Thanksgiving!!

I was really grateful that my brother Mike, Amy, and their family came home for Thanksgiving.  I was excited to meet my new niece.  Elle Mahala Thurston was born on October 18th.  She was 7lbs 7oz and 19 3/4 inches long.

Elle is such a sweet little baby! It is hard to believe that Addy was this small almost exactly a year ago.  This was the first year that I hosted Thanksgiving dinner at my house.  I had never cooked the turkey before and so this was a new adventure.

Thankfully, my sister-in-law Amy was there to help and give advice.  She taught Loni and I how to make her delicious homemade rolls.  I learned the key to making good rolls is to use a lot of butter!  Thanks Amy for all your help.

The kids crawling around on the floor while we prepared the food.  It was such nice weather that the kids played outside most of the day.  Cousins Hailey and Brady loved playing on the tramp and swing set.  Kev even busted out his motorcycle and took the kids for a ride.  He quickly became Brady's favorite Uncle.

The Turkey turned out really well.  It was brown on the top and tender meat on the inside.  Kev had his first experience carving the Turkey.  He did an excellent job of getting all the meat off the bone.

We were so glad to have Grandma there with us!  She is always so thoughtful.  She brought surprises for the kids and decorations for the adults.  She gave me two pilgrim figurines which I put right on the table. 

Hayden with his dinner which he hardly touched.  I think all those chips he was snacking on filled him up. 

Parker and Halle both digging in on their Turkey legs.  We are definitely carnivores in this household!  It was a beautiful day filled with family, good food, and music.

American heros!!

Mckenna had her American hero's wax museum last week.  Mckenna chose to do her research on the astronaut Sally Ride.  Kev was excited with her choice because his company develops rockets for NASA.  He was able to get Mckenna, posters, stickers, and the cool shuttle to display.  I also enjoyed working with Mckenna on this project.  It was a good excuse to get out my cricut to help with her display.  Mckenna is a perfectionist and her display turned out great.

The hard part was she had to memorize facts to tell people when they pushed the button by her display.  We found this astronaut costume online and it fit her great.  Luckily, Parker said he wants to wear it next Halloween so it will get some more use.  Mckenna with her teacher Mr. Smith.  He has been a great teacher.  He comes up with creative ideas to keep the kids involved in the classroom.

A couple days later I got to go on a field trip to the firestation with Hayden.  The kids were so excited to see everything up close.  The firefighters told them what to do in case of a fire at home.  Hayden would look back at me every time I tried to take a picture. He was just checking to make sure I was nearby.



Miss Marci was a good sport and got dressed up in all the gear.  The kids thought that was hilarious to see their teacher like that. After she was dressed a call came in to the station.  They had to quickly take off all the gear and leave.

Our field trip was cut a little short but we did get to see the firetruck in action.

Hayden with his preschool class and Miss Marci.

It was fun being able to go on the field trip with him!

Halloween!!

The night before Halloween we finally got around to carving our pumpkins.  It is a tradition in our family to carve the baby's pumpkin with this little round mouth expression.  Addy crawled around on the ground finding spilled pumpkin seeds while we carved.

Parker is really into the game mind craft right now so that is what he wanted on his pumpkin.  Kev helped him carve it.  I think it is funny that Parker was wearing his last years Christmas jammies for the picture.

The morning of Halloween I was at the kids school for the big parade.  I also got to help out with Halles class party.

I was in charge of the cookie decorating activity.  Those kids really love sprinkles.  They put so many on it was hard to see the cookie.  Kindergartners always say the greatest things.  These are a few things I heard;  "This is the life",  "I'm not cute",  "where is my mommy",  and "this is better than bubbles in the bathtub!"

The kids all dressed up for a picture before they were off to get some candy.

Parker striking a pose

Halle was a Spanish dancer this year.  We borrowed the costume from my half sister.  My Dad actually bought it in Spain.

 Hayden showing off his muscles.  He was so funny at the school that morning.  He was running through the halls at "super speed".   He even held the door open for the parents leaving the school.  One of them replied, '"thanks Mr. Incredible!"

I am glad Mckenna got to wear her costume several times after all the hard work she put into it.  I had her take off the sweater so we could see the black trim she put around the neck and shoulders.  Mckenna went trick or treating with her friends for the first time. 

Our happy little lady bug.  We took her out trick or treating for the first time.  She loved eating her kit kat bar.

Halle helped hand out the candy at our house when she wasn't out trick or treating.

One of our neighbors had this out in his front yard.  It was a fun Halloween with lots of sugar.  My favorite part is when the kids give me all the candy that they don't like.  Mckenna always has almond joys for me and I am okay with that.

Grandpa's haunted house!!

We had a Halloween FHE night at Kev's parents house.  It was a full moon that night.  It was the perfect back drop for all the festivities.

We had dinner and then the kids decorated cupcakes loaded with candy.

Grandpa turned on his awesome fog machine that creates bubbles.  The kids loved it. 

My father-in-law really goes all out for Halloween.  He had transformed the house with all the decorations.

He had a ghost in each window that lite up and moved around.  He is the genius behind all these creations.

He had an open coffin with glowing red skeleton bones too.

The cousins got dressed up in their costumes for a picture.

Parker with his skeleton costume in the black light.

Addy and cousin Austin looked so cute all dressed up in their costumes.  Austin was wearing Parker's pooh bear costume from when he was a baby.  It is great that so many of my nephews have been able to wear it too.

If the broom fits...

The girls and I went to witches night out last weekend.  My mother-in-law invited us to go with them.  It was fun that everyone got dressed up.  We had a good time looking at all the different shops.  It had been a few years since I had last been to Gardner village.

My two cute witches!  Luckily, Halle's witch costume from last year still fit her.  Mckenna made her entire witch costume. 

We took lots of pictures.  There were great photo ops everywhere.  I thought it was funny how Halle was cozying right up to the witch in this one.

Great Grandpa and Grandma Grant also met up with us.  Grandpa was a good sport and carried around our coats all night and took photos.  He even entertained the girls by trying on both their witch hats.

Halle and cousin Aubrey had fun running around together.

Halle thought it was funny to climb under my cloak as I was walking around.  A big thanks to my friend Jan, for letting me borrow her witch costume.  She made the whole ensemble.  She used her old prom dresses to put it together.

One thing that I love about Mckenna is her creativity.  She told me that she was going to make her costume this year.  She worked hard to make her dress out of duct tape. We ran into a few challenges as she was making it.  Once the top was covered in duct tape we couldn't get it over her head.  So we had to cut it all the way down the back and tape her into it

We also had dinner while we were there.  I had one of my favorite fall meals, cheese potato soup in a bread bowl.  After dinner, Halle joined the other kids on the dance floor.  She danced away to songs like "party rock".