Thanksgiving Weekend

We went to Mesa for Thanksgiving. Here are the hightlights.


Helping Grandma make her famous rolls.

Thanksgiving dinner was, as to be expected, DELICIOUS and plentiful. My sister, Jennifer, is always a perfect hostess.

Giant bowl of yummy mashed potatoes.

Cross-dressing cousins. Loads of fun.

Time with Grandma.

Friday was the day set aside for the other siblings and their families to get together with us. We had a picnic and played games at the park.

Before dinner, we had our first-ever bike parade. The kids absolutely loved decorating their bikes and riding them down the street. I hope this has become a tradition.

I always love when my kiddos get to spend time with their cousins. We had lots of fun, as always!

The Grass is Definitely Greener.....

....when you haven't seen more than a few sparse blades of it in almost a year and a half.

Well, that changed recently when WE GOT GRASS!!!

Phase I of Project Back Yard is just about finished.  Our yard went from looking like utter deslolation....

....to this!  It's GREEN and it's lovely.  It even smells like a golf course.

You see, around here people like to keep things looking "natural", which equates to BROWN and spiney and rocky things everywhere.  Our neighborhood HOA won't even permit residents to grow grass in  the front yard.  From googlemaps one can see in our area only 1 out of 5 or 6 homes have grass in the back yard.  Most opt for pools over grass. So, to look out our windows and see something GREEN is a beautiful sight for brown-sore eyes.  I did double-takes the first few days.

The process went like this: We hired out putting in the sprinkling system and decorative curbing around the yar.  Then one Saturday, Dan's brother and a bunch of friends from the ward came over to lay the sod with Dan. 6 pallets worth equals 300 rolls of sod.  They worked hard and did a great job.  A big thanks to them for all their help!

Woo hoo!  We love it and we have big plans for the yard.  Besides having lots of space to soon play volley ball, bad minton, soccer, T-ball, croquet, bocce ball, and other yard games, the remaining phases of Project Back Yard include putting in a flower garden, an edible garden, flowering/green shrubs, shade trees, and citrus trees.  We also will be getting a swingset and perhaps a trampoline down the road.  We are EXCITED!!

The Big Toe

It's a really important body part.

One that you don't know how much you need it till you can't use it.

I learned this the hard way this week when I hurt my left big toe rough housing with Dallin.

Hyperextension. A pop. Lots of pain. Immediate swelling and bruising. Lots of pain. Ice application. Lots of pain. Hobbling around like a gimp.  Did I mention lots of pain?

Even though I think feet are pretty sick, I'm bravely putting my very un-pedicured feet out there for all to see.

Day 1 - soon after the injury (it hurt soooo bad but doesn't even look that bad).  That night our doctor friend
examined it and said it's a bad sprain.  I thought I'd broken it, so I was relieved.

Day 2 - surprisingly it felt a little better and I got around with less hobbling.

Day 3 (today) - the camera didn't pick up the nice bruises on and all around the toe, but they're there.

Snip Snip

Look who got a hold of the scissors yesterday......

On the Move!

As of last evening, this little baby girl is a crawler!

She's been advancing toward this milestone for a while, getting ever closer to actually doing it. Exactly one week shy of turning 11 months old, she got it. You should have seen the kids.  They were thrilled for her. Dan gently reprimanded me for kind of being the wet blanket of the occasion instead of just being able to revel in her new accomplishment.  I commented on the ramifications of her no longer being stationary (the stairs, choking hazards, getting into everything), all of which equate to more effort and vigilance for me.  And, of course, he's absolutely right.  So I'm trying harder to be genuinely excited for her too.

Halloween, etc.

This post is a speed post. I'm trying to do it in just a couple of minutes, so you'll read in generalities on this one (much to my chagrin).

Carving pumpkins.

The kids wearing their costumes prior to the ward trunk-or-treat on the 29th.

Meg was a ballerina. SO UNBELIEVABLY DARLING.

Em was Rapunzel. She looked great as a blonde.

Dallinboy was a skeleton. Scary!

Baby Belle was also a ballerina. A cutie pie!

On Halloween night we went trick-or-treating with friends.