Halloween!

At long last, I am posting about Halloween. The celebrations started with a parade that when right down the street passed our house! It was so fun to sit out on our curb and watch. The boys played football with Dad while we waited.Um, Tab, you better watch out. Benton is coming for you and that kid is a bulldozer. They spent a fair amount of time jumping in the leaf piles.Waiting....waiting....waiting....Finally, the parade came. There was plenty of candy to start off the stash.Benton and Tab both had parades and parties at their schools. I forgot my camera at Benton's party. Bad mommy. But I remembered for Tab. He was thrilled that he got to lead his class in his parade with his teacher.Tab with his class.Next up was trick-or-treating. Poor things were freezing...Did I mention that it snowed a few hours after they got back. I suppose that is for another post. Then was the ward party. They had some fun activities for the kids. Here is Benton playing pin the face on the pumpkin. The end result.Tab also had a go at it. The kids were all lined up for a parade.Hobbes was a good sport.We finally got a family shot. Jason handed out candy from the Tee Pee during the trunk or treating.And close ups of the costumes. Every year I get a little bit more over the top. I do believe that this is the last year for this. Next year my mantra is going to be SIMPLIFY.

Tab and Benton. I used a pattern for their pants and tops. Then they each have moccasin like shoe covers, headdresses, chokers, chest plate type things (Tab took his off before the pictures.) quivers and bows and waist pouches used for "gathering". Daddy made their bows. No arrows, much to their dismay. I thought that would get a little dangerous. And the quivers...Paisley- I didn't use a pattern for her. She has her dress, choker, headband and feathers in her little braids.Hobbes- Doesn't he make the cutest Indian EVER? He just had a little headdress and his papoose. I love how the papoose turned out. It was so nice and cozy. I had wanted to make a cradle board but ran out of time. I can't imagine why! Then Jason. I used a pair of scrubs as a reference for making his costume. I worked out pretty well. He also had a choker, waist pouch,quiver and headband. He did NOT want feathers...lol.The quiver.
And finally, my costume. Again, I just used clothes I had as a reference for making a pattern for my costume. I had a necklace and headband, which I apparently took off before the pictures. No comments on how wide I look ok...I was a week postpartum. Just be happy I'm sharing at all.

Date Night...IN

We haven't really had very much opportunity to go OUT on dates as we just can't muster up the strength to pay for a babysitter. So we've been trying to have date nights IN after the kids are in bed. It isn't nearly as nice as going out but we get to spend some time together and we usually end up doing something enjoyable.

This time we decided to make some tortillas. We had been talking about trying it FOREVER, yet we just hadn't taken the time. SO we thought this was the perfect subject for our most recent date night. I had the job of rolling out the dough.Jason cooked them up.
Sorry, no finished product pictures. Apparently I'm slacking lately. They turned out pretty good. At first I thought that they were too stiff to use as a typical tortilla for burritos and such. But the next morning they were perfectly soft so I made breakfast burritos for everyone and they were divine. I would love to make all of our tortillas as they aren't super cheap and we use A LOT of them. Perhaps I should invest in a tortilla press? Anyone have experience with one?

More Soccer

Jason does such a good job capturing great pictures of Tab's soccer games. I just had to share more soccer pictures as that is what we spent every Saturday morning this passed Fall doing.

Tab's team, The Cheetahs, weren't exactly very good. They spent most of the time fighting each other for the ball. Tab loved to be the one kicking the ball in.He is such a silly boy. If he was standing in front of someone and wanted them to pass the ball to him, he would put his hands up in the air. I'm not exactly sure what that was about.He is not what you would call aggressive. He is quite fast and would easily get in front of the other kids running down the field and would be in a good position to stop the other team from making breakaway goals. However, he would get it front of them and then doing nothing and let them make their goal. Sigh...maybe next year he'll be more aggressive. So this shot is a rare one. He had the ball and was moving forward with it.On one of the occasions when his team happened to score a goal, they all took the opportunity to celebrate with high-fives and such. Jason caught Tab with the classic "yes, score" move. Notice his right arm in this picture...And here. Can you see the clenched fist and then the elbow drop. Classic...

Benton didn't mind the games too much.But Paisley got kind of sick of going to games. And she usually ended up getting in trouble.Then giving dad the stink eye.

Baseball With Dad

There is nothing that the boys love more than playing with their dad outside.And this time it took place in the form of some good ole' catch.I have to be honest though. It is kind of scary to be on the receiving end when Benny is throwing.
Tab... well Tab is just a goober.But at least he is a goober whose aim is getting better and can catch the ball.

Huricane Irene...Perfect Time to do some Canning.

In late August, Hurricane Irene hit the area that we live in. As we had previously had issues with lesser storms putting water in our basements, Jason took what little time he had at home to prepare for the storm. He built barricades of a sort to channel the water away from the foundation of the house.It totally looks trashy but it was only temporary until he could really fix it. And let me tell you it worked beautifully. Good job,Hubby!He also dug a little ditch that ran to our back yard that is more downhill to catch all of the water that comes from our neighbor's yard which is uphill from us. This also worked wonderfully.Prior to the news that a hurricane would be headed our way, my mom had planned to come up to help me do some canning. My sister later informed me that you are supposed to put up your stores prior to the storm and not during it. Yes, thank you, Alissa. Alas, it worked out well. We lost power and as luck would have it we were planning to do most of our canning and such outside on my mom's propane canning/camp stove. Oh, how nice it would be to have one of these.

We started with Peach Jam. Yum!It was so nice for cleanup and everything being able to do it outside. Let me tell you it is the way to go. I just hosed off my deck when we were all done.After the peach jam we made Salsa. How else do you make salsa but in a massive tub? Tab really enjoyed stirring it.Then we moved on to making Dilly Beans. Oh how I love my dilly beans.The end product!

Rainy Summer Days

We are now going to backtrack and catch up... as usual.

We had quite the rainy summer. And one particularly sunny yet rainy summer afternoon, the kids were driving me nuts. So I kicked them out to the back yard to play.I do believe they were as happy to be outside as I was to have them outside.Even if there was a bit of this.