Chuck E Cheese

 As usual, Hyrum celebrated at Chuck E Cheese for part of his birthday festivities.  Here are the photos.

Halloween

For Halloween this year Hyrum chose to be a hunter (surprise, surprise!) and Lydia was a dinosaur. Lydia wanted to be Cinderella but we didn't have time to get her ready by the time we made it back from McCall. She was happy to be a dinosaur though.

These pictures are from the trunk-or-treat at the church. Halloween was on Sunday this year so the trunk-or-treat is all we did. It was nice that the kids got plenty of candy but not an extreme amount.

Going through the loot back at home. This was always a fun part for me as a kid. All of us kids would sit around the living and go through our candy and trade any we didn't like.

Jon doesn't like to carve pumpkins but, being the good Dad that he is, he carved a few with the kids Halloween afternoon so we could light them before trick-or-treaters came.

Hyrum's pumpkins

Lydia's pumpkin with all sorts of words written in "Lydian" on it.

Despite not being able to go trick-or-treating themselves, the kids still had a great time handing out candy that evening.

McCall

We took advantage of cheap prices at our timeshare in McCall this weekend. We got there Wednesday night and went to Gold Fork Hot springs the next morning. Out of all the hot springs I've been to Gold Fork is definitely my favorite. We spent about 3 1/2 hrs there soaking up the sun in the beautiful fall weather and all the good minerals from the hot spring.

Jon doesn't think he's much of a social guy, however, whenever we go somewhere he always makes friends. Seriously. He sat the the far end of this pool for at least 30-45 minutes chatting with the guy next to him. As you can see there weren't too many other people there. A few people came and went while we were there including a family with three kids that Hyrum and Lydia enjoyed playing with. Having it pretty much to ourselves was one of the best parts.

Hyrum climbing the rocks where the hot spring dumps into the pool to pose for a picture.

The "belly" as Jon lovingly refers to it at 29 weeks.

Friday we drove around Ponderosa State Park and spotted several deer. Unfortunately, for Jon and Hyrum they weren't any bucks.

Hyrum's pouting in this picture because he wanted to hike on a different trail.

My extremely photogenic and handsome husband.

Down by the lake

I love that dimple!

Attempting a family photo with one grumpy kid.

Photo courtesy of Lydia. We brought some tenderloin and back strap from Jon's elk he got this year with us and Jon cooked it on the BBQ. It was wonderfully delicious! Especially, with one of my favorite foods- sweet potatoes- on the side.

The kids love swimming and had a great time using the pool.

Lydia with the fish Hyrum caught.

The fish almost got away in the water so Lydia brought it ashore and built a "fire pit" around it so it couldn't get away. You can barely see the fish in the middle of the rocks.

Jon caught one soon after this picture and let Lydia reel it in she had a great time bring it in.

Hyrum got a snag so Jon encouraged him to cross the river verses losing his lure. Being the end of October the water was a little chilly :)

Applesauce and Fall Fun

Lydia at the pumpkin patch 4 days after we went in shorts and T-shirts with Grandma. It was a chilly morning. My friends' preschool was going and since we homeschool we decided to join them.

I had told myself I wasn't going to make applesauce this year since I'm pregnant and my veins hurt when I stand for too long. Then a family in our ward told Jon they had a bunch of apples if we wanted them. It's hard to refuse free fruit so Jon and the kids picked the apples and we made sauce.

Jon was very kind to cut up all the apples.

And, if you know Jon he always has to have a little fun when doing any activity. He's showing off his juggling skills here. I sure love the happy joyful energy he brings to our home!

We decided to homeschool Hyrum this year for a few different reasons. The main being the fact that we're gone a lot and he misses too much school. He loves to hunt with his Dad and being homeschooled allowed him a lot of opportunities to do so this fall. For the most part I am extremely grateful to homeschool. I love spending more time together as a family and having my little boy home with me. It's also been a lot of fun for me to watch the kids become better friends. In the summer months there's so many neighbor kids to play with that they don't play with just the two of them very often. Now they play together everyday. This game involved burying Hyrum under piles of blankets and they insisted I take a picture.