Wrapping up September

Wow, I didn't realize how many pictures I took to document all the fun we've been having since I last posted.

September 19th was Talk Like a Pirate Day. The last couple of years I've taken the kids to Krispy Kreme that day because if you dress up like a pirate you get a dozen free donuts. Chris took them this year. We kept a dozen and a half. Half we gave to some friends, and then we gave a dozen to the local fire department. We did that last year too. The kids got another tour of the station and trucks, which was really fun for  them. Here are my pirates...........

Chris got out the wet/dry vac and hooked it up for Myles and Elsa out on the lawn. They had fun pretending that they were doing magic with the ball.

Sorry this video is sideways. I thought I checked to make sure I had the camera turned the right way.

This past week Aeva's seminary teacher asked her to make a visual aid for learning scriptures for their test. She was so excited. The teacher was thrilled that Aeva had not done stick figures.

Rhaevyn made this hippo for the mom who brings Aeva and her home from seminary. She is going to attempt to make more animals and sell them at an upcoming bizarre. She also made a headband.


Time to kick off a new season of Dr. Who, and how better to do that then with fish fingers and custard.

I'm loving the fall weather. It's not too hot or cold. The sun is out, there is a slight breeze, and the air is fresh and crisp. Myles and Elsa helped me chop vegetables for homemade chicken soup yesterday. We were given a bag of apples, and I decided to make an apple pie. I haven't made one in a while, but it was so yummy. It's also time for Wooly Bears and more art with leaves. We had a lot of fun with our latest art project.

 

  
 
Meg, my funny shopping girl.

Last night we all went out to view the eclipse. It was gorgeous!

Happy end of September and first of October :)

Productive Week

The second week of school was as successful as the first. Yay!!
We are on a roll!
Thursday we enjoyed a thunder and lightening storm during lunch. We had quite the downpour too.

I put two quilt tops together this week. They both went together pretty fast, surprisingly.
 I've had some fun this week looking at some new patterns for quilts, and I can't wait to try them out.

I absolutely love the material for this quilt.

The car was sold on Friday. I was getting a little worried, as it seemed like some flaky people were wanting to buy it, but then they backed out. Hooray for answered prayers!

Here are just some crazy pictures Myles and I took.

 

 Meg loves this song at the end of one of her favorite movies. Myles is dancing with her in one of them despite his hurt foot. I love how she wags her pointer fingers when she dances. This is usually what she does when she says no.............she waggles her finger. I think it's pretty endearing.

Meg loves to play with cars, especially while we are doing school. In the middle of a lesson I start giggling as I hear a car noisily roll across the floor, and then I reach down and roll it back to her. This goes on for a bit until she decides to play something else.

I was just thinking yesterday  how much I love having my munchkins at home everyday to teach. I love that whenever I feel like it I can give them a hug,  a kiss, or tell them I love them. How fun it is to open the door to the girls' room while they are doing school work and tell them "I love you", or walk in and hug them. One day I'm not going to be able to just give them a hug whenever I want because they'll be off on their own adventure of "life". I think I'm truly blessed.

This and That

We had a wonderful first week of school, and it's proving to be a fabulous second week.
This was our first art project for the year. It was really a lot of fun to make. A week ahead of time we painted white paper. The kids especially loved this part because it didn't have to be any specific pattern.
When that was dry I cut out pumpkins, gourds, and leaves. Rhaevyn and Aeva did their own wording, but I found quotes for Myles and Elsa. Then we outlined the cutouts in gold. It's fun to have a bit of fall coloring bedeck our front door. There was enough left over for me to make one too.
Elsa.......

Myles...........

Rhaevyn and Aeva....................

Elsa lost her first tooth! This was exciting. I took her picture, and then Meg decided she needed a picture too. Myles was so cute. About an hour after Elsa fell asleep he crept out to the living room to give me the tooth and explained that he had put a quarter of his own money under her pillow with a note from the Tooth Napper. Elsa was so ecstatic the next morning. I mean no one else has gotten a letter from the Tooth Napper!!

We acquired a new resident for our garage last Monday. Chris keeps asking me how he looks in it.
I just laugh. He and Rhaevyn had a blast driving it home to our house. Saturday Chris spent a while detailing it inside and out.

Before you get excited let me just mention that he is selling it for a friend . We are hoping that by tomorrow it will be sold. A gentleman came to look at it Saturday evening after looking at several other MR2's. He couldn't believe how clean it was. Fingers crossed :)


Meg was playing peek-a-boo with her hat. She has come to love building with blocks. She gets super excited after she has stacked a few.

