Bring on Halloween!

We are excited about Halloween around here! Took the little cuties to the park and let them play around in their costumes this weekend. Got to enjoy the costumes while they can! :) Check out the cutest bugs ever!

I told the kids (well, Luke mainly) that if they would sit still for some pictures, they could have a lollipop. Ella rather enjoyed hers. Luke thought it was pretty cool for a bit, but was soon DONE with photos and peaced out to play frisbee with dad.

And, I wanted to blog about last week. It was kind of rough!
Jake was at work from six in the morning until midnight or later a few days. (Jenni, you are so awesome to do that all the time!)
I had a tire blow out on 1-15 (Where it's really scary and under construction and there is not a shoulder and the lanes are super narrow and Jake was at work and couldn't help)
We missed swimming on the tire issue day.
Someone stole our cute fall wreath that was on the front door.
Ella has been teething and grumpy (went from having 4 top teeth and two on the bottom to five (almost six) on top and four on the bottom!)
This same cute little grumpy pooped in the tub a couple of nights ago. Now that is fun to fish out of the tub after a long day (in sick green water her brother has splashed all over the bathroom). Disinfecting all the bath toys was even more of a party.
Another day she escaped from me during a diaper change and peed on the floor.
Luke freaked out at play group at the park Friday because it was "hot" (it wasn't) and we left early.
I made poppy seed muffins and was excited to eat them. Turns out the seeds I used were super old, expired, and nasty.
Just one of those weeks. I hope this next one is better! With a cute spider and butterfly around though, how could it not be?

Wild Things, Pumpas and Soup.

Friday night we loaded the kids and a bunch of blankets, pillows and snacks in the car and headed over to the drive-in theater. It was fun! I hadn't been to a drive-in since I was a kid. We saw Where the Wild Things Are. It didn't live up to the high expectations I had and was kind of long, but the characters were cute and Luke seemed to like it.
Saturday we made a visit to the pumpkin patch. It's tradition now! I hope the next place we move has one too. :)

Ella loved all of the "pumpas!!" Whenever I was carrying her she would be squirming to get down and touch them. They had big piles of various kinds of squash too. She was having fun!

Checking out the animals...

This big peacock flew up right next to Jake! It was huge and creepy.

Hay maze...

The pumpkin Luke picked out! He picked one for Ella too, but we don't know what happened to hers. Mysteriously disappeared from the car on the way home.

And one last thing.

We tried a new soup recipe last week. It's from this fun Halloween book that my grandparents gave to Luke and is pretty tasty! Looks really festive too in the pumpkin. You should try it.

Extra Good Alphabet Soup in a Pumpkin

Slice off top of 1 medium size pumpkin; clean out inside of pumpkin and set aside. Saute 4 cut-up chicken breasts in 3 tablespoons of butter until golden. Remove and saute 3 sliced carrots, 2 sliced celery stalks, and 1/2 cup scallions. Add 1 can each of cream of chicken soup, cream of celery soup, and chicken alphabet soup. Stir in 1 can water, 1/3 cup sour cream, and 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg. Mix well and pour into hollow pumpkin. Top with pumpkin top. Place on baking sheet and bake in a 350 oven for 90 minutes. Scrape pumpkin sides when serving (the best part!) Makes 8 servings.

Cutie Walker

Ella has been getting better at walking over the last couple of weeks, and now she's pretty much a pro. I love one year olds! Such a fun age. Hearing their cute little voices start to talk and watching them lose their wobbliness is so much fun. Today was perfect outside. Breezy, cool, and just right for playing at the park. Check out my cute walker!

I guess she didn't want Luke holding her hand...
Yeah for kites!
Luke wanted to take some pictures, and I think this one he took of his feet actually turned out kind of fun!

Rise and Shout

Jake and I went on a date last night to the BYU vs UNLV football game! I'm not a huge football buff, but when BYU is playing I love to go! It's the superfan in me I guess. Haha. (By the way, old BYU roomies, you'll appreciate that I still have my superfan t-shirt. Good times!)
We won 59 to 21. Go Cougars!!

We had some good seats! First row at the 40 yard line. Kind of on the wrong side of the field though! Haha. Luckily a few cougar fans were sitting on the other side of Jake so we weren't completely surrounded by red. (And, Jake could talk some serious football talk with them since I'm not the most up to date person when it comes to football stats and details) Since we were right behind the Rebel players, I was entertained by all of their comments each time BYU made a touchdown and their cool hair-dos.

Thanks Jake for a fun night! :)

Gingerbread Haunted House

Last year, we made one of these gingerbread haunted houses and Luke didn't want to part with it after Halloween. He would look at it every day and tell me that Bony Legs lived there, and we would talk about how scary it was. I finally threw the dusty thing away in December one day while he was napping. Anyway, it was a big hit, so we got the same kit again and he decorated it last night. So proud of himself. I helped him gob on the frosting on the roof and then he did the rest. (BTW, I think 3 year olds make much scarier haunted houses then the ones pictured on the Wilton kit box)

He wanted me to take a picture of his purple tongue.

ThE GOod, ThE BaD, and ThE UgLY....

