Halloween!

May the force be with you….


I loved our Star Wars theme this year. My favorites were Chloe and Ethan’s costumes. I had so many compliments on Chloe’s costume. I even caught two different people take a picture of her. I was a pretty proud Mom.

The kids really got into their character.
Bryant was a very handsome, honorable and controlled JedI Knight.

Conner was a pretty dark Darth Vader. He kept promising everyone different powers like being able to fly, or be invisible if they join him. I don’t know where he got that stuff, he has never seen the move as far as I know.
He would go up to Chloe, Ethan and Bryant and say “Princess Leia, join me and you can fly.” “Yoda, join me and I will give you invisible powers.” “Bryant, do you want to fly? You should join me."

Ethan was a very wise Master Yoda and loved the respect he got from the boys.

Chloe made a good ticked off Princess Leia.



For Halloween we went to Boo at the Zoo. It is pretty fun, you go trick-or-treating around the zoo. We went a few years ago and the candy was much better, the bad economy even affected the candy at the zoo.

Halloween Food!

I love all the creativity that goes into Halloween. This year we did our usual Grilled Bats and Cats with Goblin Blood soup (see Halloween 2009). For dinner we had Mummy Stromboli and blood worms mmmmmm. The boys wouldn't even try the worms, they were actually really good.
We had our friends Jen and Ivan over with their kids Naomi and Ashton. Ashton brought a plate of cookies that he decorated and was so excited to show me how good he did. He did awesome, I wish I would have got a picture of them.

Last Night at Cornbelly's

Our last night at Cornbelly’s. We had so much fun racing, climbing haystacks, jumping, sliding, dancing and so much more.

Trip to Blanding Fall Break

We went down to Blanding for Fall Break. We got there just in time to watch the last half of Brett’s football game he did great. We were really excited about the trip because we were going to bottle applesauce, spend time with friends and family and go to the cabin. Ethan got croup the first night we were there so we pretty much spent the whole vacation house bound. We did get the applesauce done thanks to my Mom for lending her kitchen and Ramona and Camille for the apples. We did 35 bottles! It was beautiful weather the whole time and despite the sickness it made me homesick for Blanding.

Pumpkins!!!!

Pumpkins are so fun to carve, we look forward to this every year especially James he is quite the professional, I bet he could work at Cornbelly’s. We let the kids help us clean them out, then they pick out a design or draw how they want it carved.

Cake Decorating!

Checkout Conner’s face. After decorating my kid who hates chocolate decided he like chocolate icing, go figure.

Just Beautiful!

I love this dress. My friend Marisa gave it to me right before we moved. It was her daughters and every time she wore it I told her I loved it and I wanted it. I didn’t think she would really give it to me. I really have very generous friends. Thanks Marisa!

Passes to Cornbelly’s was a great investment. They had a Christmas Tree of pumpkins. It was way cool. I took a picture of just a few of my favorites.




Conner makes a good little farmer. We discovered while going through the main corn maze that James and I don’t do to well when we are lost. We’re great and happy for about the first 10 minutes and then we freak out when we discover that we are totally lost. The best part is the boys got a new flyer with a map on the front every time we went. We get in the corn maze and sure enough they didn’t have one. We still did good it only took about 35 minutes, which was faster than they said it should take us (imagine if we had a map).

James and Chloe's First Dance

Fun at Cornbelly's with the WHOLE Family!

Ethan and Chloe's Outing with Mom and Dad

We got passes to a place called Cornbelly’s. They come every October by Thanksgiving Point and do a corn maze and a ton of fall activities for families. They had a haunted corn maze that James and I were able to go to because my Mom stayed with us and watched the kids, and they had a corn maze dedicated to 100 years of scouting of the scout emblem.
James was off of work and the boys were in school so we decided to go down to Cornbelly’s with just Chloe and Ethan. We were the first ones in on the first day. It was a lot of fun, and very relaxing. Ethan had a blast.

Do you see our little Francomstein?

Conner Learns to Ride his Bike

Conner finally learned to ride his bike on Sept. 25th. James went down to the church parking lot (the only flat place up here) to teach him. He actually learned pretty fast. Grandma and Grandpa Francom were in town and came by, they were able to come watch him ride. Afterwards we went to the Thanksgiving Tower to watch the “Glass Blowing” show and to get cheap ice-cream. It was pretty cool.

Free Fun at Thanksgiving Point!

One of our favorite things at Thanksgiving point is actually free. At the “Water Tower” there is this sculpture that has different pullies and levers that sprays out water. The boys love it and so do we. We like to go to the ice-cream shop that is right next to it and get 2 regular cones for $.50 and 3 kiddy cones for $.25 (for ages 3 and under it is free) great deal huh, and then when the kids are done eating we let them go play with the fountain to get washed up. It is there during the summer. If you are ever up here during that time you should exit and go try it out.



This is cool but not free (sorry). At the dinosaur museum on Thursdays at 3:30 they feed the Gar (?) fish. It is pretty cool, they feed them live gold fish (sad). It is cool watching them they are a lot like a crocodile.

Conner’s First Day of Kindergarten

Conner finally got to go to the “big school”. He has been looking forward to going to school all summer. Bryant got to go to school 2 weeks earlier so it made it so hard on Conner. Conner’s first day of school didn’t go as I had pictured in my head. Bryant’s first day wasn’t busy at all and I came in plenty of time for pictures and to see his classroom. Conner’s went a lot differently. We were going to walk but last minute decided we better drive to get there in a more timely manner (15 minutes early). It was so busy when I got there it was crazy. There was no parking and tons of people so by the time we got to the outside doors we were a little late.
Well I couldn’t believe they hadn’t opened the doors yet, I thought this because there were a ton of parents standing outside with their kids. Then after a bit I realize the kids they were standing with didn’t have bags, those were not their kindergarteners, they had already dropped them off and were just hovering. I went over and knocked on the door and they let him in. They wouldn’t let me come with him because they had already started. I felt so bad because I told Conner that morning I would go in with him and make sure he knew where his cubby and seat and everything was.

I came home crying to my mom, I was sad about not going in with him and because I didn’t get any pictures (stupid I know, but it matters). She made me feel better, and then when I picked him up we went in and got pictures. He had a great day.

I felt bad for Conner’s teacher. They had their school picture that morning and she didn’t know about it until right before. Then 2 kids were sick, 1 threw-up. Not a great first day.

Last Gardens Monday Activity: Animals