Fall fun has started

Its that time of year when it seems there is always something going on. Last weekend we drove to St. George to visit the Staheli Family Farm. It was perfect shorts warm weather. (which was a nice treat since we are supposed to have snow today)

Here's a turkey checking out Luke.... or Luke checking out a turkey its hard to tell which.

The boys loved jumping on the air pillow, we had to drag Luke away from it. Next year we really need to get a trampoline at home.

Who can resist a photo op like this? Cutest farmer, pig and pumpkin I have ever seen.

Kolby on the look out for pirates. You have to look out for them they can sneak up on you.

The highlight was the corn maze.

With real live corn :)

Rubber ducky water races anyone?

I love Lukes face in the picture. The rope swing was a big hit, the boys begged Dewey to put one in our barn.

Tall enough to stand on a hay bale and "hold" the scarecrows hand.

Notice anything different about Luke? He is now one of the proud majority members of our family that wear glasses. At his last parent teacher conference his teacher mentioned he had not done very well on the eye test. So back we went to the optometrist we had just visited with me and kolby and wouldn't you know it he needs glasses too.

I think he looks just cute as can be in them :)

And an apple update. (last post) I'm sure everyone (bahaha) has been waiting to hear how the second box of apples went. Well I'm happy to say we have 9 quarts of applesauce 11 pints of apple butter and 3 bags of dried apple rings. Oh I am in the swing of things now people, bring it fruit :)

Phone Dump

I thought it was about time to unload or upload some of the random pics sitting on my phone.

Earlier this summer we went to a local music festival in town. Dew and Luke went off in one direction to find food and Kolby and I in the other.

This is what Luke came back with..... a turkey leg. After I was done gagging I snapped a shot of him enjoying it.

He followed it up with cotton candy.

My little dog Bailey...... She is getting older and has had many trips to the vet recently. I am not handling it well.

Farm in Spanish Fork where we had our flat tire. After I had bugged Dew enough I wandered off to take pics.

Driving home from work to the sight of smoke directly North of us. The fire crews got the fire under control within a few days, always a little scary.

Kolby "bobbing" for doughnut holes at the pumpkin festival

Sign on the boys bedroom door.

Traffic jam in a small town

Kolby waiting to meet his teacher for the first time.

Close-up

Remember our big night out in Salt Lake City where I mentioned Kolby fell asleep at the restaurant?

A few weeks ago we met our wonderful friends Troy and Wendy in Las Vegas.

Even though it was only one night we had such a good time.

We saw Carrot Top, very funny.

Troy and Wendy were married here many years ago. We made them pose by the chapel picture. How cute are they?

It was so good to relax and laugh until our cheeks and stomach hurt. Such a good time, I'm even sharing a pic with my cutie hubby and me with all my chin wrinkles :)

A little random insight into me,

There is a small town to the South of us that is well know for its delicious apples. Every year they have an apple festival and local families bring their apples to sell. The last two times I tried to buy them they were sold out before I got there. This year I vowed we would get there early. Which was not as easy as it sounds since that morning was the Women in Business Pumpkin festival which I had committed to help with. Once we got there I had the four of us running to the fruit stands. As I looked around I did not see many apples. The first stand says "this is the last box", We will take it, pay the man. I might have given dirty looks to the people around just to let them know it was mine. These are yummy apples people.

 Kolby LOVES applesauce the child will eat it at every meal. So my plan was to make him lots of it. So on to the Internet to find out how to make applesauce. The first several sites listed all kinds of equipment needed that I do not have. But the beauty of the Internet is that if you look long enough you will find what what you want to hear. The instructions I decided on said the peels would neatly float to the top, you just grab them up with tongs easy peasy. At this point I should mention that no it did not occur to me that if it was that easy why did the other sites say you needed all that equipment. Once I got the applesauce started I thought it would be a fine idea to make apple butter too. So I start pealing and chopping apples for the butter while I wait for the applesauce skins to magically start floating. As you can imagine the whole kitchen is taken up with apples and every possible pan and bowl. Oh I should also mention that a few days every month I am not the nicest person to be around. (read fire breathing dragon) This was one of those days, so it makes perfect sense for me to start these projects......

It soon becomes clear to me that the first 5 sights were correct, equipment was and is needed. The apples for the applesauce are now mushy with the skins still on. There is nothing else to do but start scraping the apples one by one in the TWO stock pots I have full of them. So as a recap apples started for the apple butter all over the counter me hand scraping apple for the applesauce. It was at this point Dew and the boys came in from outside. I think I said "Make dinner" from the look on Dews face my head was spinning al la poltergeist. He starts frantically going through cupboards to try and throw something together while staying out of my line of fire. About that time the doorbell rings and our wonderful neighbor comes in. He innocently asks what I'm doing as I'm sure dew was shaking his head and mouthing "save yourself". Once I explain and he looks around at the "situation" he says he will be right back. A few minutes later he and his wife are back bringing all the special applesauce making equipment they apparently had laying around their house. As I still had half a box of apples left I was THRILLED. Dew might have dropped to his knees in thanks I can't be sure.

