And they're off! (Thanksgiving 2014)

This year for Thanksgiving week we were able to have my parents here to celebrate with them.  My parents drove here on their way to serve an 18 month mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  They have volunteered there time and funds to serve the people of the Cincinnati, Ohio mission.  We spent 5 days together and then sent them on a plane (super sick, we shared that with them, I felt so bad) to Provo, UT, where they are spending 2 weeks training for their positions in the mission.  Then they will fly back here and with their filled up car, drive to Cincinnati.  I am so very proud of their dedication and sacrifice to serve Christ.

 We had Thanksgiving dinner with our great friends the Sheffield's.  Later the Jesperson's joined us all for dessert.  And this is our lone picture.  But it was a great day and I feel extremely blessed we spent it with family and friends.

Music Concerts

Tis the season for music concerts.  Dallin had his before Thanksgiving and Mason had his the week after.  Unfortunately I couldn't see Dallin during his.  So only pictures before and after.  And with Mason I didn't bring the camera, expecting similar things as Dallin's, but I should have.  All I had was my phone and the pictures didn't turn out well, so I have one lonely picture.  Bad mom!  Oh well, the concerts were really nice and I really enjoyed being there for them and hearing them.  The boys have had to work really hard to play catch up.  In Chile band didn't start until 7th grade.  They got 9 weeks of it in 6th grade.  A kind of trail run to see if they enjoy it.  Here in Iowa they start completely in 5th grade.  Mason is about caught up, but Dallin will take probably until the end of 7th grade, as the kids all had two years on him.  It has been frustrating for Dallin, but he is doing it.

I see it all over his face - "MOM, why do you have to have that huge lens on the camera, pointing right at me, you are so embarrassing!"

I think with the lights and distance, my phone just refused to focus!  But this is the high school jazz band concert that Mason participated in.  

Living History Farm Race

I got to run a 7 mile cross country race at the Living History Farms.  It is a fun race that involves a lot of mud and 8 stream crossings.  The weather was unusually warm for the third weekend in November (I did it in 2010 and we weren't so lucky with the temperatures).  Which is good since the water was so cold in the stream!  Iced over in many places.  I was able to cross on the ice for half of them, the others were cold!!!  

 The final stretch.  Mark was waiting for me.  It is always nice to have someone at the finish line cheering you on.

I ran with a friend.  Her son also ran, but finished quite a bit faster than us.

Rainbow School Reunion'

Easton and I had the wonderful opportunity to take a quick 2 day trip to Utah to have a Rainbow Jardin (preschool) Reunion.  Four little gringo boys and their moms together for the weekend.  It was such a good trip, it was too short and so worth it.  Easton and I loved every second of it.  Friday night we spent trick-or-treating with the Whitt's.  Then Saturday we picked the Swain group up from the airport and met the Lambert's for lunch, a museum, and then a fun afternoon and evening all together at the Whitt home.  It was perfect and the boys played and got to have a sleep over - they were so excited about it all.  Easton and I feel so blessed that we were able to spend that weekend with such amazing people.  

 A second night of trick-or-treating for Easton. 

 I missed these amazing women.  It was so great to be with them.  We talked and talked and talked!  And laughed and laughed and laughed!

 Cafe Rio and lots of fun.

 Museum of Natural Curiosity.  Look at those cute faces.

 A sleep over - a dream come true for Easton.

Beggar's Night

As is tradition here in our town, the trick-or-treating is on the night before Halloween and called Beggar's Night.  And there is a set time 6pm-8pm, I love that part of it.  It was originally so you could trick-or-treat and then on Halloween attend the town parade.  It has just stuck and so we hit the pavement a night early.  I was glad because it was a nice night and Halloween night was cold!  Mason left to go to a Halloween party with friends.  Dallin and his friend went by themselves.  Dallin said this will be his last year, as he thinks he is too old for it after this year.  Drew had a group from the neighborhood that my friend and I took out, along with Easton.  Easton ran the WHOLE time!  And he is fast.  He definitely kept up with the big boys.  

Our Halloween dinner! 

 Link

 Secret Service Agent

Iron Man

Carving Pumpkins

We were so excited to carve pumpkins!  The past couple of Halloweens we have bought one small pumpkin (they are hard to find and super expensive in Chile).  We would carve them and each person would get to pick one thing to carve - the nose, the mouth, etc.  So this year it was any pumpkin you want and any carving you wanted.  Surprisingly our kids don't pick out super big pumpkins - none of them are super fond of cleaning out the "guts" of the pumpkin, the bigger the pumpkin, the more guts to scoop out.  It was a fun Monday night!

Bringing back the Tradition

We had a good weekend in which we literally squeezed in our trip to the Berry Patch Farms to bring back a tradition we did before we left to Chile.  It was so great to have autumn and fall (in October) and be able to go to the pumpkin patch and pick apples.  

We bought some popping corn at the farm and then had to get it off the cobb.