Bob's Your Uncle

For several months now, Sophie has been asking to have her hair cut short.  I made her wait to make sure that she really wanted to, but she kept asking!  So we finally did it.  Chopped it all off.  I was remarkably composed through it all.  It was good that I was taking pictures and couldn't think about it too much because I may have cried!  Sophie didn't flinch!  She had 12 inches cut off and has donated it to "Locks of Love".  At least all that pretty hair went to a good cause!  And she really does look so darling!  The lady didn't give her as much of an A-line as I'd wanted, but she did a great job!  I'm just not sure that I like how much older it makes Sophie look!

The Freaky Feast

~MENU~

Eyeball & Bloody Chunk Salad

Ribs with Schneken (Slug) Sauce

Severed Mummy Fingers

Deviled Eggs

Newt Eye Jello with Mashed Toenail Topping

Squirrel Brains

To Drink: Hulk Spit

Dessert: Graveyard Surprise

Halloween Costumes

I'm not entirely sure what made MAKING the kids' costumes sound like a good idea, but I won't be doing it again!  I really thought that throwing a few patches and some raffia on Briggs' existing clothing and sticking Porter through an old box with some spray paint would be a matter of minutes.  I planned to spend a little more time on Sophie's, but I told Tyler he was on his own and thanks to Old Navy, Sawyer was covered, so I thought I was good to go.  Not so.  I'm sure I spent the better part of a day each on Sophie's, Briggs', and Porter's costumes - although I did have a lot of fun with the spray paint and couldn't help even spraying his shoes. Then of course Halloween day came around and Tyler hadn't done a thing - claiming to have had no time (apparently the fact that he has had time to read most of The Lost Symbol this past week isn't relevant because it was almost entirely done in the bathroom.  Hmmmm).  But aside from the fact that I put many things I needed to get done on hold, it turned out great.  They were so cute in their costumes!  I'm so glad that they'll still let me dress them up!  It's just a shame that I don't have footage of them singing and acting out their parts!  Oh, and next year...we'll be buying!

Halloween BOOing

This is our Halloween kick-off!  

We started out several years ago with the simple "knock and run" technique, but it has evolved over the years.  Now it's full-up black clothing and camo!  We just need to get some ear-pieces so that someone can run the operations with satellite imagery from the computer at home next year.  Maybe then no one will turn and flatten Porter as they run from the house.  If it weren't for the camo we would have been totally busted!

Fall Soccer

Fall is probably our busiest time of year, but I love it!  With both kids playing soccer in different age groups, we have soccer every single day of the week except Sunday and Monday.  Combine that with piano, dance, gymnastics, Tyler coaching and playing soccer as well, Activity Days, and FHE and we're all quite busy, but I'm not complaining!  It's so much fun to watch them play!

Paris & Versailles

I realized after running the Wasatch Back with my family in June that if I was going to keep up my level of fitness, I needed something to motivate me.  Not that I don't love to run because I do!  But somehow there is just always a long list of things that I need to do and for some reason, taking care of myself easily gets bumped.  But with a race looming it didn't matter if it was raining, or if I was tired, or I needed to spend time on my calling, or if the laundry was piled up, or if Tyler wanted me to watch The Office with him...I had to make time to run!  So I signed up for another race.  This one was a 16K (10 miles) that began at the Eiffel Tower and ended in front of the Palace of Versailles.  I can't say I broke any records, but I finished and I had a lot of fun!  Plus...I always love Paris!  The downside was that Tyler got lost trying to drive through Paris to Versailles without me there to navigate and got lost.  He did get to Versailles eventually, but missed the end of the race and so I finished with no one there to cheer for me!  We'll have it down next year though, so if anyone wants to come and run with me...

After the race, we toured the gardens and then the palace at Versailles.   It was fairly painful to walk around after the race, but they were really beautiful and the weather was perfect.









This is where I decided we were done touring for the day!  I had hoped to get to the Eiffel Tower again in the evening so that the kids could see the lights, but it was obvious that they were done!  They were probably lucky that I had run my race earlier because I was tired too and really wasn't up to it either!

Our second day in Paris we went back to the Eiffel Tower so that the kids could go up inside, then we visited the Musee d'Orsay - which was unfortunately closed that day - and then the Sacre Coeur...which we hadn't been to before.  It would have been fun to fit in more, but it is amazing how slow you travel with four kids when you are walking and taking the metro!