So hours later I had the applesauce I had started done, it came out to be 3 quarts. And the apple butter in the crock pot. (Which burned the next day and had to be thrown away)

This is when any rational person would realize you can buy applesauce and apple butter at the store and be happy with that.

I however ordered 40 pounds of apples from Bountiful baskets, they will be here Sat.

Thought I would share a little of the crazy yet ever optimistic me :)

Soccer Wrapup

Another soccer season has come and gone.

We took pictures at Kolbys last game. Luke did a great job as a sub for Kolbys team.

Kolby with his patent soccer smile. He literally just smiles the whole time, running after the ball, blocking doesn't matter he is smiling.

One of the other moms brought spray paint for the kids to spray paint their hair. So cute, the boys loved it.

Team picture they have their "mean" faces on. And yes Dew sprayed his hair too.

Kolby loved having Dewey as his coach this year. How stinkin cute are these boys?

We had so much fun with Lukes team. We met some great friends and really enjoyed this season.

Luke found his niche as a defence player. They don't have official goalies at this age so they play two kids back acting as defence. (pretty much a goalie)

Luke took right to it, and really got pretty good. He blocked countless goals during the games.

It was so fun to watch these kids progress with their skills through the season. There were some great parents that were so supportive of all the kids.

End of season team photo, again how cute are these kids?

Crazy face pic.

Until next year.... Kolby says he isn't sure if he wants to play again. Luke says for sure soccer and for sure football...... we will see :)

Mini-Va-ca

A few weeks ago (OK by the time I'm getting around to posting this is probably been at least a month)

we made the trip up north to go to Dewey's nephews wedding. They had a lovely outdoors ceremony in the spectacular Provo canyon. Congratulations Jarome and Niki!!

The wedding was a little delayed so we had some time to try and take some pics.  

We have lots of wonderful family in Salt Lake that we normally stay with when we make the trip up there. But this time we thought it would be fun for us to be tourists. So we stayed at a hotel in the heart of the city right next door to the Gateway center. We started our adventure by swimming in the hotel pool. I lost track of how many times Luke jumped off the side of the pool. He varied it up by being a "frog" every couple of jumps. Not many pics since we were all in the water splashing and having fun.

We then walked next door to the Gateway center.

We started at the Children's museum. Tt was the first time the boys had been there, they loved every minute.

A favorite of all THREE boys was the helicopter on the roof.

I had to drag all three of them back into the building kicking and screaming :)

I was pretty impressed with how well the Children's museum was set up. They an area donated by a local TV station which was pretty realistic and enthralled Kolby.

He thought it was pretty cool playing news anchor.

By the time we left it was time for a late dinner. We had a yummy dinner at Z Tejas. Luke claims that the corn bread was the very best thing we has ever eaten in his life. Our plan was to eat and then go to a short science movie at the Planetarium. We sort of didn't take into account that our 5 and 7 year old had been up and running at full tilt all day long. Kolby curled up and fell asleep at the restaurant. So we decided we would head back to our room and relax. However at the exact time we were done eating it started to rain, not a soft sprinkling but a hard downpour. Everybody else was standing by the door waiting, when it occurred to us that the last time we checked we don't melt in the rain. So we grabbed hands and took off running. We made it to a candy/chocolate store dripping wet so we could each pick out our desert. My brilliant hubby asked if we could have two extra bags. In no time at all he MacGyvered (pretty sure that's a word) little rain ponchos for the boys that went over their  heads. And back out we went to continue walking, we got a few strange looks but just smiled. Hey we live in the country we know how to improvise.

The next day on the way home we drove up Spanish Fork canyon to meet up with some friends that were camping. One of Dewey's oldest friends Mike and his wife Michelle have a darling son Kolbys age. The kids always have so much fun when they get together. This time it was a water balloon fight where they all ended up soaking wet. As we drove down the canyon talking about what a fun weekend it had been Dewey says "Somethings wrong" and pulls over.

A very flat tire. Did you get the timing, we say what a fun weekend and them blam a flat time..... anywho Dew hops out to change it which should take no time at all. Kolby helped by sitting in the spare and I "helped" by saying fudge and making countless references to the Christmas story movie. I like to do my part. As it turned out the tire iron bent and the tire would not come off. Luckily on the 3 1/2 hour stretch of road between Salt Lake City and Cedar City where the tire could have blown it happened to be in Spanish Fork Dewey's home turf. After a few calls his wonderful Aunt Vickie and cousin Bert came to our rescue. They took the boys to Grandma Warner's for water and snacks and brought back a bunch of tools. Between Dew and Bert they soon had the tire off and changed. So just a few hours later then we planned we were on our way home.

A very fun weekend, good memories full of laughs and adventure.