October this year has been so, so nice! The weather has been unseasonably warm! Last year, we had snow on October 1st! This year, we have been out enjoying the weather as much as possible! We drove out to the Palisades area one weekend and let Zeus come along in the car. The fall colors were beautiful and the kids (and the dog) loved running around in the woods.
Fishing with the Boys
Josh took the boys fishing one morning with his brother, Bryan, and his son, Brennan. They just went out on the river close to our house this time because they had they needed to be back in time for a football game. They had a lot of fun, but didn't catch much! Caleb mostly just goes for the junk food anyways!
Treehouse Fall Festival
One of our favorite fall activities every year is going to this local farmer's house where they do this "fall festival." They set up all of these little storybook props and we go walk through the "enchanted forest." Here are some pictures of Avery posing as "Goldilocks" and "Little Red Riding Hood." After we walked through that, we went on the hayride that the farmer guy does and he shoots this pumpkin cannon into his field! Then we got some of their fabulous scones! They also have a big slide that the kids played on for a long time. Here are some pictures of that!
Gabe's Championship Soccer Season
This year, Gabe had the best team ever! At first, he was sort of bummed that he didn't try out for JV because some of his ninth-grade friends had done that and made the team. However, it turned out that this team he got put on was full of amazing players! Most of them were younger than Gabe, so he was kind of the old man on the team, but that was ok! They ended up only losing one game the whole season to Teton, but then they also beat them at a different game. In the championship game, they ended up playing Sugar City, which was crazy because they had already beat Sugar TWICE! But in the end, they beat them again 6-2. Here are some pictures of him with his coach, Freddy, and with his team, and with his medal!
Caleb's Football Season
This year, Caleb had a lot of fun with football again. His season was kind of up and down. They won the first two games by A LOT! I think the scores were like 36-6 and 40-12. Then the third game they lost by one touchdown. Then they won the next one. Then they lost the next one and so on. They DID end up going to the playoffs though! That was exciting. It had been a three-way tie, so they did this "Kansas City play-off" game between the three teams. Their team won! So they advanced to the playoffs. They were considered the best team in the "B league" so they had to play the second-best team in the "A league" which happened to be Madison Gray! It was a good game and we were winning at half-time, but then one of our best players got hurt, and it kind of went downhill in the fourth quarter. They ended up losing to Madison Gray. Then the next game, Madison Gray lost to Rigby! I was secretly happy that we got out when we did because the weather turned really cold right after the game that we lost and the Madison Gray team ended up having to play in SNOW! (I wasn't sad to miss out on that experience! haha) Here are some pictures of Caleb with his teammates.
Ever since March, we have been having church at home. I'll admit, it's not all bad. I've worn the same comfortable long skirt every Sunday for about sixth months now. Gabe makes fun of me and it's become a tradition at this point. He's like, "You better burn that thing when this is all over!" haha I will be somewhat sad when we go back and I have to start caring about what I wear to church in front of people again. We did have ONE day back at church though! Starting on about September 1st, Idaho had moved into phase 4, which meant that we could gather in groups of up to 100. Our church leaders divided up the ward into groups and assigned each group by the last names of the alphabet. Our day finally came on October 11th, along with everyone with last names of R-Z! We had to wear masks and we weren't allowed to sing. We got there at 12:00 and we were all done by 1:00. Guess who one of the two speakers was? Caleb! haha The Bishop asked him to prepare a talk on what his favorite conference talk had been. They even had a little camera at the pulpit and broadcast it on YouTube for the people at home. He did a great job! Now the governor has recently moved us back to phase 3 because cases were rising again, so now the limit is groups of 50. We will see when we can go to church again! We have such a large ward (probably 500 people) that it won't be very often!
Here are some pictures of church (Caleb at home church with Zeus) and Avery standing outside the church building with her mask! She was so excited to get to wear her baptism dress again.
Josh at the FBI Academy
Josh got to attend this fun little FBI Academy in Yellowstone. It was a week-long from Sunday, October 18 - Saturday, October 24. I think that will go down in history as the longest week of my life EVER! He left on Sunday, then I was on my own with the kids on Monday! Tuesday and Wednesday I had parent-teacher conference, so I had to stay at the school until 7:00! My poor kids had to fend for themselves! Also, Avery's babysitter found a job as a para at a school, so she let me know that she was quitting like the day before Josh left town! I was freaking out. Luckily, my sweet neighbor offered to watch Avery after school for me until I got home. The boys and I always get home about an hour after Avery gets home. So, it was a stressful week! On Friday, I loaded up the kids and the dog and we drove the hour and a half to Yellowstone after school. The kids watched TV in the hotel room and we ordered pizza for them while Josh and I went to the "graduation ceremony" in the banquet hall. The chief and his wife drove up to join us so that was nice. They're so supportive of Josh. They really love him.
Halloween
I feel like we all needed Halloween this year more than ever. Kids have been deprived of so many things in this country for the past seven months! Luckily, in Idaho, most people are pretty in favor of keeping schools open and keeping sports seasons underway! People were equally in favor of handing out candy and letting the kids trick-or-treat. We had a LOT of kids come through our neighborhood. I started out with a big bowl of "good candy" (M&Ms, Kit Kats, Reeses, etc.) and then I had an extra bowl as a backup that had lots of little candy (tooties rolls, wrapped gummies, fruities). We went through BOTH bowls!
Avery dressed up as Hermoine from Harry Potter. She's just starting to get into Harry Potter this year because her teacher LOVES the books and makes everything about Harry Potter. They had a Halloween party in class and it was Harry Potter themed.
Caleb put on the pumpkin head and sat still on our porch with the bowl in his hands this year. He scared a lot of little kids as they would reach for the candy and he would jump at them! He liked that! haha Avery went around the neighborhood with me and Josh and our new neighbor, Maggie (the one whose mom babysits her now), and Kendalin and her parents. The weather cooperated and we had a lovely night! We went out at about 5:00, and by 7:00 it was dark and we were tired and we were in for the night! Gabe had gone around the neighborhood with a couple of friends on skateboards just harassing people and causing a general disturbance. haha No taking candy. He had fun though. It was a great Halloween! My favorite moment was when I saw these two brothers dressed as Biden and Trump. I had them pose for this picture in front of my Trump sign!
In two days, it will be November 3rd and we will have the big election day! Some people are saying that we may not know who wins until Thanksgiving because of all the mail-in votes. I just really hope that the Democrats don't rig it and stack the ballot boxes or something. It's a scary world we are living in these days. I really hope they don't shut everything down again.
That's all for now! We will see if the next time I write, we are still going to school five days a week!
0 comments:
Post a Comment