Wilmington, NC Trip

Morgan had his first residency interview in Wilmington, NC. Since it was relatively close to us (8 hours car drive) we made it a mini family vacation. While Morgan was busy with the interview process, the kids and I explored the Children's Museum. It was AWESOME! Here are some of the things the kids enjoyed:

The Train Tables

Miriam LOVED the water color mixing table. She sat there for 30 minutes just mixing the different colors! Doesn't she look like a scientist?

Luke and Miriam really enjoyed the grocery store. Miriam would load the cart, Luke would send it up the pulley and then they would go to the top and drop it all back down to the bottom.

Then we made it to the craft time and they were making table turkeys.

The boat that rotated was super cool too.

But Eve loved the imitation sand box the best! The texture of the pellets was neat and she and Miriam had a blast scooping and building.

Miriam all tired out!

Crazy Luke found lots of things to jump on and crawl through!

That night we were able to go out with another family that attends the residency program. We ate at the Bonefish Grill (one of my new favorite places to eat) and they picked up the tab. Pretty sweet deal! We got to ask lots of questions about the program and what life in Wilmington is really like. It sounds like a great place to be and it's at the beach. What more could you want?

On Saturday morning we decided to explore a little before heading home. We drove up to Carolina Beach and watched the fishermen on the pier. Even though it was mid-November, it felt great outside. Thank you Wilmington for a great get away!

Miriam's 1st Field Trip- Yellow River Ranch

Miriam experienced her first preschool field trip this past Tuesday. All the moms and preschoolers went to the Yellow River Ranch in Stone Mountain for the morning and for a picnic lunch.

This place was better than a zoo because the children were able to feed most of the animals and some of the animals roamed freely throughout the trails. As soon as we exited the gift shop, this little deer quickly greeted us and practically took the crackers out of Laura's bag.

3 Black Bears...apparently this place rescues animals that have been injured and couldn't survive out in the wild again. I still felt a little nervous while they eyed my baby strapped in the snugli!

This bear was totally posing for more treats!

Ella and Miriam pretending to be afraid of the bear!

Words of Wisdom:

Just like Maw Maw's house...

This sheep was so excited to get treats that he had his ENTIRE head through the fence.

I have no idea how he was able to squeeze it through such a small opening!

After our picnic lunch we headed home and took a quick nap before picking Luke up from school. Miriam was so excited to tell Luke all about her field trip when he got in the car. She absolutely loves having her own school!

Happy Halloween

October is such a busy month in our family. Now to end the month with Halloween!

Miriam loved this skeleton decoration. She called him her husband!

We waited until Morgan returned from Spokane to carve pumpkins. Miriam and I made a silly faced jack-o-lantern.

Luke insisted on testing his father's carving ability with the Iron Man jack-o-lantern.

After celebrating Eve's birthday on Friday, we went to a friend's Halloween party. Here are all the children in their costumes:

On Saturday our ward was having their fall festival and trunk-or-treat. Miriam was so funny in this game. She wound up her arm just like a pro baseball player before sending the bean bag to the hole.

Here's Iron Man Luke trying to win some tickets.

Morgan and I are HUGE "Chuck" fans. If you haven't seen the show, check out NBC on Monday nights at 8:00. Such a fun show! Anyway, Morgan was the Nerd Herd guy Chuck Bartowski and I was the kick butt spy Sarah Walker. Close by are our little princess daughters and our super hero son.

Miriam and her best friend Ella.

Little Cinderella

Sunday night I took the kids to just a few houses in our neighborhood. Here are our candied out kids:

and Luke looks like he is about to fly off his seat!

Time to ration the candy out!

Hope your Halloween was as fun as ours!

Happy 1st Birthday Eve

We celebrated Eve's 1st birthday on Friday, October 29th. It is hard to believe that a whole year has gone by since she was born. Here's a little bit about Eve:

Eve is such a busy little girl. She loves to play in her room by herself (I think there's less competition for the toys that way). She likes to sit in her music chair and play with the school bus that plays "The Wheels on the Bus" song. She loves to dance to music and LOVES to play on the play set. She will pound on the back door until I let her out to go play. Eve has a head full of curly hair and will rub her head as she is falling asleep. She loves to take a bath and will come to the tub the instant she hears the water running. She squeals at decibel levels that are dangerously high. Eve has her Daddy wrapped around her finger. She is sensitive and doesn't like to be scolded and will make the world's saddest face when she is in trouble. Eve has the purest laugh and we love to hear it in our home. She has brought a piece of heaven into our home and we are grateful to have her in our family.

For her 1st birthday, we kept things low key. After school we opened presents and then had birthday cake. If you are wondering about her red cheeks, it is just a result of her allergic reaction to amoxicillin that she was taking for strep throat the week before. I guess my allergy to penicillin was my gift to her for her birthday. Lame, I know.

Eve and all her presents.

She quickly got the hang of ripping the paper off the presents. She has been playing with Miriam's baby dolls and now she has one of her own.

Her new ride!

Eve and her cake...a brownie pull apart cake.
Eve absolutely refused to eat a piece of her cake. We tried and tried but she would have none of it. Oh well. Did I mention that she is strong willed?

Maybe next year I will make her cookies instead. She likes those A LOT!

Happy Birthday Eve! We love you!

Happy 6th Birthday Luke

Can you believe that Luke is now 6 years old?! We celebrated in true Iron Man style the Saturday before his birthday.

The festivities began with all the kids making armor arm bands while we waited for all the guests to arrive.

We then tested their super hero abilities with several games. First we tested the sense of direction with "Pin the Spark on Tony Stark."

Then the evil Modok threatened to destroy our party fun with bombs. Luckily, the super heroes were able to diffuse (pop) the bombs just in time.

All super heroes need to be quick, so a test of their speed was conducted with a race.

Then we were off to an obstacle course in the back yard that included climbing over the fence, jumping over obstacles, looking for gold in the sandbox, shooting a basketball into the hoop, blowing a bubble and going through string obstacles. Here are our friends Landon and Toa during the course.

We worked up quite an appetite with all those skills tests and headed into the kitchen to refuel on birthday cake. Make a wish Luke!

Our friend Kira playing on the play set during our refreshment break.

Here's Miriam enjoying the pretzels! After food, the super heroes needed to destroy the evil Modok once and for all. Luke, Miriam and I had made a Modok pinata for this very moment. Here's a before picture of the pinata:

Here's Caleb attempting to destroy the villain.

Modok was defeated and now we can celebrate with CANDY! I had to risk my life to get in the midst of these kids to help scatter the candy towards the back for the kids who couldn't get into the grabbing. Miriam was very grateful though for my sacrifice!

Present Time!

After presents, we sent the super heroes home! It was such a great party and I am so grateful for our friends Tamme and Sean who stayed to help with all the games. Luke loved all of his new toys and even shared several of them with Miriam...on a temporary basis, of course.

On Tuesday, his actual birthday, we celebrated with his classmates during snack time with frosted sugar cookies.

Once we were back at home, Luke got to open the presents from his family. He refused to open them on Saturday at the party because he wanted to have something to open on his actual birthday. That was a very big deal to him!

Luke got to eat his favorite Pepperoni Pizza for dinner and have leftover birthday cake.

Happy 6th Birthday Luke!

We love you so much. Thank you for the joy that you bring into our lives!