MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

I have been wanting to do a special family night for Christmas, but just haven't been able to find anything that seemed just perfect. Also, Byron just finished finals late last week and let's face it, family nights when I'm on my own just don't really end up being very spiritual. Since this week is busy with other family happenings, I decided tonight would be a perfect night to pull off the special evening I have been wanting. Although it wasn't perfect, I was so happy with how the night went and I hope some memories will be kept of what could be a new family tradition.

felafelbaklava

I decided to make some (somewhat) authentic mideastern food for the occasion. Felafel and baklava are the only things that came to mind, so I found some recipes and decided to give it a try. I knew it was risky, but I was so happy that everyone seemed to like all the food that went along with our evening. I made some homemade felafel and we ate it in pitas with a yummy cucumber dill sauce. The entire pan of baklava has already been polished off, so I say that means good reviews there too. Of course, how can you go wrong with a pastry layered with butter and nuts and topped with sugar and honey! It was divine! After dinner we did a little program where Byron and I were the wise men and we told some stories and sang some Christmas songs together. We watched the Luke II movie while eating our dessert and called it a night. I know the rest of the week will be fun and busy, but I hope that tonight set the tone for a special and meaningful Christmas for our kids.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!

O Christmas Tree

Here we are decorating the Christmas tree...

My little goof balls!
More sillies :)

I loved how Paige put every ornament on the same branch. I took a few off to keep the tree from sagging, but left most right where she put them~too cute!

Holiday Parade

Earlier this month I took the kids to our town's Christmas Parade. Mostly my kids just like catching the candy they throw off the floats, but it is fun to have a little celebration that runs practically right through our backyard.

After the parade there was a little festival at the park. I was feeling nice and let the kids get sno cones. Yes, only in AZ can you find people standing in line to buy sno cones at a Christmas Party! The sno shack gives you a cup of sno and there is a little table where you can add your own flavors. I let the kids each fix up their own sno cones and Clark went all the way around the table adding just a squirt of each flavor....suicide sno cones....yum!

Hay Ride

Here are some pics from a hay ride we took with the fam for my brother Tyson's birthday.

After the hayride we had a bonfire and weenie roast...check out those hot dog cookers!

Catching up...

I guess I have alot of catching up to do! Here are a few of the funny things the kids have been up to lately.


A few weeks ago they were all out in the backyard playing and something went over the neighbors fence. So my ever creative son, Benson found a rope, lassoed the fence and attempted to repel over to rescue his missing toy. He never made it over, but I loved the idea and the look on his face in this picture!


They all love to dig in the plentiful dirt we have in our yard. One day I found this "artifact" along with the message: The mone ston The kids fownd the mone ston chreshre.
I just love seeing into their little minds...of course, they found the moon stone treasure! Yesterday they found some dinosaur fossils too! It's a treasure hunt every day out there!




And I couldn't resist this picture of Paige. After a few hours at the park, here is my sleepy Cheeto lovin' girl!



We have been planting more in our garden, so I had the idea for the kids to paint markers to show what we are growing. It does add some color and personality to the garden, and it is so fun to watch our little seeds start to grow. Can't wait to be able to start enjoying some of that yummy homegrown goodness!

Night Out

Last night we turned our "night in" into a "night out". Thanks to a mini hibachi stove and a 2x6 board on the side of the house, Byron made us a nice little fire in the backyard. We all had some hot chocolate with whipped cream (the only way to go...so yummy!) and of course, roasted marshmallows. It was nice to be chilly for the first time in a while (it was still in the 90s last week here) and snuggle around the fire just talking and singing and being together.

Halloween

Halloween Night

All ready for trick or treatingBenson just wanted to be anything Star Wars. We settled on this Obi-Wan Kinobe costume Byron found on Halloween afternoon for 1/2 off. Benson was thrilled! Clark wanted to be Batman, even if it meant wearing his old Batman pjs (see his preschool pics). Paige never changed from wanting to be a pink kitty, and she is a pretty cute kitty if I say so myself!

Here is Clark and all his preschool friends. They put on a costume parade and a little skit for all the parents.

Last weekend our neighborhood had a fall carnival. Our neighbor dressed up as the clown. The kids call him the thumbs up guy because everytime we see him walking to the mailbox he gives all the kids a thumbs up. He is a really friendly grandpa from back east and he made a great clown!

The kids had fun playing little carnival games and we even came home with 3 goldfish. Unfortunately the last of the fish was found floating upside down this morning. :( As Clark has been saying, they all "kicked the can"!

They were also giving horse rides, and after almost 4 years of living here and walking down to visit the horses, the boys finally got to ride on one. They all wanted to ride Fred, our neighbors horse who is the tallest horse down there. It was a fun afternoon and we feel blessed to live in such a great neighborhood!

We also had our 2nd annual family Halloween party with Byron's family on Monday night. We had Ashley's yummy carmel apples and played the kids favorite game, bobbing for donuts. I hope Ashley doesn't mind that I copied these pictures from her blog, but here are some shots of the donut game.
Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!!

Fair with Grandma

Last Friday my mom took all the grandkids to the AZ State Fair. We all had a really great time! Aubree and Chris even snuck into town and joined us as well!

Benson, Lucy, Keane and Grandma rode on the elephant. After they got off, Benson ran over to us and said that it was the coolest thing ever! He was pretty excited. Clark was just happy to watch from a distance. :)

The petting zoo was the best I have ever seen. The animals were all in pens, but there was food you could give them and they were all pretty much within reaching distance. There was a zebra, giraffe, camel, buffalo, ostrich, yak, tons of goats, of course, and many others. Most of the animals were young and not full grown, so it was really neat to see and feed them all.

Look closely, it looks like Clarks hand is inside the camels mouth!

I wish I had a video of this because it was hilarious! The kids found a goat that was talking back to them. The kids would all Maaaa at him and then the goat would Maaaa back. It went on for a few minutes back and forth. Notice Benson plugging his ears!

There was also a show with some bears and their trainers. The whole show I was just waiting for something from animals gone wild to happen. It just doesn't seem right for a human to be playing and kissing a full size grizzly bear. Here is the bear balancing on a ball for a marshmallow treat. Pretty amazing!

All Benson wanted to do the whole time at the fair was ride the ferris wheel and play the squirt gun game. Here he is living his dream. The best part is that he even won the squirt gun game and got to take home a big stuffed turtle. He felt like he had won a million bucks! Thanks to Grandma we got to play a few more times so that Clark and Lucy could get a prize too!

Clark had a great time on the bumper cars with his cousins!

We topped the day off with some sno cones and fried zucchini.