I keep getting asked if I've sewn any more quilts. Making all those quilts really took a lot out of me, but I think I will probably start one in the next couple of weeks. I was amazed to see that the Facebook page for my project has reached ten different countries. Most people reached were in the U.S. and Canada, but there were several in the U.K., and even a couple in Asia, Australia and the Middle East. I just think that is really, really exciting!

Last week of Summer Break

It's been our last week of summer break. I wanted to let the kids have some extra time since a lot of their summer was helping to give me time to do quilts.
I think we are ready to start our new school year. I know I am excited! We've got weekly lesson outlines, new books, and some fun art projects planned.
I dolled up Elsa's school desk. It's such a cheary color, and spices up our living room. Elsa supervised my paint job. She is super excited to have a pretty school desk.

Before

 

 After

 

I told the kids this should be our theme song for our school year..................mainly just the chorus.
It's  Always a Good Time by Owl City.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzumsXtyCW4

The kids were good to humor me with start of the school year pictures. I can't believe how big they are all getting. It's amazing looking at last year's pictures and this year's.

 I keep asking myself, 

                  " how is it possible that I now have a junior?"

  

I think Aeva definitely looks like a teenager this year. I can't believe how little she still looked last year.

 I can't believe my handsome little man is in the 4th grade. 
I keep thinking that that just isn't right!

 And this little princess is now in the 1st grade. 
Kindergarten went waaaay to fast!

 

My how this little munchkin has changed in one year.

 

 Elsa has been trying to show Meg the ropes of riding the tricycle. Meg is really sneaky about escaping out to the back yard. Sometimes she has shoes on, always someone else's, and sometimes she doesn't. You'll notice Elsa's shoes in the back ground. She couldn't get onto the tricycle with them as they were hindering her from stepping up onto it. Elsa is always so good about making sure Meg has a helmet on. I watched this morning as Meg spent ten minutes just playing with the strap trying to fasten it. Needless to say she was fascinated by it.


 

 We harvested our first cantelope from our garden. Oh my goodness it was delicious! Sweet and juicy.
It was gone pretty quickly. I'm hoping the other three hurry up before the weather gets cold. We lost one to an animal; perhaps a racoon. We did see a squirrel steal one of our yellow zucchini.
We made some zucchini muffins this past week, using zucchini from our garden, for Rhaevyn and Aeva's breakfasts before seminary.

 

 

 Rhaevyn has been running a salon here the past couple of weeks. First she cut about five inches off of her hair. I think Chris and I had wide eyes and dropped jaws. It's still fairly long, and it is her hair. Next I came home from shopping to discover that Aeva's hair had been chopped. She had been growing it out and had been wearing it up in a full bun. Then she'd wear her glasses, and she looked super sophisticated. I'm guessing at least 4 to 5 inches were cut off because it was cut to her chin. I ended up taking her to the lady in our ward who cuts my hair to have it fixed a bit. Aeva really likes it. She wears short hair really well................in fact I think she rocks it. I think she is happy as it won't take long to get ready for seminary in the mornings. Then I walked in on Myles trying to trim his hair. I had him hand over the scissors so I could finish the trim around his ears. At least that is all he was trying to do. I was thinking that I went for this many years without anyone trying to cut their hair ever, so I should be thankful.
 I made a pillow for our couch. We had a green pillow that had had a good life but had run its course. I whipped out my scrap-bag to see what I had that would kind of match the living room. It has now become the favorite pillow.

Aeva made this green cloak. It think it is some kind of costume. Rhaevyn did the design on the back with embroidery thread.
Also, this is the song we love to play for Aeva. It kind of tortures her because she wants to got to Japan so badly. One day I'm sure she'll get there.
 It's Tokyo by Owl City.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of9Py3umWl8

 Meg has learned a new trick. I am not sure how she learned how to get on Pandora, but if she gets a hold of the Roku remote all of the sudden she hits the Pandora button. Then she's up on her feet and dancing to music. It cracks me up. In fact she just did it and was dancing to "Do You Love Me"

Myles made me close my eyes on the way over to the back door. This was his surprise.
In an effort to help Myles through his grieving process, we've decided to call our baby Max. When we found out we were having a baby, Myles really wanted the baby to be named Max, as he really hoped he'd be getting a brother. He wants to be able to say he (or she) and not "it".We told him that when we get to heaven, if our baby is a girl, I don't think she'd mind in the least if we've been calling her Max.