Fall Cleaning

Right before Thanksgiving, I became thoroughly disgusted with the condition of my van. In fact, it was the day of the Twilight movie when I realized that there was not even the remotest possibility of me driving people in my car to the movie.  The very next day, I pulled out the heavy artillery and went to work. Between hauling all the leftover junk into the house, driving to a carwash, washing, vaccuming, and shampooing, it took a looooong time. It's a good thing we have our own rug doctor, because I spent about two hours just shampooing. I was so thorough, I even shampooed the ceilings, which had splatters of something on it. Lexi came home from work and couldn't believe I would do such a project without her, so she started in on her car too.

Leelee had to go in her exersaucer for a while, since Keith was changing the oil on the car at the same time. Poor girl was not too happy, but eventually wore herself out.

I did feel rather sad for her, but she of course woke up for good as soon as I took her out of the chair. Anyway, it felt so good to have a clean(er) van!

Twilight!

My friend Bridgette invited us to go see a special showing of the last Twilight movie that started six hours before the midnight premier for the regular public. Lexi and I thought that sounded like fun, so we bought our tickets! Above is Lexi, me, Bridgette, and Jenn holding up our special tickets. I'm surprised that Bridgette has decided she could remain friends with me, since she is a complete die-hard Twilight fan, and I am a lukewarm at best Twilight fan. She later told me that she had forgotten when she invited me that I'm not quite as into it as her. ;)

It was a fun girl's night out, especially because we didn't have to wait around for the midnight show! The 6:30 time was much more better. Above is Beth J., Bridgette J., Jenn, and Jen U. Below is Lexi, me, Kenya (Deseret's sister), Deseret F., and Lisa H. Yep, I took another cheesy movie theater photo of us at a Twilight movie!

I love going to the movies! I've frequently said it doesn't have to be a great movie for me to be up for going. And we'll just leave it at that as far as the movie is concerned...

Kindergarten Feast

Isaac's school had a feast for the kindergartners the Thursday before Thanksgiving, which was their last school day until after the holiday. They didn't really invite the parents to come, but they had lots of parent volunteers that were told to stay and eat with their child, so I figured they wouldn't notice an extra mom or two. I'm not able to do much volunteering this year because we have a baby, and I wasn't even sure I could make it down to the school in time since I had to get Finley to preschool first, so I never told Isaac that I might come down to eat with him. But I sure was glad I made it there! There were tons of parents milling about and Isaac was thrilled to see me.

They had all the kindergartners come in the morning, and he had so much fun that day at the "fun centers," where they played games and made things like his pasta necklace. Here he is with his teacher, Mrs. Isaacson. So glad I got to spend this special time with my boy!

Keeley makes more messes

As noted before, Keeley loves her veg. I love how completely filthy she got in these pictures!

That little grin! It's like she's saying, "I'm messy and I know it!"

Such a silly smiley girl with green goo all over her!

Grabbing the spoon--why do babies have to do this?? It would be so much easier to feed them if they weren't such grabby-guts!

You can see why lunchtime frequently means bathtime around here! You can also see why we took Keeley's helmet off when it was time to eat. (And if you're wondering about the helmet, or DOC band, there will be a post soon explaining all about it!)

Vampires, Witches, and Zombies, oh my!

Yeah, Halloween was so last month and a half, but here we are as monsters anyway.

Finley didn't like the green skinned, scary witch I made of her, so here she is as a cute witch.

As soon as I saw this program, I knew IJ needed to be a zombie!

Move over Bella and Edward, these guys are some hottie super bomb vampires.

Anyway, a fun program to Halloween-ify your family!

Keeley River's 1st Mess

Keeley has reached another big milestone--she made her first mess! I'm sure it is but the first of many. In early November, I put her down on the floor and she scooted over to her toy box. She figured out how to pull it over, and then proceeded to remove every item from the bin and scatter it around her.

She's such a cutie, and looks rather proud of herself. I told the kids that she had made her first mess, and Isaac asked if she was early to do that, and wondered when he made his first mess. He seemed to think it was an actual milestone, rather than an indicator of the years and years of messes yet to come...

Spooky-ooky Dinner and Halloween

We had our traditional spooky-ooky dinner the day before Halloween this year, and Scott and Elise joined us. On the menu--witches brew, of course, and witch finger cookies.

Deviled monster eyes.

