McBlog

I just realized that I didn’t take any pictures last week, as far as I know. I just didn’t even think of it. So this week, I will work on catching a few photos! In the mean time, here are a couple of random photos from a couple weeks ago.

Sometimes we have to force these two kids to eat some dinner! And this is what it tends to look like. By the time I’ve accomplished the task of making dinner while also refereeing Chase & Charlotte’s play, I’m pooped. Luckily, Pace eats really quickly, so he then takes over the task of getting them to eat something while I chuckle at the sight of it all.

What does a person do? Maybe I should have them skip their afternoon snack so they’ll be practically starving by dinner time. THEN maybe they’d appreciate it!!!

One might think, “Well, obviously they’re just not hungry, so don’t make them eat.” But we usually start on the bedtime routine afterwards, and if they haven’t eaten much, they both cry and put on this big show about how hungry they are. And if they don’t eat anything by the time they go to bed, they wake up all night crying and asking for food (=punishment for the parents). Hm.

So that’s why we avoid all that drama and just force them to eat some dinner at dinner time! I know, perfect parenting skills at work around here…

                                                  

 

My kids have certainly had their fair share of fun this fall season! You’re probably all tired of hearing about what people are doing to celebrate autumn/Halloween. But too bad! haha

Uncle Casey helped Chase carve the pumpkin. Actually, Chase didn’t do much besides explain the concept he wanted, smack himself in the face with a slotted spoon, and then eat Oreos.

A couple weeks ago, we invited some friends to go to Pumpkinland in Orem with us. It’s a cute place where they have tons of things for kids to do (play areas, animals, gardens), and of course, you can buy pumpkins at the end. Definitely the best festive place for little ones. Pictured below is Chase with his BFF (just a couple of tough guys).

                                                

And Chase loved this goat (below). Somehow, it seemed as though the goat reciprocated his love.

(If you’re wondering what happened to Chase’s face, he had a few warts treated by a dermatologist. He’s gone through this several times, and it’s kind of painful for Chase, but this method doesn’t cause scarring which is important since the little warts tend to appear on his face. I’m hoping that this might be the last time he’ll have to have warts removed. Only time will tell!)

We took all the Activity Day girls to Cornbelly’s at Thanksgiving Point. SO much to do there, like a huge corn maze, a haunted creature you could walk through, pedal carts, big slides, hay ride, etc. It was our big (pricey) activity of the year, and it was so helpful that Gretchen came and took my kids around to do everything so I could just be with the awesome little girls from my group. I love my church calling! Hard to believe I’ve already been doing this for 2 years.

The above picture represents a kid’s dream come true… A large play house that you could color all over!!! Hopefully kids won’t see that as a green light for doing the same back at their real houses.

Have I mentioned that the traffic and construction here is ridiculous right now?? It took us an hour and 15 minutes to get back from Thanksgiving Point (should take 30 min or less). Poo.

All complaints aside…. The afternoon following our Cornbelly’s adventure, Gretchen so kindly took my kids to play at Hee Haw Farms in Pleasant Grove (yet another Halloween-themed place that has fun things to do). I wouldn’t exactly say my kids are spoiled, but………….. maybe they are.

This past week we’ve been *blah* sick. Hopefully Pace is the last one, and on the upswing! There’s not much to say about that, except that I have done absolutely nothing over the last several days! And we’re thankful for our normal, everyday life when we have good health.

This time last weekend we were on a fun family vacation in Idaho! Our good friends Bracken & Katie invited us to a cabin up there with them and the Fears. We really enjoyed this short, but fun-packed trip.

The best part of all was going to Yellowstone National Park! We went through part of Montana and into Wyoming just to get there (haha but that part only took like 25 minutes). We were shocked to discover that it costs $25 per car to get into the park, but we soon found out that it was well worth it!

Gorgeous scenery, and some good friends! (Sarah was taking this photo.) I believe this waterfall was called Firestone Falls or something; Pace had read about it and it was a really pretty spot.

Chase & Charlotte loved having kids to play with the whole time. Charlotte apparently wanted to get hit by a car because she kept charging wildly into the road. Luckily, she never got hurt!

                                    

We saw lots of bison & elk, a coyote, some interesting birds, and even some funny little mice. The animals (and the views) were fascinating!

My family went to Yellowstone when I was like 5, and I vividly remember the bubbling mud pots with the stinky sulfur smell. So of course we had to visit those, too. I loved the smell because it brought back memories!  (I think I was the only one who didn’t mind the stink.) We just had a couple of videos of those, but the photo below is of a hot spot that was bubbling right next to the river. It was a little chilly outside, so a few of us were tempted to jump in there to warm up, but we resisted. We also saw several geysers, which were interesting!

Some from our group went up to a mountaintop to hit golf balls off the cliffs. I just heard it was freezing up there!

The whole thing was a great trip and we loved having some family and friend time all rolled into one.