October Fun

This October we not only had visitors, but it was Halloween. We had a lot of fun going around and the girls loved dressing up.... Well, Arlee did.

Arlee went as Mirada on Brave for dance class and music
time. This is Arlee's dance partner, Lucy. Aren't they so
cute?

That Saturday  we went to the Thompson Farm. It is in our
area and a total blast. The kids loved every part of it!

Lydia is so goofy these days. Her personality is really
starting to come out. I love to see the things she does.

They had a pumpkin cannon and apple cannon. All the kids loved this.

Landon and Lydia on a mission to get to the hay ride. 

Zoey and Arlee being goofy

It doesn't look like it in this picture, but Lydia loved this ride.

Let the hunt begin. They had a great pumpkin patch. 

I think she may have found hers.

"This one is yours mom!" She picked a great one. I loved
the shape of it. 

Arlee and Zoey having a race. This was a lot of fun to see their competitve
side shine through. They had a lot of fun competing.

Of course, the dads can't let the kids have all the fun! Hahaha

I loved all the activities that they had there. What a blast.

YEEEE-HAAAWWWW!!!

Like a mentioned before.... Personality!!!!!!

And some more of it. She was refusing to look at me for
a picture. Then when I would put it down she would
laugh at me. Crazy girl.

Arlee was relaxing while waiting for the train ride.This
was her favorite part she says.

After the train ride we headed home and got ready for a Halloween party.

We are going to suck your blood.

We got so many compliments on our costumes.  

The girls had to stay home. This was a couples party
and it was a blast!

This was the day before Halloween. Arlee was Mavis,
Hans was Drac, I was Drac's wife and Lydia was Mavis,
but in bat form. We were Hotel Transylvania! We
attempted to make Arlee's hair black, but it was a lot
lighter than Hans'', which in turn made it really hard
and kind of a mess.

The day of Halloween she opted to be a Black Cat instead.
That was a lot easier. Why don't I have a picture of that?
Because I am a slacker mom. DANG IT!

We weren't able to decorate our pumpkins yet. So even
though it was Nov. 1st we did it any way. I am not really a
fan of carving pumpkins so I thought I would just
decorate mine with the candy that no one really likes. Arlee
could see the fun in all of this. Naturally she wanted to do
the same. Pretty good, right?

Hans is die hard.... He carved 2. One happens to be Arlee's.

Our neighbor had us come over and decorate pumpkins with her the day
after my mom and sister left. They are the ones on the end. We loved do
this with her and her family. I swear we have the coolest people to hang out
with up here. They just adopt us into their families and we love it. I am not
shy about going either. We would miss out on so many experiences if we were.
Left to right is Lydia's from our neighbors, Arlee's from family decorating, Hans/
Arlee's, Hans', Mine and then Arlee's from our neighbors house.  I am missing
the ones that were on the porch that we decorated with my mom and sister.
Anyway, we had a great Halloween! We Went trick or treating with our friend's,
The Gillman's and then finished off in our neighborhood at a few people that we
knew. The girls ended up with 12.5 pounds of candy. I have put some on pumpkins,
some in the freezer and some in the closet. Oh yeah and some we ate.
Now we are looking forward to Thanksgiving in 2 days!!!! Oh my goodness, where
has the time gone. I can tell you one thing it has past by with a lot of fun.
Stay tuned for Thanksgiving pictures. We will be having it at our house this year
with some friends that we are actually adopting. Normally it has been the other way
around.
Happy Turkey Day soon!

Oh yeah, baby girl is doing great. Still moving like crazy. Oh and now people are
telling me that with in the last week I am actually looking pregnant! Hooray! I am
now at 23 weeks and going strong. As long as I have my compression stockings,
heating pad and something to eat. ;) I will post pictures sometime.... maybe. 

October Visitors

My mom, Abbie and Kara came for a visit in October. We had so much fun having them over. They are welcome to come back anytime.

I took some pictures of Kara and the pumpkins that we grew this year. Isn't she cute?

The next day we went on a hike. We were supposed to go to this other one,

but it was closed. All because someone was having a temper tantrum in the

white house. Talk about being a baby! Anyway, we still had fun.

Lydia hated this nice backpack...finally she passed out!

We had a lot of fun decorating pumpkins. Even though it started out like this.

It ended like this... They are happy now.

And just look at those works of art!

We went on another hike the day before they left. Problem was... the trail
wasn't marked very well at all. So my mom, Abbie and Hans went looking
through a farmers field to find where to get out....They sort of found it.
Probably not the best hike to go on ever again.

Lydia and Arlee enjoying themselves while the adults
were trying to figure out what was going on. Arlee carried
the tumble weed around the whole time. It was her umbrella.

Lydia Miss... Cutie pie

Hey look we found the car too. The only reason we went on this hike is
Lydia wouldn't sit in the backpack and Abbie had to get her steps in for the
day. I think we accomplished it, just fine.
They went home the next day. Luckily, Kara was a trooper both ways so
I think Abbie might come and see us again. I guess now Abbie understands
the road with a baby. She can only somewhat understand what we go through
every time we go to Utah. It is a lot of work, but it is worth it.
Come back again soon. We would love to have ya.

It's A...

Seaside Getaway

Hans' opposite needed a full 7 days off in a row to move. This meant that Hans would also get 7 off in a row. So we decided to rent a little beach house and getaway for a few days. We left Friday, September 19th and came home on the 23rd. It was just what we needed. Can't go wrong with time with the family.
Be prepared for picture overload... go get some popcorn or something. We had a lot of fun!
The first stop was the house where they filmed the movie Goonies!