Jack-o-lantern quesadillas. This meal was thrown together at the last minute, but I thought it was a fun time.

On Halloween, we quickly carved pumpkins before our neighborhood party. Poor Keeley was not happy to be relegated to the exersaucer, but sometimes you have no choice.

Finley and Lexi worked on one together.

Finley decided she wanted a happy pumpkin, and it turned out super cute.
We cleaned all the pumpkins out while the other kids were still at school so they would be ready as soon as they got home.

I helped Isaac do a scary one and Lexi helped Sareny with a design she came up with on her own. The kids also carved a little pumpkin for Keeley. Below--Isaac's, Keeley's, Sareny's, Finley's.

We had dinner at our neighbor's house, and then Keith and Keeley sat with the neighbors while Lexi and I took the kids around with the group.

Sareny and Isaac with a girl in our group.

Finley wanted to sit in the stroller. The whole time. Even if we were just moving from one garage to another, she would run and jump in.

Me and the kids. I was glad to have the stroller though, because at some point, the kids' buckets got too heavy so they dumped the candy in the basket.

We were joined on this outing by a nerdy PE coach...we pretended we didn't know her when she started olympic-style speed walking around the neighborhood. Actually, it was pretty darn hilarious.

The kids' pumpkins all lit up.

And a parting shot of the kids by their pumpkins. We had such a fun Halloween this year!

Soccer!

The three older kids all played soccer this year, and they had so much fun! Sareny was so excited to have her tia Lexi volunteer to be her coach this year. That was pretty cool. Sareny wore number two this year.

Their team was navy blue and they were The Pirates. One of the (few) perks of being the coach--you get to pick the team name!

 Grammy Jo and Bampa took the above and below pictures when they were here. Sareny breezes by the sinister black team, and with Lexi after the game.

Sareny's best friend Emily was on the team for the first half of the season, and then she moved away. Sareny still had a lot of fun playing--she worked really hard and improved each week. Below is her and teammates Drew H. and Mason R.

Here she is lined up with Bryce J. and Dillon P. to play offense, her favorite, with Drew on D.

I really enjoyed watching her games this year--they were rather intense sometimes! It was a lot of fun to watch the players all get better.

The huddle after their last game.

I lined everyone up for a picture. Left to right: Dillon, Diego, Nathan, Bryce, Sareny, Drew, Mason, Lexi. Not pictured: Jacob H., Dorian B., and Emily, who had obviously moved.

Some of the boys started doing silly/teen model poses.

Our allstar!

Isaac and Finley played on the same team this year in the prek/k division. Their games ranged from being fun to watch, to being boring, to being frustrating. That age would be so hard to coach! The very first play of the very first game, Isaac drove the ball down for a goal.

That was pretty exciting! He was quite proud, and his coach, my friend Bridgette J., gave him five.

Isaac definitely played a lot better this year than he did last year. When he was trying and paying attention, he did pretty good.

Here is Chase G., Isaac, and Finley lined up for a kickoff. This year, Isaac wore number three and Finley wore number five.

This first game, Finley didn't actually do too bad. She mostly paid attention and was at least running after the ball. As the season went on, that was not always the case.

Here she is with teammates Kade C., Will., Sydney J., and Chase, and she is actually kicking the ball.

These are from the last game of the season. She wanted to wear sunglasses that game. I was pretty proud of her for stepping up this game and trying a little harder than she had been.

Isaac fighting for the ball. He scored at least one goal every game except for one. Near the end of the season, his asthma started acting up, and he sometimes had a hard time breathing.

This was Finley's best play of the season, she actually dribbled the ball down the field a ways. Pay no attention to the fact that she is slightly out of bounds--that's perfectly allowable in their league!

Isaac gets a high five after scoring another goal.

And the end of the season huddle and cheer for the other team.

Learning about sportsmanship by shaking the other team's hands. Their team name was The Speedy Wolves, which I thought was pretty cute. The funniest team name we encountered was The Tigerlions. Pretty clever.

The team: Finley, Oscar, Isaac, Will, Chase, Sydney. Not pictured was Kade.

My two soccer girls.

 Three soccer all-stars! Next year Isaac will be moving up a division, so his games should be more exciting to watch. I expect that Finley will play more like I know she can more often. Sareny will be in the same division again, and she really was fun to watch. And hopefully Lexi can return to be Sareny's coach again--that would be awesome!