Playgroup Halloween Fun

Okay, so I WAS going to do better at blogging this year, but of course I haven't...  I do have a few excuses, it's been a crazy couple of months and I just got finished teaching my month of preschool for the co-op Preston is in which took a lot of time.  We were also in Utah without internet access for almost  a month this summer, and in Hawaii for a week.  Pictures of that to come sometime, I promise.  A few people have given me a hard time for not blogging (including my mom who want's to see pictures), so I figure it's best to start with today.  These pictures are from a few halloween parties we've had the last week.  

The playgroup Halloween party was today.  All the mom's did a great job putting together fun activities, and of course all the kids looked cute in their costumes.  Preston's a firefighter if you can't tell, his hat was shed early on during the party.

Candy toss.

For this activity they had to find the eyeballs in the noodles, I think they were bouncy balls.  Of course Carter just wanted to eat the noodles, and kept eating them... He's the dalmation dog.  Did you guess right?

I moved him away, but he kept going back for more.  Silly kid.  I promise I do feed him. :)

These last two are from our ward "pumpkin party" we had last Friday.  Of course we carved pumpkins, and Preston was determined to help Gabe with his scary faced pumpkin.  I know it's kind of hard to tell, but Carter is also hanging on Gabe's legs.  What can I say, he loves his daddy. :)

Happy Halloween everyone!  We're hoping it won't be TOO rainy when it comes time to trick-or-treat...

New Temple

I'm telling you, we had our impromptu trip to Utah at just the right time.  While we were there the open house for Utah's newest temple, the Oquirrh Mountain Temple (don't ask me how to pronounce it), was going on, and my parents just happened to be planning on going the last weekend we were there.  Before a temple is dedicated they have open houses like this so that anyone can go inside and see what the new temple looks like.  I was really excited for Preston to be able to go inside.  His favorite song is "I Love to See the Temple," I have to sing it for him every night before he goes to bed.  Just like I thought he loved seeing the temple, and even showed a pretty good amount of reverence (for a 2 year old) while walking through it. 

Here is the temple as we saw it from the freeway, it was up on a big hill, hence the name.

Right before we got there we stopped to meet my cousin Megan on the side of the road, she had something for my mom to pick up from her.  She was on her way to help someone paint their house.  I wish I looked that cute when I was going to be painting all day!

Once we got there we parked in a gravel lot a little ways away from the temple.  Here's everyone waiting to get picked up by a little golf cart.

Preston was glad to have Grandpa there with him, and I was glad to have him there to help carry him.

 

My dad pointed the temple out to him in the distance.

We had a pretty good view from the parking lot.

After walking through the temple we went to a tent outside that had cookies and water bottles for everyone (it was really hot!), Preston really liked that part.

Then we got out and he got to see how big the temple was up close.

After walking around the grounds a little bit we decided to head back and had to spend a little bit more time waiting for a golf cart.  We could have walked, but I'm not sure I would have made it after walking up and down all those stairs in the temple.  Hey, I did just have a baby three weeks before this.

Bryant enjoyed waiting for the golf cart too.  He didn't want to look at the camera because candids make for a more interesting picture according to him... I think I agree. :)

The inside of the temple was absolutely beautiful of course.  I always love looking at the different artwork they have hanging on the walls and how they set things up.  I hope that one day I'll be able to go back there, with Gabe maybe. :)

Family Filled Sunday

The day after the fourth my 18 brother Kyle was ordained an Elder.  In our church this can happen after a boy turns 18.  I wasn't able to be there when my other brothers were.  A lot of our family was able to come, and it was really special to be able to take part in.

I attempted a makeshift tripod for this picture,and as you can see I barely made it in time, and look kind of funny.  Oh well, at least everyone there was in the picture. :)

My mom made us all a yummy lunch as always.

We also got a few pictures of family while we were there.  I LOVE this picture!  Need I say more?

We also did some four generation pictures.  Here's Tyler and Mara's family with my parent's and grandparents...

and me and my boys with my dad and his parents.  I had to swap a few heads for this one. :)

It was a nice relaxing day.  We always have fun when the whole family gets together!