November

Bright and early on the morning after Halloween, I drove Brynn down to a tumble and stunt clinic held by the BYU cheerleaders. It was open for all high schoolers but I think she might have been the youngest one there, haha. She showed off her tumbling and then got to try some individual stunting. She had a good time.

Both Brynn and Ivy were way too excited to set up their Christmas trees and got them up and decorated the day after Halloween. I set up before Thanksgiving as well, but never this early! They were so happy, it was contagious. Molly was a willing helper.

Stockton went to the Sadie Hawkin's dance on the first day of November. He went with Bryn Danley. Even though Halloween was technically over, it was a costume party and they went as Care Bears. They went to an arcade for their day date, had dinner catered from the Junction at some family property of Bryn's, went to the dance, etc. He had a great time!

Stockton and Bryn Danley

Molly texted us one night to ask if we could see the Northern Lights from our house. I didn't know anything about it! I couldn't'see them with my naked eye but someone told me to try to use my phone and take a picture. It worked quite well...this is off our back deck! Wow!!

Leaf Day! Always so much work but it was a little easier this year because I had found some time during the week to get the leaves a little contained. We also tried using the blower to blow the leaves rather than raking all of them and that made a huge difference! The kids were good helpers and we managed to get everything up and put in the big pasture leaf pile, yay.

Let the Christmas decorating begin! I used to be in the "nothing-before-Christmas" camp but that has changed in the last several years. There is so much decorating to be done and it is much more manageable to do it in stages. So, first up, the Christmas tree! I am getting the hang of this big tall tree but it still takes all day. Good thing I have a couple of happy "helpers"!

We were getting quite the pile of eggs on the counter so one night I started washing them and putting them in the fridge. At some point, Ivy took over and didn't want any help. I kept track of how many we/she washed and the grand total was an astonishing 186 eggs! This did not include those that were bad or cracked that we fed to the cats...for sure there were over 200 eggs when we started. You better believe that we give away eggs to anyone who comes to our house.

I took Ivy to a book talk held at a Midway bookstore where the author, Jennifer Nielsen, was speaking. She was amazing! I won't be able to do her words justice if I tried to sum them up so I will just say it truly was very inspiring and I'm so glad we went! Ivy also got a few new books because I'm a sucker.

 

Since we saw Wicked Part 1 last year, we were all anxious for Part 2 to come out. Molly and Brynn were working the actual night it came out but we were able to go the following morning. It was so good, we all loved it. Molly and Ivy are especially keen on musicals, with Brynn being a little less keen-but we would never have left her out and I think she enjoyed it anyway!

The priests quorum had a turkey bowl against the elder's quorum and that was really fun. Justin reached out to some boys who have graduated and also the Webb's who got moved to a different ward when we realigned a few months previous. I'm so glad for the relationships he has made these last {almost} 4 years.

Kelton and Jake Webb, Justin, Parker Webb, Jacob Steiner

Stockton has been collecting these Lego cars from Walmart. They are pretty inexpensive and he was up to six different cars in November. I have no idea which is which but he definitely does and knows all the intricate details about them as well.

Since the end of July, we have been raising turkeys as part of the 4H turkey sale that Wasatch County does. We started with 6 turkey chicks (2 each for Stockton, Brynn, Ivy) and took care of them until the 3rd weekend of November when we loaded them up in the back of the truck, drove them to the fairgrounds, and dropped them off to be weighed and slaughtered. Then the next Tuesday night was the turkey auction when people and businesses came out to support the kids and bid on the turkeys. One of our turkeys had died and one didn't make weight so we had 4 turkeys that we were selling that night. Brynn was the lucky one who got to go twice. I was actually really nervous! We hadn't done a lot of advertising so I wasn't sure anyone would buy our turkeys. But they did and I worried for nothing. I was relieved when it was over though! Good job kids!

*Since the turkeys had already been processed, the kids stood on a stage with a buyer gift while an auctioneer took bids. It kind of felt like my child was out there being bid on, phew! My parents bought one, a ward member bought one, a baseball mom bought one, and a random stranger bought another. 

Justin had a big week-night ward council that night. Our ward had just been "reorganized" so they were hashing out callings for several hours. He finished about the same time we did and Molly had just made it home for Thanksgiving so we all converged at Dairy Keen for fries and shakes. Yay!