Halloween

I know it's late, but yes we did dress up and beg for candy again this year. Well not we, but you know what I mean. This year we went for the "Mom's working, and she's tired, and she's not making costumes this year so what do you have in your closet that will work?" approach. So... after only one short trip to the sewing machine we ended up with Cinderella, a knight, and a cowboy. Parker really wanted Elijah to be a dragon so he could save Alexia from him but alas, there are no dragons in our closets.Here the kids are standing by their respective jack-o-lanterns.
This is them getting ready for the annual sort-o-thon.

Here is Elijah with his three "pops." He loved going and getting the candy but didn't last longer than twenty minutes. Okay to be fair mom didn't let him last more than twenty minutes. He thought that he was supposed to eat the candy as he got it which made for a painfully slow process. He would unwrap the candy after getting it, then sit in the stroller and eat it until we got to the next house. Then he would take the sticky wet candy out of his mouth, hand it to me and walk up to the next place for more. I could only take so much so after a few houses, I turned around and handed him off to Darren to help hand out the candy at our place.

Why My Kids Make Me Smile

A few Sundays ago I was sitting between Parker and Alexia. There were some callings being made with sustaining votes asked for. After a few times raising our hands to sustain someone Parker leaned over and asked me if he was supposed to hold up his left or right hand. I told him it was supposed to be his right. "Oh no! (with a gasp) I've been doing the left." At which point Alexia leaned in to tell him, "That means you don't care."

Punkin Carvin'

Ummm we were a little late this year on the pumpkin carving. The home teachers stopped by just as dinner came out of the oven and so an hour later we ate, made the big kids scurry into pj's and then aprons and then set to work. Elijah was having none of it. "Eww Goss!" he said with a shake of his head when I tried to stick his hand inside a pumpkin. Ironically he doesn't like getting his hands messy. I know, it makes me scratch my head too. Anyway he was still incredibly interested in the goings on though.If you look closely you'll notice Lijah's shirt says "Crabby" on it. I'm not ashamed to let him wear this shirt. In fact my good friend Kathy found it for me with him in mind. If any of you have heard me describe this sweet third child of mine you'll recognize this as an accurate description, although with the onset of his language skills the flow of crabbiness from Elijah has ebbed. Still...if the shoe or shirt fits and all...

Alexia going for the good stuff.

The master carver at work.... This is one of the holiday traditions that Darren is really in to. A lot of them I think he does just to humor me, but pumpkin carving is this man's job.

Then momma sat by Mr. Crabby with an almost empty pumpkin and said, "Lijah, get momma that seed." It turned out that then it was so "goss" after all.

Elijahism...

Who needs mom to get the gallon of red punch down from the top shelf in the recently cleaned and polished refrigerator? Especially when there are bar stools nearby (bottom corner on the left).

So you don't need to point out the obvious to me. I do see the same refrigerator lock NOT LOCKED in the picture that you do. It was originally installed to keep him from eating 12 string cheese in one day. It's just that I thought we were past that - apparently we are not. A few other notables...Alexia's lactose free milk - with the lid off - wonder what he had planned for that. And then there is the tale tale towel. This is how I know Elijah is smart. Not only does he think that he can get the juice down for himself and let's face it...he did AND there is actually quite a bit left in the jug, BUT he knows he made a mess and went back to the bathroom to retrieve cleaning supplies in the hopes that he could just take care of it before mom showed up on the premises. Now to be fair to Elijah I probably could have prevented this. I was in the backyard with him repainting our play yard. He went into the house and I soon heard the sound of the bar stool moving across the tile floor. I KNOW from previous experience that I only have about fifteen seconds after hearing that sound to mess with his plans. Obviously I wasn't moving fast enough that day.

Birthday Update

I just wanted to post this picture of Darren on his birthday with the kids. His big day fell on a Monday this year and while celebrating on a weekend is fine, I love to make THE DAY feel special. A great friend kept the kids for me while Darren and I had dinner together. This was so nice! Thanks so much Renae. There was soft music, candle light, sparkling cider, hot food and uninterrupted conversation. Plus as a bonus there wasn't one trip from the table to get something once our meal started or a waiter asking us how everything tasted.

More Family

I'm going to now introduce you to Darren's family. First though I have to scour my hard drive for pictures. You see the Stewarts are not really know for their love of hanging around to have their picture taken. But I have snuck a few here and there. So let's see what I can find.