Good stuff from this past week...

It's October! Yay, I love October. The weather has been great. FINALLY not unbearably hot around here. We've been able to go to the park during the day which really beats waiting until the sun is going down to go outside! And, this was conference weekend. All the talks were especially good this time around.

Ella is almost an official walker! She's been taking quite a few steps since Sept 25, and is just about there. I think she'll really take off any time.

Made quite a bit of progress on my health and aging class!

Luke is loving swimming lessons now. Phew! Here he is with his teacher this past week...


Also, I put him in a class at a gymnastics gym a month or so ago. The class is just for three-year-olds and they do a lot of obstacle course type things, climb ropes and ladders, and jump on trampolines. Jake got off early enough to come watch this past week so Luke was excited to show him his "tricks."

We found a good Mexican restaurant here! Seems like everywhere around Vegas is a pizza joint, so this is good news :)

Went to enrichment and learned how to make lots of new yummy things. Can't wait to try making them at home!

The bad...

I was really hoping that when we moved away from TX, Luke's asthma problems wouldn't follow us. I had heard that a lot of people have breathing issues there, and then they go away after leaving (something about the weather patterns or air in S.A... I don't exactly remember what the doc said). Well, Luke hadn't had any problems here until this past week. We've been up in the middle of the nights again for breathing treatments. He's been kind of sick with a cold, so I think that's what brought it on. Poor kid.

Somebody at our house got a speeding ticket. (wasn't me)

This same somebody came soooo close to running over a pedestrian. Really, it's a miracle he didn't hit the guy. People, if you have black skin and it's dark outside, DONT WEAR ALL BLACK CLOTHES. Thanks.

My leg still isn't up to running and it's been a month since I hurt it. SO annoying. At least it lets me do most other things at the gym without hurting now.

Ella added "Poo Poo" and "POOP" to her vocabulary. MY ONE YEAR OLD IS SAYING POOP. What a nice brother to teach her these types of things...

The Ugly...

Not my husband (I happen to think he's a hottie). And not his friends. It's the mustaches that I think are gross. Jake and the other guys in his AEGD program decided it would be fun to grow out staches for the week. Eew.
Luckily they shaved them off on Friday.

Plane Obsession

Around the time that this picture was taken last year, Luke became totally obsessed with planes.
He has always liked them. BUT, over the past twelve months, they have become the coolest things ever to this little boy. So, I have to blog about it. He got this bear backpack from our friend Ryan last Christmas and since then he has used it to take his planes along with us wherever we go.

A couple of weeks ago we went to a local children's museum. He wanted to spend THE ENTIRE TIME in this plane. We had a few melt downs when other kids wanted to be pilot for a bit.

And then of course whenever we're outside, it's awesome to see planes. He has always loved it when they fly over. Funny how it never gets old. This pic was taken earlier this week at the park.

He is always building planes... with blocks, boxes, couch cushions, and Lego's that is. Oh, and paper ones too. Occasionally Jake and I are in the mood to help. Here's Jake and Luke with their Lego plane made last night. Luke is pretty awesome at building them by himself though.

We draw planes too. Pretty much every time we get the crayons and paper out. Here's one that he drew today. "It has a lot of missiles and guns on it so it can shoot down those little planes." Oh, and check out his name on the paper. He's getting pretty good at that. cutie.

Still loves his plane books!

Here's a pic from the Adventure Dome at Circus Circus a couple of weeks ago. Rode this ride six times.

Our FHE activity last week was watching the planes land and take off at the airport. Woo hoo :)We found a great place to watch the planes last time my parents came to visit. Anyway, Luke sat in the front of the car while we watched and wanted to push all the buttons on the dash to pretend he was controlling the planes. It was really funny, but you'd have to be there to think so!

Oh, and he started swimming lessons last week. The first lesson went horribly. First off, he refused to get in the water with his teacher. After he got into the water he cried for the rest of the lesson. When we went back for lesson #2 I was a little more prepared. Ella and I got in the water with him and his teacher to see if that would help him out. That didn't help. BUT, he found a missile (that would go on a cool plane) toy in the toy box there. And, that did it! He was a happy camper throwing the missile toy around and then kicking or pulling with his arms in the water to get it. He has been looking forward to his next lesson so that he can go and check out the missile again.

So, the plane theme never really ends around here, and it's kind of fun! Those are just a few examples. He tells me all the time that he wants to be an "air force jet pilot... not an airport pilot." And says he'll give me a ride in his plane when he gets big. Maybe he'll give you one too :)

My Baby Girl Is One!!

We've had lots of fun getting to know this little princess over the past twelve months. It hardly seems like a year ago that we brought our pink bundle home from the hospital. I remember holding her and thinking that I needed to love every minute of her tininess because she was going to grow up fast just like her brother did. So, she grew up. And, just as I thought, way too fast. This past week she turned one year old. Happy Birthday baby Ella! We love you.

Here's a little about Ella at one year...

*She has always been a great little sleeper.

*Despite having a hard time naming her at first, the name Ella totally fits her now. Luke calls her Ella Bella. Kinda funny!

*She loves her brother, and lights up whenever he comes in the room!

