Halloween (finally)

So, on Halloween, we had the traditional chili and corn bread, then Brian and Landen went out trick or treating while I stayed at home with sleeping Abrie and to hand out candy. Yes, Abrie went to sleep at about 5:30 for the night, and I was a little sad that she didn't wake up, because I really wanted to put her costume on and have her go out trick or treating with her brother....but she had other plans! So, here's some pictures I took later with her costume on:

Our little Ladybug (yes, the poor girl is teething like crazy, for the last 2 months now with no signs of teeth!)

A close -up (blurry) shot

The loot! When Landen started complaining of his pumpkin being too heavy and didn't want to carry it anymore, they came home ;)

Me acting like an imbecellin (word courtesy of Brian Regan) while Landen shows his muscles (oh, and BJ had to get in on the action too). The parents of kids would just crack up when they saw my costume....a little trick and treat ;)

Landen and Daddy showing off their guns

There's my muscle man Buzz. He cracks me up when he's "showing off his muscles"

Air Show

We got to go to an air show on October 29th, and it was AWESOME! I've never been to one before (hence the 51 pictures I took, and no I won't bore you with them all). It was also "Navy Week", so they had set up a little bouncy area for the kids. Landen enjoyed going through one of the bouncy planes, although he couldn't get over one of the walls so he had to come back out the entrance! I loved walking around and checking out all the planes, like this sucker:

This cargo plane was HUGE! Big enough to carry other planes, tanks, vehicles, passengers, whatever they need!

Here's Landen and Brian with one of the planes. I just realized that it looks like they're posing with the racy lady on the side of the plane...oops!

Here's me and the kids on the huge cargo plane. You can see my sunburn already forming on my face. Apparently I thought it would be smart to not wear sunscreen while staring into the sun all day watching planes, parachuters, etc.

But, my favorite of the day were the:

BLUE ANGELS! They were AMAZING!!!! Looking at the picture above, their normal "diamond" formation, it was CRAZY the insane things they did! If anything went wrong with even 1 of the planes....yeah, I'm kinda morbid that way.

It was an awesome day and it pooped out the kids! I was so surprised that Abrie was able to sleep through the constant noise! If we go again next year, we're definitely packing cotton balls for ear plugs for the kids!

Jack-o-lanterns

Holy crap, I'm still 2 weeks behind in posting!!! Anyway, 2 WEEKS AGO for family night we carved our pumpkins. Landen still won't touch the pumpkin guts, but he definitely knew that he wanted his white pumpkin to look like a ghost, so Landen and I worked on his while Brian carved out the BIG one (I swear it was like 40 lbs). Landen also colored all over Abrie's, so we had to draw a face on it to make it look like it was on purpose (hers was too small to carve). Here's the finished product:

Trunk or Treat

I was so excited that our ward (church) decided to have a trunk or treat! We hadn't been to one in FOREVER! For some reason they didn't do it in our last ward in Rexburg (seriously, I thought that was part of the church handbook!), so it was fun to introduce it to Landen. The young women in the ward had set up little booths for the kids to play in and get prizes. There was "fishing", a "kissing booth" (you threw a bean bag at someone's kisser through a lip shaped opening---quite funny!), bean bag toss, and a cupcake walk! Landen was in heaven! Also, there were a couple of other boys that were having the time of their lives just chasing Landen around and picking him up. I'm pretty sure his energy lasted longer than theirs.

We also had a chili cook-off, and I made a yummy black bean and sweet potato chili I got from my friend Holly (go here if you want the recipe). I STILL have tons left over and need to find some way to get it eaten (it freezes really well though).

Here's Buzz himself waiting to do the cake walk. After dinner, all the kids had a blast running around the parking lot going from car to car getting candy. Landen had a lot of fun going around with his buddies. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of Abrie in her costume, so you'll have to wait until I catch up on the posts ;)

illness

It really doesn't seem fair that there's still nasty flu bugs going around when the weather is still warm here, but I guess they don't care what the temperature is outside...tis the season! And, we've all been hit with it! Brian of course only got a little sniffle for about a day, but poor Landen and Abrie have had the nasty drainage for about 2 weeks! We took Abrie into the doctor last week because her poor right eye was draining so much (she had a blocked tear duct) that it looked like this:

She was also having having some pain in her right ear, and there was some nasty crusties that I was cleaning out of her ears everyday...worse in her right ear. Come to find out, she had and OUTER ear infection! Supposedly uncommon for babies, but of course, one of my children would get it. Because it's not common for her age, there was no medication for it (it would require some kind of ear drop), so we ended up clearing it up with a good old hydrogen peroxide mixture and a cotton ball! She'as STILL draining! But, my little chubster's gained a whole pound in a month! (which can only take me a day ;).

Landen's had his share of it too. Along with the drainage, he always gets a cough. It's always been that way, but he started to get a low grade fever on Halloween, so we took him to the doctor the next day, and they found NOTHING wrong with him, and just thought it was a virus. Well last night (the day after we took him to the doctor), he spiked a temp. of 102 degrees! After phoning the "nurse line", we took him to an urgent care where they found a left ear infection and white patches in the back of his throat which tested negative for strep, but they're sending it out for a culture to be sure. He had strep a year ago with scarlet fever, so they wanted to be sure. Again, strep is not common in children Landen's age either. I'm telling you, if it's rare, my kids will get it! They're also sending a urine sample out to have it cultured because he had elevated protein in his urine. But, thank goodness for antibiotics because he's already feeling better!

I've also had some of the congestion, but it's mostly gone now! Thank goodness! I guess once we all get better, we should go get a flu shot!

The Pumpkin Patch

So we took the kids to a pumpkin patch a week and a half ago (I seriously don't know what the heck I've been doing lately to be so busy! Maybe it's the five books I've read or applying for jobs like a mad woman), and let's be honest...they didn't care too much about the pumpkins. Both had started getting sick earlier that week and were draining A LOT, so we spent about 5 seconds getting this picture:

They both refused to look at the camera! Then Landen picked out his white pumpkin and spent the rest of the time doing this:

I did try to get some pictures with Abrie and the pumpkins, but she was more interested in just looking at them. Even people passing by thought she was adorable and tried to get her to look...no such luck!

(That is some random person's hand trying to get her attention)