October 2021

We had the first day of October off from school because it was a compensatory day for SEP conferences.  We went to a pumpkin patch where we chose pumpkins and got corn stalks to decorate our porch.

Then we went to Gardner Village and went on a scavenger hunt to find all different kinds of  witches.

Emily and I made up some cinnamon rolls.

We watched General Conference on Saturday and then went and got shakes at Arctic Circle afterwards.

Finishing the cinnamon rolls.

 Between General Conference sessions on Sunday we went for a drive up Butterfield Canyon to see the changing leaves.  Unfortunately the leaves were already starting to fall, but they were still pretty.

 

We found some cattails.

Megan helped make apple crisp for dessert.

Emily was Safety Patrol captain and had the responsibility of lowering and raising the flag each day.

Emily went through 8 weeks of vision therapy and improved her sacadees/tracking scores to normal!  She still needed to work on perception and reversals of letters, but she chose a treat for her accomplishiments up until now.

It's fun to see what a year can do.  We're so grateful for our beautiful house with its fence and yard.

We wrote love notes for a service project.

For Fall Break, we used our summer reading program passes to the Natural History Museum of Utah. 

 

Emily at the water station.

Tyler and Emily's dinosaur drawings.

"Excavation" site

Later that night we went to see Jennifer A. Nielsen.  She is the author of the Ascendence series and was releasing the 5th and final book, The Shattered Castle, that night.  The kids and I have loved listening to the other books and were excited for the final one.  Jennifer was sooooo nice and down-to-earth.  We waited in line for a long time to talk to her and have her sign our book.

 

Emily, Jennifer Nielsen, Megan and Tyler 

We went to a new nearby regional park.

 

 

Tyler and I arrived at Liberty Park one morning so he could help out with his A-Train basketball team for the American Cancer Society Walk.  It was a rainy day, but it was fun to help. The boys set things up for the walkers and then put out yard signs along the route.  They then helped clean up at the very end.

 

We met my parents and The Little Leos at Obstacle Warrior Kids.

Emily

 

Megan

Tyler

 

Then my parents treated us all to Cafe Rio.

As a reward for FINALLY finishing reading the Book of Mormon as a family (it only took about 22 months), we celebrated by going out to eat at Texas Roadhouse.

Our poor, but only, selfie.

Emily's ribs

Tyler's burger  (He was interested in the sports TV on the wall)

Megan's steak

 

I didn't get a picture of Darrell's chicken, but here's chicken-fried steak.

We carved our pumpkins and the American Girl dolls and porgs got in on the action too.

 

Emily

Megan

Tyler

We had a Halloween party at school.  My team and I dressed up as Cruella and the Dalmatians.

Tyler's team (The A-Train) played in a tournament.

 

We had a neighborhood party.  It was fun to meet some of our new neighbors.

 

Halloween fell on a Sunday this year, so we did our celebrating and trick-or-treating on Saturday.

Our traditional Papa Murphy's jack-o-lantern pizza

The girls were playing around and Emily pushed Megan into Megan's door.  The door stopper broke through the door and created a hole.  We told them the money we would normally put towards Halloween costumes would go towards fixing the door, so Emily came up with an orignal idea--they would dress up as their Squishmallows. They did a nice job creating the costumes.

Emily as Dexter.

Megan as Lily

Tyler as a Jazz basketball player

Darrell went out with the kids while they went trick-or-treating and I stayed home and handed out candy.

The loot

On Sunday, the actual day of Halloween, we went to Derek and Tansy's for dinner.  The food was yummy and cousin time is always a good time.