Soccer

Since I can't seem to download my more recent pictures (like Halloween!) I've decided I might as well post some of the stuff that didn't quite make it to my blog this fall.
Soccer season was even more crazy that usual, this year. We had three kids on three different teams, and of course we caved and agreed to coach Brielle's team.

It was actually pretty fun to watch Tray's team this year. He's getting really good and his team did awesome!


Brielle's games were more for comic relief. I love this pic --Jody told the kids to give us their ready faces.Pretty much the only time Brielle was able to kick the ball was when Jody let her kick off or do a corner kick . . .

...I love that this picture shows how far the ball actually went after the kick!
That's quite the kick!
Is it just me, or does she seem to be the only kid running away from the ball in this picture?



Kutter's games were a lot of fun to watch, too.
He 's getting really good and had a blast because two of his best friends were on his team!I am so relieved that it's finally over -- at least until spring!

Last Weekend

Most people probably considered this weekend their last blast before the outdoors freeze up and turn from gold to a murky gray--their last chance to play before winter sets in. For us, last weekend was the pinnacle of all our fun until the holidays roll around.

The fun started with the delight of having a visit from Grandma and Grandpa -- who came on Wednesday for an extra long weekend! This meant that Brielle had the pleasure of dragging Grandpa along with Daddy for her very first field trip -- to the pumpkin patch and corn maze. She could hardly sleep the day before and was so enthusiastic that it almost made them as excited to join her.

The best part of that whole deal was it meant Breje and I were free to spend a whole day with Grandma in Boise -- and we literally shopped til we dropped!


The only way this weekend could get better was by having Travis, Hayley and the girls arrive on Friday afternoon. We kicked the celebration into high gear with another trip to Boise for dinner.
I'm pretty sure Brielle and Sienna were the only ones who didn't notice what a long, hungry drive that was!
We eventually made it and delicious Mexican food was had by all -- along with yummy brownie sundaes for Kutter and my birthdays! Whooo hooo!The real highlight of the weekend was that Kutter was able to be baptized. I got this shot just while we were waiting for everyone to arrive. Can you tell that Kutter is "seriously nervous and really happy"?
We were able to have a very simple, small ceremony with just our friends and family, and the only thing that could've made it better is having the rest of the fam there!


Grandma Linda always makes a special baptism book for the kids to remember their special day. Besides all the fun pictures, she includes a personal testimony from everyone in the family that the kids can read whenever they want.
It was a pretty big hit and Kutter even admitted to me later (although if you tell him that you read it here I will deny it with all my heart and then hunt you down!) that he cried when he read all of the testimonies. We were pretty much worn out after all that, so we spent the rest of the weekend eating great food, playing games, and just watching the kids hang out.

You can't really beat that weekend!

Kutter's Eighth Birthday!

I can't believe our little Kutter has reached the age of accountability! There are so many things to love about Kutter, but I think my favorite is his sheepish grin! I adore how much he loves school and how quickly he makes friends. He loves all things boy -especially sports, which is why we threw him a football party for his birthday. I tried and tried to get him to agree to USU colors, but he's officially ditched my team in favor of BSU blue and orange -- we'll try to forgive him! I'm kind of proud of my BSU blue turf tablecloth ....... it was supposed to be bad weather, so I planned all sorts of football themed games -- a football toss and football bingo...

.l. but I was thrilled when I was able to ditch that plan and just send them outside to play football!

I eventually had to let them in for dinner -- good ole ball park franks, blue and orange nachos and some nasty orange gatorade. They thought they'd died and gone to heaven!

I have to give Jody credit -- I started whining about Kutter wanting a real cake and not just cupcakes (I am so not one of those talented cake decoraters) so Dad stepped in and created Kutter's football cake!

Gift time was the best part! You know you got good stuff when you're older brother is sneaking up behind you to snatch your new toys!

He liked his new BSU shirt way more than he's showing. I swear! Happy Birthday Kutter!