This is Darren's dad Jerry Stewart. I remember taking this picture. They had come for a visit and some down time and we made them help put in our back yard trees and shrubs. We're good like that. So are they. At the time he was saying, "Darlin' don't take my picture." My reply was, "Oh I'm taking one of Elijah." I love it when he calls me darlin'. Now he is the hardest one to get in a picture.

But a man with a grandson on his new tractor will generally not balk if he sees you with a camera. He will also answer his phone and pretend he can't see you there while you take it.

This picture of Lexi and Parker was taken with grandma and grandpa when we all went to Oregon together. Clearly they are having a great time.My kids adore Grandma Stewart and the feeling is mutual.This is Darren's sister Rachelle together with Alexia. She's another one who is hard to get into a picture. Aunt "Shelly" and Lexi are great pals.This is Darren's brother Nolan and his wife Megan. This picture was taken not long before their sweet addition was born.Here is a recent picture of their little family stolen right off their blog. Little Olivia is almost a year old. Happy birthday baby!

Darren's family all live in the same town that we grew up in - Kirtland, NM. It is such a bonus that everytime we go for a visit we get to see everyone.

Now this last picture is one I just stumbled across in my hunt for family pictures. Megan took it in April of this year. I was home in AZ while Darren took the kids to NM for the weekend and birthday celebrations and she took some pictures for me. It just looks so sweet to me. If I had to guess at what is going on in it I'd say Lexi did something wrong, her Daddy corrected her on it and Parker is sharing the love. I love family. Especially my own little one.

Family

My sweet sister in law Katie sent me a cd with pictures from our family's reunion and weekend together this summer. (THANKS KATIE!) Getting us all together is an accomplishment. Getting us all in a picture is a miracle. We were actually only missing Becca's husband Daniel. Some of you know my family. Some of you have met my family. Some of you are my family. But I'm still going to take a minute to introduce them.

Let's start with who started the whole thing. These are my parents, Marion and Shauna Wells. They live in Kirtland, NM. He grew up in Hanksville, UT. She grew up in Geneva, ID. Both of my Grandmothers still live in those teeny tiny towns. They met on a blind date. One banana split and three months later they were married. They thought they wanted four children. They ended up with seven.

These are my brothers and sisters. Growing up with seven kids in the family always sounded like a big family. But for some reason when we were all in the same room it didn't seem like a lot. Now that we bring our spouses and children to the room with us, it is filling up fast. I am the third child in my family and the oldest girl. In the front are (from left to right) Melissa my youngest sister, Brad my oldest brother, and Rebecca the number three girl. In the middle it's me and my brother Randy who is just older than me. Behind us is Scott my youngest brother and Alena the sister who is just a year younger than me.

Here is Brad's family. His wife's name is Katie. Their two kids are Benjamin and Emily. They live in Rigby, ID.

This is my older brother Randy, his wife Kristin and their baby boy Asher. They live in Sandy, UT.

Here is my family including my hubby Darren and our kiddos, Alexia, Parker and Elijah. We are in Gilbert, AZ.

This is my sister Alena's family. With her are her husband Andrew and little girl Kurstyn. They live in Sterling, ID.

This is Scott and the two ladies in his life, his wife Lindsay and baby Shelby. They live in Vancouver, BC Canada.

Here is Rebecca. Her husband didn't make it this year to the family reunion. Here is a picture of the two of them together. They live in Cozumel, Mexico.

This is my sister Melissa. She lives in Provo, UT.

Grandma and Grandpa with their grandkids who now out number their kids. We've been busy working on that whole multiply and replenish thing.

Happy Birthday Daddy-O

Doesn't Elijah look so cute and retro?

Oh wait, that's not Lije, that's Darren looking so cute and retro. Today is Darren's 31st birthday. I know he is all about a nice quiet day for himself surrounded by his loving family. So I'll just keep it to myself. Or maybe I won't.

Hey Sweetheart, I love you. Hope you have a great day. I'm so glad I don't turn 31 until next year. Go ahead and feel old and wise. You deserve it. xoxo -- Heidi

Can I get a HALLELUJIA anyone?

Ahhhh... that's better. For the first time in a long time I filled up my van for less than sixty bucks. $2.96 per gallon - I love you Safeway and your $.03 off per gallon loyalty card. Especially when I remember to bring it with me to the pump.

Lexi and Emma

Lexi has a best friend in her class this year and it has made school so much more enjoyable for her. Gone are the constant complaints about not liking school from last year. I really think Emma is a big reason for that. Lexi is physically mature for her age. Emma is pint sized. Seeing them together brings a smile to my face everytime. Emma's birthday party invite arrived on our door last week and Lexi and I were both sad to note that it was going to be happening on Sunday. So we decided we would just have to do something to celebrate early.

