My little artists' pumpkins

They drew and carved these works of art themselves.

They amaze me.

Here are a few of the comments I heard:
"Ew!!!"
"This is grosser than I thought!"
"Mom will you wash the outside of mine off so I don't have to touch the gewey stuff?"
"Mom, will you do mine?" (meaning gut it)

Amber's 8!!!

Amber's 8 favorite things at 8:

Art, especially drawing

Webkinz

Playing with her "imaginations", they're magic

Ballet

Family Home Evening

Aristocrats, the movie

Trick-or-treating

Her Bat Ballerina Kitty Costume

Check out that gap in her teeth. She lost her 4th tooth the eve of her birthday. She wrote the toothfairy a note and got a $1 bonus!

General Conference Blog

Okay all my General Conference reading friends. I think I have the blog fixed so you can post comments now.

Sunday

Tomorrow is our Primary Program. I got to write the program this year. I'm genuinely excited. For one, I don't feel like I wrote the program all by myself. The ideas came to me clearly and easily, though a little slowly. We have such great kids in our ward and great music leaders. I have no worries. Plus, I think this is my 5th or 6th primary program, so I've learned not to sweat it. It all works out.

I look forward to Sundays. I feel true peace, happiness, & belonging at church. I love seeing my little family lined up together in Sacrament meeting. I love knowing that other people are teaching my children the things that I want them to know. Hearing it from multiple sources helps them really get it.

I have to give some kuddos to my husband. Every time I have a baby I get a primary calling. I have never cared for my babies at church, except during Sacrament Meeting. I openly confess he's much better at it than I am. He can get them to sleep in church. I can't. He can entertain them on his lap for two hours with no toys! I come with my bag of toys & goodies & it's not adequate. I let them down on the floor during Sunday School & he warns me, "I wouldn't do that." Sure enough, when I try to restrain their freedom after they're let down a tantrum follows.

Words of the Latter-day prophets blog

I started a General Conference study blog. It's http://www.wordsofthelatterdayprophets.blogspot.com/. Anyone is welcome to join us. We'll study one General Conference Talk each week. We'll begin a new talk each Sunday. If you let me know you're interested I'll add you as an author. Feel free to invite friends on your own blogs too.

This week we'll be studying President Monson's talk "What Have I Done for Someone Today?" from the Sunday morning session. You can link to it and all other conference sessions here. You'll find the links to listen, read, or watch them.

We'll keep the discussion quite open. Please let me know what order you think we should study them. 1) Start with President Monson & work through the 12 apostles by seniority 2) The first contributor to make a suggestion gets to choose the next talk 3) Study the talks by topic 4) study the talks in the order they were given.

Conference

I'm throwing an idea around in my head. I hope you'll let me know what you think. I want to study one General Conference talk each week. Isn't this the miracle of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? We have living prophets! I want to study and apply their words more thoroughlly.

Is anyone interested in joining me in studying one General Conference talk in depth each week and then jointly blogging about it? I hope you'll let me know what you think.

picnik

I found a fun free photo editing site. It's picnik.com. The girls and I spent part of our afternoon doing this. I also used picnik to edit the photos I posted of our Capital Reef trip.

Capital Reef

Our day at Capital Reef.

All day I heard "Mom, take a picture, Mom, take a picture."

So I did.

Once the trail got steep I couldn't get my kids to turn around.

(They must be like their mother)

I was delighted to see them LOVE hiking. Giddy might be the right word.

Even this little one loved it.

She giggled everytime I took a big step down the steep parts with her in arm.

These girls were in their element.

They loved finding nesting spots in the rocks.

I couldn't resist the photo op here.

This is Krystal with the girls.

Jessica really formed an attachement to Krystal.

She'd walk right up and expect Krystal to pick her up.

This was such a beautiful hike.

I can't wait to go back again.

There are some amazing sights in this world of ours.

Spud Harvest

I asked one of the potato farmers in our ward where the word "spud" originated. He couldn't tell me.

The girls are out of school for 10 days for Spud Harvest, so we made a trip to Rich's parents' house without him. We had such a great time. My in-laws are wonderful. In 10 years of marriage I don't remember either of them ever being critical of me. Although, recently I've noticed that Sondra can poke fun at some of the silly things I do & we laugh together. This weekend I heard her laugh a lot & I reveled in it. Sondra & LaMar don't spout buckets out unwanted relationship and child-rearing advice. Actually, when they do give advice I tune in and listen. I value their viewpoints. Most of Rich's best traits come from them; his gentleness, his kindness, his lack of pride, his laugh.

Rich's little brother & new wife, Krystal were in Richfield too. I was excited to spend some one on one with them. Matt has grown into a kind, responsible, respectable, nice guy. I adore Krystal. She walked into a well-established family group & fit right in. (Matt's the youngest of 8 and there's been a 10 year gap between his wedding and the last one). Krystal's easy to talk to and easy to be around. We spent a day at Capital Reef together. I'll post pictures later. We had a great time. I enjoyed the talk time with her. I'll be glad to mingle the rest of our lives together. She's down to earth, yet confident. Simple, yet refined.