October and November {2012}

:: General Conference ::

Often my husband has not been able to watch it with me because drill weekend often happens the same weekend. It was wonderful that this October's LDS general conference he didn't have drill. During at least one session the girls quietly colored. These and other photos we took this fall are {HERE}.


:: Halloween activities ::

On September 27 my friend Laura L. and I had fun taking our kids to see the witches. I put my baby in a pumpkin and took pictures.


A couple of weeks later I helped the PTA do vision screening, which overlapped with the parent craft activity, but I was able to do both. I painted two little wooden pumpkins, cut and glued on the scrapbook paper, then finished assembling the parts at home.

I also made a wreath for Halloween. I like that it's unique. It's not any of the styles I saw on Pinterest. I tied orange, black, green, and purple fabric scraps around a $1 D.I. wreath and hung it on our front door with clear jewelry elastic (and a piece of packaging tape on the inside of the door). After I had taken it down I accidentally came across the other part I had wanted, so I and added it: silver chipboard letters to spell "BOO." I hot glued these on and decorated the borders of each letter with a black permanent marker.

The most important part of Halloween is the costumes! Like my friend Anne, this year I didn't get the natural light photo I wanted of all of us in our Halloween costumes. I don't know if I ever have; maybe next year. It was just the kids who dressed up this year. They were the three little kittens who lost their mittens. The tails were the challenging part to make; I only made one. I thought that soon after Halloween I'd make two more tails, get the better white clothes (which my husband had moved and I couldn't find them) on the kids, and take a picture outside. Now that it's been so long and there's snow on the ground and I keep forgetting-slash-having-other-things-I-need-to-do, I probably won't.

I thought of the three little kittens idea maybe a couple of months earlier and procrastinated getting the kids' costumes started. I ran out of time to make a costume for me. I was going to be a mama cat, with the mates to their mittens on a string around my neck or something

L is adorable. She always sings the song wrong: "Three little kittens, they lost their mittens and began to cwy and couldn't able to find them."

The kids and I went to our ward party the Friday before Halloween, and it included a trunk-or-treat. On Halloween day Shbogoo gave her class fruit leathers (instead of candy). We watched her school parade at the end of the school day. I let my girls play on the playground before we walked home, and then we headed over to the little party at our leasing office. All five of us spent some time at my mom's; my younger sister and her family came, too. The baby girls are always cute together. I really liked my niece and nephew's costumes. We didn't have our kids go trick-or-treating at all because we had accidentally left the kitten ears at home. For some reason it took us a while to realize this. My mom asked, "So what are their costumes?" It was fine that they didn't trick-or-treat. They had had plenty of candy and even cupcakes at the church, school, and leasing office.


:: Thanksgiving ::

We attended Thanksgiving meals with all of our parents this year. Actually, my husband was going to be able to come to half of them, but since he got sick he missed them all! Both he and the baby were sick Thanksgiving day, so I nursed her before going to Thanksgiving #2 (are you confused yet?), left her home with him, and nursed her right before and right after Thanksgiving #3. The first one (Wednesday night) and the fourth one (Friday at 4:00) he had to work and I of course took all three girls with me. Right now I only have photos of my mom's house and my dad and stepmom's house. The dinner on Wednesday night was the huge one, at my mother-in-law's roommate's parents' house. This was about 60 people, since they've been married a long time and have a lot of posterity. They're so nice to invite us. All four get-togethers were fantastic.


:: Other :: 

Shboogoo turned six and had a nature birthday party. She loves dinosaurs so I made sure to have a drawing of a brachiosaurus be part of the decorations. Probably our favorite part was the "cake": banana bread with a rainbow of top make of pieces of fruit, served with a little vanilla ice cream. Not a lot of friends came, and it was simple, but she kept hugging me and thanking me for making it such a fun party. I took a lot of pictures.

Among other things I don't have pictures of but that happened this October-November: two people I knew on my dad's side of the family (and one person whom I hadn't met) died of sad causes. I didn't know them real well, but I had known my cousin's husband Pete my whole life and I first met the other person -- their grandchildren's mom -- ten years ago. It was good to be able to see relatives at Pete's funeral, and to hear that he, a quiet man, had been living the gospel. That day I felt more grateful for my knowledge of Heavenly Father's plan of happiness for all of his children.