Feelin Crafty

It hasn't exactly been feeling like fall around here lately, but something happens to me when the kids go back to school and I just desperately need to craft. The problem that I constantly run into is that there are hardly any places to buy craft supplies in this small town -- so I literally jumped for joy when I found this idea somewhere out there in blog-heaven. The supply list was surprisingly do-able.
Old sweaters: check
Twine: check
Rubber bands: check
Stuffing: Well, you're supposed to use actual stuffing, but if you're as cheap as me then you just use the wasted pieces of the sweater and then you feel even less terrible about cutting it up in the first place). So check!
The cost of this adorable little pumpkin patch? Totally and completely free. That's not even the best part. It involves no sewing and it's completely possible to complete them in one afternoon (as long as you and your friends are prepared to completely ignore all of your sweet little girls and not notice that all the flowers have been decapitated and a frog may or may have lost his life in what possibly could have been a science project gone horribly awry!)

Such lovely proof that summer is not quite over... ... do you love her outfit? Nothing says "I will never trust daddy with a hose" like wearing a bathing suit to help wash the car....

.. and you didn't miss the perfect pairing of the black cowboy boots did you? Which brings me around to mentioning that the other day, when I was dropping Brielle off at preschool and didn't have anything scheduled, I asked her what I was ever gonna do without her during class. She thought for just a few seconds and then replied, "Maybe you should just go shopping .... and buy me a whole bunch of shoes!" Had to ask!

And since you asked (okay, 2 of you asked!) Breje titled her poster "centered around a great oak". The oak represents how her family is her center, her ctr ring and her torch represent how important her faith is and standing for truth and righteousness. The tent symbolizes how much she loves camping and all the flowers represent her closest friends. The muic notes represent her love of music and the lightbulb represents her glorious brain! The cats represent her pets. Whew!

School Projects

I think I need to dedicate this post to my mom, in honor of all the ridiculously complicated school projects that she helped me complete in the wee hours of the night, because I either forgot all about them or just couldn't face them until the last minute. Mom, remember the miniature log cabin which counted for half of my grade in Interior Design 305? Remember helping Jody and I (yes, I was a grown married woman for crying out loud!) glue individual floor boards on until 4:30 in the morning? Even Cody helped me with that one -- his Styrofoam chimney rocked!
At least Breje has given me some advance notice so far, this year. She had me puzzling over how to create a scale model of the earth's crust for at least a week. Here's what we came up with.... ... yep, that is an enormous brownie, covered in several flavors of chocolate chips. Leave it to me to make a science project out of chocolate. Breje and I were carefully placing chocolate chips until early the next morning, and yes, that's to scale baby!
The next week she gave me the entire weekend to help her with her project for English -- a poster decorated with at least five symbols that represented her. She even convinced her friend MacKenzie to come help. I figured it would be a piece of cake.

Clearly, during all those late night creative sessions, my passed along her "seriously this is not problem and it'll be done in no time and we can still make it way cooler than any one else's" gene. At some point I convinced Breje that it'd be way easier to build a tree out of packing paper and silk leaves than to draw one. It spiraled a little out of control after that, but the good news is that she did get manage to get both projects turned in on time and received w A's! We make a great team.

Preschool

Brielle finally got to start preschool this week. It is her new favorite thing. She had butterflies and nervous giggles for an entire night before-hand and woke up with explicit instructions as to her attire and hairdo. (Not a control freak at all!) She begged for lunch at 9:00 because she knew she was supposed to go to school after lunch. She couldn't wait for pictures--apparently this is the official "I am old enough and cute enough to go to preschool" pose. Maybe Sienna taught it to her?! She went in with hardly any hesitation and gave school glowing a review when I picked her up. She told Breje that the only time she was "nuhvus" was when they did "that scout thing, with the flag, you know, the plex a burlegence"! I guess we'll be practicing that one at home for awhile!
Since she's getting so gosh-darned old these days, I find myself hanging onto her more naive moments. One of my favorites was when she demanded curly hair for our Labor Day party. When I finished she said "People are going to say that I am so beautiful, but (noticing my straight hair) they might think you just didn't do your hair!"