*You probably won't meet more of a mama's girl then this little girl.

*She is a super girly girl! Anytime I get out her bows and hair things, or her shoes, she wants to dig through them... then tries to put them on. Don't try to put a headband on her though because she will rip them off after about five minutes! She only likes them if she's the one putting them on.

*She is pretty easy going most of the time, and quite serious. You have to work pretty hard to get her to smile, but when she does it's contagious!

* She loves music... especially theme songs from TV. If she hears the song from Barney or Caillou in the other room she will crawl in as fast as she can and start dancing to the music!

*She's a little book lover and will sit and look at her books for a long time. She will point to the pictures and jabber to herself. Loves it when we read to her.

*Loves to eat "nanas!" Loves her "baba" too. Is starting to develop quite the vocabulary! (Mama, Dada, ack! (Luke), bebe (baby), buh (bird), and some others I can't think of right now) You may need us to interpret though! :)

*She is a FAST little crawler and loves to get into EVERYTHING. If I go in another room for just a minute, I will come back out and find her splashing in the toilet, emptying drawers or cupboards, ripping up a magazine, or messing with whatever she can get her hands on. This is new for us since Luke never got into stuff! Can't wait to see what happens when she starts running and walking around!

She was so excited about the cupcakes on her big day that she grabbed one when we were singing happy birthday to her. I was holding her next to the cupcakes while Luke blew out her candle. Luke helped her open her presents too. He was nice enough to let her play with them when he was done though. Grandma Pam and Grandpa Paul were in town for the day to celebrate, and watched the kiddos while we went to my friend Bahar's wedding that night. Thanks for coming mom and dad! Happy Birthday baby girl! Oh, and Jenni, Happy Birthday to you!! We hope your day was a good one too!

Oh, and isn't it annoying when you publish something and then see a bunch of typos later! Aaah!

Mr. and Mrs. McCrory!

One of my best friends got married this past week, and Jake and I got to go to celebrate with them. Everything was absolutely gorgeous and perfect! Congrats Bahar and Thomas!!

Friends, Family, and Reunions

We got back a couple of days ago from Utah! I went up before Jake with the kiddos to see some friends and family before the Smith family reunion started. My grandparents met me and the kids in Cedar City and drove the rest of the way up with us, so the drive really wasn't bad. Thanks grandpa and grandma :)

First stop on our trip was Woods Cross... my BFF's house. Ashley and I have been friends since we went to nursery together at church... so pretty much our whole lives. Here we are when we were like five. Apparently we had some awesome hair skills.
Here's another when we were like seventeen...
I think I'll end the old and embarrassing pictures there. We don't get to see each other that often any more, but it always seems like things are just the same when we get together. I love that. Luke had fun playing with Presley (check out these pictures from when they were babies), and Ella and Evvah just kinda watched the big kids play and tried to keep up. Maybe next time they will be old enough to play too.

Here's Luke, Presley, and Ash in the hot tub. Luke was a little hesitant about wearing pink and purple floaties. Haha. Kind of a bummer that this is pretty much the only picture I got when we were there. Anyway, thanks Ash for a fun time!

The next day we headed up to Ogden and hung out with Grandma Nan and Grandpa Arnie. Some of my aunts and cousins and their kids came over and we had a fun lunch. Aunt Carol came up and visited for a while, and Luke and Ella couldn't get enough of the swings and playhouse.

Grandpa gave Luke and Gabbi a ride...

Grandma went with us to the Dinosaur Park. Luke didn't like the Dino's as much as I thought he would. Bummer. He just wanted to play at the playground and swing the whole time.

Dinosaur Park Stuff!

After our stay in Ogden, we went up to Wolf Creek for the Smith family reunion. It's always so pretty up there, and good to be with everyone. I am lucky to have such awesome in laws!

Here is a picture from the house we stayed at. One of these days I want to live in a place with a view like this!
And another...

Here's Jake with his parents and the siblings.

Rick and Sherry with all 15 grand kids! Smith ladies... Me, Shauna, Hailey, Melanie, Kristen, and Jenni

2006 Babies all grown up... Luke, Austin, Gunnar, Lane, Lucy, Seth, and Logan
Luke and Ella with Grandpa and Grandma

Newly engaged... David and Shauna!

Mr. Luke tromping through weeds...

Ella was liking Utah's soft grass

Family program and fun... Shauna was a good sport!

Whipping cream game...
Luke was loving all the cousin time!

Why is it that every year I get a picture of Luke and Ethan with sticks?

More cousin stuff...

After our time at the reunion, we headed over to Huntsville to see Grandma Fran and Grandpa John! We stayed the night and headed out the next day. We managed to fit in lots of playing outside, book reading, bull riding at Uncle Den and Aunt Kathy's, visiting, and eating.

Grandma and Grandpa reading to the kids...

Grandma let Luke water her flowers :)

On our way back home we stopped in Provo to walk around BYU like the good old days! I love Provo. Dorky thing to say, I know. But, I do. And, it was fun walking around and thinking about fun times, classes, and the good friends I made there. We got a few things at the book store, and then drove the rest of the way home. Phew! Long post.