was super excited about them. For the uninitiated... there are Captain America, the X-men, Spiderman, and the Flash emblems. 

This is the only picture we could manage of all three grandkids together. Awesome isn't it?? :D

Logan and grandma Karen.

On a completely different subject... those of you who know about photography and cameras, my camera seems to be photographing on the dark side... even in fairly bright light. Does anyone know why this is happening and how I can fix it? Is it something I'm doing? 

Paris....

Recently, Luke got sent to Germany for work. Being the lover of travel that I am, I invited myself along! We stopped in Paris the first two days and then made our way via high speed train to Stuttgart, Germany.

We had an amazing time! Paris was surreal. We've all seen everything Paris has to offer in pictures or in the movies so it was crazy and amazing to actually see everything in real life! 

We had quite a few adventures, starting with the lugging of our suitcases through the crowded Paris subway system. Not fun. Parisians don't move aside... even when it's obvious you're lugging around a 

50 lb bag. Eventually we just had to start using the suitcases as weapons. :) Also, it's at least 7000 degrees in the trains. So yeah, not off to a super fun start but I promise it gets better! 

After we get there Luke and I go for a walk looking for an ATM and a place to eat. Oh, here's a little tip if any of you decide to go to Europe. American credit cards don't work everywhere. Europe uses a different type of card with a microchip embedded and you must enter a pin for purchases. Hence some of the automated machines like the train ticket machine and some restaurants and vendors can't read the mag strip on American cards. Anyway, back to the story. We've only been walking around for about 10 minutes and I'm gawking about at all the sights when BAM, I step on dog poop at just the right angle, slip, and seriously almost fall on my butt. I totally would have fallen if Luke hadn't been there. It was hilarious and disgusting. 

We were there for less than two days so here are some of the sights we saw. I hope to go back one day and see the rest!! 

*** Be prepared... I've only posted a fraction of the pictures I took but there's still quite a few! ***

 This is a movie poster for "The Hangover". I thought it was funny.

Notre Dame. Seriously one of the most amazing things I've seen in my life. It was so beautiful and the architecture and carvings are amazing. 

It was super dim inside and tripods were not allowed so I couldn't really get good pics but you get the idea. This is looking from the back of the cathedral towards the alter (?). I'm not sure it's called the alter... it's where the priest stands for services. It's still a functioning cathedral, they hold mass, there are priests for confessions, and there are candles you can light. The giant poster you see at the end there is of Pope John Paul II. 

I can't say enough about how much I loved this place. I was blown away.... it was so beautiful.

Gorgeous stained glass throughout. 

One of the famous rose windows.

This is one of the portals on the west side (in the picture of the outside above, it's the middle one.) It depicts the Last Judgement. Right above the doors in the rectangular area are the dead coming out of their tombs for judgement. Above that in the middle are the archangel Michael and Satan. Michael is weighing the souls and the worthy go to the left to heaven and the unworthy go to the right with the devil. 

Above that in the triangular area is Christ sitting on his throne with angels at his sides and the carvings all around are of the Heavenly Court. 

The larger statues at the bottom are of the twelve apostles. 

A close up of the Heavenly Court. 

We also went to the Louvre. It's a massive museum so we didn't go in to see the exhibits since we only had two days in Paris.... it would have taken far to long. Every building you can see in the picture above is part of the museum and that's not even all of it. It's giant.

The famous glass pyramid that is the Main Entrance to the museum. We went inside and let me tell you.... it's pretty to look at but it acts as a giant greenhouse trapping in heat. I started sweating the instant I walked in there. 

Later in the evening we went down to the Arc de Triomphe. I was a little iffy about why we were going to see a giant arch in the middle of a round-about but when we got there it was pretty cool. It's so huge! Also, the traffic around it is captivating. Paris drivers are crazy and fearless. You couldn't pay me enough to drive anywhere in Paris. Around the Arc is this giant, multiple lane round-about that Luke and I studied for several minutes and could not make any sense of. People were darting in and out and at one point a man with a child on a bicycle drove right through the middle of it all. Crazy.

The Arc is at the top of the Champs-Elysees. So we took a gander down that street. At one point we stopped to watch some street performers. As we were turning to leave, we saw Sam Donaldson... the news anchor. It was super weird! 

Our hotel was right by the Eiffel Tower so the last night we were there we went for a walk around it. Oh, and got the most delicious crepe I have ever eaten. Seriously, if we had bought one at the start of the trip instead of at the end I would have been eating one hourly. It was that good. 

**Pardon the blurriness. I didn't have my tripod**

These next pictures somehow made it to the bottom of my post. These are from the first day were were there. We went up to the top of the Eiffel Tower that day.

Arc de Triomphe from the top of the Eiffel.

The windows in our hotel room opened up WIDE! 

And, of course, the bidet. Which I never did use.... I think it would feel weird.