We took these pictures from the Goonies house in Astoria, Oregon.
We could hear these weird sounds and then realized that they were the
cause of it all. What a cool experience it was to see them out in the wild
making a racket!

This was for my dad. Every time I see an old car I think of him. He can
always name off the model, make and year of the car... if it is old. They
used to have a distinct look to the year etc. but not anymore he says.

This is the Goonies House. There is even a sign that
says, The Goondocks

When my parents came for a visit a couple months ago they came up the
Oregon coast first and then over to out house. While they were traveling they
came upon this bridge. My dad is not a fan of water. They just about went
over this bridge, until they realized they didn't have to. My dad was in a total
panic- well sort of.

After hearing about this bridge and looking it up I decided that I wanted to
go on it. Even though it scared my dad. I actually think that was part of the
thrill for me. (insert giggles) 

Since we were going through Astoria, Oregon we thought we would make
the trip and cross it. What a great experience! The girls thought it was
awesome. 

While we were crossing Arlee was saying, "This is awesome. See I am not
freaking out. Why was Papa freaking out? He is so weird." 

Lydia just kept shouting, "WATER!!!!"

Totally in the water!

This is the other side of the bridge. The Washington Side. The bridge goes
over the Columbia River. 

The length of the bridge is 4 miles total. They count as soon as it leaves
the hill. So the ramp is included. As you can see it is very high. The Astoria-
Megler Bridge is  a steel Cantilever through truss bridge that spans the Columbia
 River between Astoria, Oregon and Point Ellice near Megler, Washington.
 Located 14 miles from the mouth of the river, the  bridge is 4.1 miles long and was the
 last completed segment of U.S. Route 101 between Olympia, Washington and Los Angeles,
California. It is the longest continuous truss bridge in North America.

This was our beach house. We found it on www.oregonbeachvacations.com
It is called "My Beach House" Actually this house reminded us of our
town house that we lived in when we first got to Yakima, Washington.

As you can tell the girls made themselves right at home.

Girls' bathroom

Girls' Room

Master

Master Bath

Hans had a childhood friend move to Beaverton, Oregon after law school.
They came up for the day. It was about an hour and a half drive for them.
We went to Haystack Rock and played on the beach.

It was cold, but totally worth it.

Once Lydia got over getting her hands dirty.

Arlee was in heaven.

John, Mallory, Arlee and Hans

Trevor and Cassie

Haystack Rock

This picture was taken right after a "sneaker wave" (Stinker Wave as Arlee
calls it) flooded our beach site, ruined our phones, made everything wet
and sandy. Luckily, it missed the camcorder, but only because Arlee's
backpack protected it. Thank goodness I was worried about it getting
sandy from the kids not being careful.  

Family Photo Opp.

Like I said, she was in heaven!

The girls were having fun getting their hands dirty and then holding them
out saying, EWWW! in unison. 

Boys will be boys. I have no idea how cold the water was, but it wasn't
swim worthy in my opinion. But hey the ocean is the ocean.

After the beach we ate lunch, gave the kids naps and
then set off for the promenade. After we stopped at the
Salt water taffy outlet and got over a pound! Seemed
like a lot for us, but we have been enjoying them.

We spotted BIG FOOT! Haha! It was good too, but we are
looking forward to trying more places the next time that
we go. The resturant was pretty dark inside. It was hard
for us to read the menus. The girls loved the smile fries.

After dinner we headed to Gearhart, Oregon. Only about 15 minutes away.
The Sunset was beautiful! We were looking for sand dollars, but I guess
you need to go during low tide. I think we were still in high tide. This
beach you can drive your cars on if they have 4 wheel drive. So we had to
drop the Millburns mini van off and load them in the back of ours. We were
all safely transported down the street. 

The girls had fun finding jellyfish that had been washed up. When they
found one they would all point and say, "EWWWW!" and burst into
laughter. Probably what kept them going. It was freezing and we didn't find
any sand dollars that were whole.

After we took them back to their van they headed home to Beaverton. It
was a great day and surprisingly good weather. It only rained while we were
inside.

The next day it was rainy all day. So we stayed inside and did two puzzles,
watched a movie and let Lydia nap for a few hours. She didn't get a good
nap the day before. After her nap we went to Del Ray and enjoyed yet
another beach. It was wonderful!

We ran from the waves. One of our favorite things to go on the cold
beaches.

Lydia actually liked getting hit by the water. She wasn't
happy if the water missed her.

Arlee's pants were soaked so we changed her into her swimsuit.

They enjoyed chasing the gulls.

Walking in the tire tracks

making silly faces

Being together

And checking out their shadows. We actually found a whole sand dollar.
 Only one, but hey we found one. 

We had to pry this little girl out of the water and off the beach. Arlee was a
better listener. Lydia is still too little to comprehend we were all hungry and
would go to another beach after dinner.

After dinner we walked to the beach just a couple blocks from the house.
It had some swings that Arlee and Mallory were dying to go on the day
before. They played on them for a little bit.

Then the storm came. We thought we were right in a pocket of lovely
weather, but it proved otherwise. We pretty much bolted back to the
house. By the time we got back it was a Monsoon outside. We had two
happy girls that got their fill of the beach during our trip.  After we got back
we showered and ate ice cream. Put the girls to bed and Hans and I watched
a movie. Well, being pregnant meant that I fell asleep half way though.
Hans then turned on the BYU/ UTAH game. Too bad I wasn't awake. My
team won. 4th year in a row! Go UTES!