We took Emma out for banana splits and some girl time on Saturday. Oooo I love my girls' dark blue beautiful eyes. Thanks Darren for that contribution.

Elijahism

Who says you need a spoon to eat yogurt?

Conference Weekend

This weekend was a slow one at our house. We had friends over for dinner on Friday and so the big cleaning jobs for the weekend took place a day early. Since moving to Arizona two and a half years ago we haven't stayed home for even one conference weekend. We have always headed to NM to spend the weekend with family. This was to be our first together at home, with our kids big enough to hold still and participate. Darren and I were both looking forward to just staying put. That said we knew we needed a plan. I printed off activity packets from the LDS Living website and then stole an idea from a girl in our ward with the skittles.

Notice the pictures on each package. When one of the Presidency or Quorum of the Twelve spoke, the kids dove into the basket to find the package with his picture on it and divided the spoils. The kids decided on the best idea of them all though. One night for FHE we cheated and read some stories from the Friend as our lesson. One of them was about a family who read about King Benjamin's people casting their tents toward the temple in order to listen to their leader speak to them. The kids in the story decided they wanted to have a tent for General Conference and made their Reverence Tent out of pillows chairs and blankets. Well that idea became ingrained into our kids' minds and they decided the only way to listen to Conference was with a Reverence Tent of their own. Long after the packets were completed and tossed aside, and with the packets of skittles dwindling, the Reverence Tent held out. As long as it was up and they were in it, they were quiet. It may become a tradition. Now for Elijah, the way we made it through conference with him (for the morning sessions that he was awake) went something like this:

That's the library's Land Before Time in there. Good old Little Foot.

And since I couldn't decide which picture to post because he is so cute I'm putting this one up too.

Oh and just one more. And I'd just like to say that Daddy got him dressed today. That's why he matches so well and all.

There were plenty of times I told the kids to be quiet or sit down or knock it off, but we made it. Hope yours was good too.

Rise and Shine!

A knock on your door accompanied by two rings of the doorbell at 4 o'clock in the morning is never a good thing. Just so you know. Unless of course you have a friend who is due any minute and you are watching the kids when they head to the hospital. But I don't have said friend right now and FYI call first and I'll have pants on.

Anyway back to the very urgent knocking/ringing this morning. Darren and I hopped out of bed, scrabbled to get presentable and find glasses to be able to see and he opened the door to a police officer standing on our doorstep. Apparently last night in our neighborhood some cars were broken into and one of ours was in the driveway with the doors open and the dome light on. It seems as though they wasted their time with ours because nothing was taken as nothing was in there. Even all of the paperwork was left in the glove compartment. Whew! Dodged that bullet.

Then this morning I got to thinking about the garage door opener and wondered if they took it hoping to come back later. A quick call to Darren and a quick run out to the parking lot at work confirmed that it was in the car. I checked out the garage and everything is still there and just as messy as it was before bed last night. Darn, if they had taken a few items it would have saved me some of the time it will take to clean the garage this weekend.

And while I'm not an alarmist - I make it a policy to never worry out loud - here's a little reminder to lock your car doors and take your valuables inside. I'll never get both cars in the garage - nope not going to happen in my teeny tiny Gilbert, AZ garage. It was most likely a few kids looking for cash. Sadly I don't have much of that laying around. :p

It's Official!

Hell DOES freeze over!

The kids got stuck in a doozie of a storm on the way home from school yesterday. By the time I met up with them they were drenched. They wanted to play in it of course - so I let them. I scrounged up some wimpy ponchos and sent them out to play. These pictures make me a little jealous that I didn't join them. But then it started to hail and so after they ran in I grabbed my camera. By then the little suckers - ice pellets, not kids - had started to melt (It was still over 100 degrees!) but you get the picture.

I'm too lazy to get my video with sound out so just pretend you can hear the wind and rain a rippin'. The ponchos only delayed the inevitable, they were drenched by the time they came inside, but they had so much fun while they lasted.

Dejavu

Tomato sandwiches for lunch...

Baking bread...

Cooking down plums to can plum jelly...

And making a sweet treat to end the day right...

Feels like a Saturday at my mom's house growing up. The only thing missing was 17 batches of laundry - oh and the other 13 loaves of bread. Mom everytime I eat a tomato sandwich I think of you. :) Missed you today. -- Heidi