Happy Thanksgiving!

School Play

Audrey was chosen to be "Patty Pointer" in the 2nd grade play "ARF" last night. She had to perform twice during the day and then again in the evening for the public performance. She was so cute all dressed up as a puppy and excited to show us what she's been practicing. We were so proud of her! She said her lines with such confidence and enuciated her words perfectly. Here are a few photos of our little star...

Saturday and no rain

We have had a lot of rain this fall. Saturday was a beautiful day and we just had to get out and enjoy it. We went hiking at Tanyard Creek in Bella Vista to enjoy the changing of the leaves. It was great! We also had our ward Halloween party that evening. I made my delicious white chili for the chili cookoff, definitely the only non-traditional one there. It didn't win any awards, but somebody liked it because it was all gone when I went to take the crock pot home. So we all got dressed up and had a fun time trunk-or-treating, among other festivities. Check out the photo of Nate in the banana suit. He must have some crazy awesome self esteem to go out like that! He really didn't wear it long since he left the party early to watch the BYU game. Happy Halloween!

Fall and Football

Yesterday was Tyler's last football game and the weather was perfect for watching him play. He has really enjoyed his flag football team this year. He was one of the youngest on the team and made great improvements. The coach even had him play quarterback some this season, which of course was very exciting to Tyler. The girls always play in the dirt/mud during the game, which is always fun to clean up. I figure it's a small price to pay for some good old fresh air and football.

Feet

The other day we got some Fruit Loops with our newspaper, which Sammie was happily eating while watching her cartoons. She must have gotten bored, because she decided to stick them in between her toes and dance around. We all thought it was pretty funny...and she really can dance while keeping the cereal between her toes!

The "Punkin" Patch

Yes, that is how they spell "pumpkin" in Arkansas. Too bad you can't see the funny sign in any of the pictures. Just another reason we love to be ozarkies.

Saturday was a beautiful day. Still shorts weather if you can believe it. We drove out to this pumpkin patch we've never been to before, to celebrate October. We couldn't believe our TomTom got us there, with all the dirt roads and double wides, but we got there. The farmer had grown every kind of pumpkin imaginable. I loved the ones called "fairy tale pumpkins"--they are kind of terra cotta colored and have the neatest shape. We got to pull a little wagon around and pick our own to take home. Then there was a free hayride, complete with tacky halloween decorations hanging in the trees to frighten and delight my children. The "bucket ride" was fun, blue water storage buckets cut to fit child sized riders, pulled by a tractor. The girls enjoyed that, but Tyler opted for the corn maze. He made me go with him. I just kept thinking, "if it were dark and there were people jumping out at me, I could have a heart attack in here." Thank goodness for Tyler who told me, "good thing I have a man's sense of direction, or you'd be lost in here." Little does he know how wrong he is about the first part, but how right he is about the last.

We had a wonderful Conference weekend. This is the first one where I actually sat beside my husband for an entire talk. Yes, on the couch without one single interruption! My children are finally getting older! It was so fun to sit with them at lunch after the first session on Sunday and ask them what their favorite talk was and why. They had actual answers, even Sammie! She said she really like the music best. You should hear her immitation of the Mo Tab, she can even do vibrato! The down side to this is that I am already beginning to forget what it was like when they were babies. Oh well, each season is wonderful in it's own way....

By the way, I don't tell my girls to pose for photos, they just do. Check out the way they cross their legs and everything. Funny huh!

BUG!!!

Today after we got home from church, Nathan announced to the children, "if you want to see the biggest bug ever, come see this." I didn't even bother to look at the time since I was in a rush to feed everybody. So later in the afternoon when we went outside to go for a walk, we were surprised to see the bug was still in our yard, on the driveway actually. Nate was right, it definitely IS the biggest, furriest, strangest beetle-like bug we've ever seen! I just love the way the kids all got down on the ground to study it. Just another benefit of living in Arkansas!