Fall Concert

Childrens' Choir started up again in September.  Emma opted to take a break this semester but Samantha was eager to join up again.  They have learned lots of fun songs from all over the world and she has had a great time doing it.  She had her fall concert on Thursday evening where choirs from all over the valley came to perform.  Their first song each child was able to play an African drum with a drum teacher that taught them some beats from West Africa.  Then they sang a beautiful song called "Liberty."

Clara thoroughly enjoyed herself but mostly wanted her picture taken.

She lasted through about half of the program and then it was time to take this stinker home!  We are really grateful that our girls love to share their talents!

School Programs

Within the last week the girls have had special events at their elementary school which have been wonderful to participate in!  The first event was the annual Veterans Day Assembly.  Apparently this is a long standing tradition within this school to invite all the veterans in the area to come and watch a patriotic program put on by the students.  It started with the Boy Scouts displaying the colors and everyone saying the Pledge of Allegiance.  Then the children started singing and it was beautiful!

They did some songs where everyone sang, including the audience.  Then they did the anthems of the five branches of the military.  Sam's grade sang about the Navy and Emma's grade sang for the Coast Guard.  The principal said that it was usually an emotional and touching program and it certainly didn't disappoint!  As a parent, I am thrilled that our children are learning about the meaning of Veterans Day and what it represents.

On Friday the school had an awards assembly which they hold every nine weeks (for each quarter).  This is a time when they honor the childrens' accomplishments and the parents are invited to attend.  Each class chose three students who excelled in reading and three students who excelled in math.  Then they were announced in the front of the school and given a certificate.  Samantha received an award for her excellence in reading!

Here is the certificate she was given:

She also had an award for 100% attendance so far this year!  She loves to be at school!

Emma's name was called for her reading achievements as well.  Here she is coming up to the front to accept her award.

These were the rest of the fifth graders....

And her special award....

Then the principal recognized everyone who participated in intramural volleyball.  Each student received an award and had their picture taken with their team.

 Here is her certificate....

Emma had an award for her attendance as well: 98%

I love that these kids at this school are being recognized for their hard work.  It is motivating for them and you can see how excited they all were to have wonderful things said about them.  Kudos to the staff at the elementary for making it such a great place to learn!

Raspberries

One of the things that we love about our home is our raspberry patch.  However, we only had a slight harvest with them this summer - mostly because they hadn't been watered for a while during the moving transition and also because they weren't being taken care of as they should have been.  Mark did a lot of research and we knew we had to change things up.  This is a picture from about a month ago of our raspberries.  They were very overgrown.

Now this is how they look.  Last weekend Mark spent almost an entire day trimming and transplanting.  He cut them down to a good height, spread them out, and added some wire fencing to contain them and keep them upright.  We went from having 20 feet of overgrown raspberries to now having 40 feet!  It is so much more spacious on that side of the house and the berries look much healthier!

We have to do a few more thing to brighten up the area but we are really pleased with how well it looks now.

Cross your fingers with us that we will have an abundant harvest next summer!

Halloween Festivities!

Happy Halloween!  We've had a fun Halloween week here.  The girls only had school on Monday and Tuesday so we've been playing all week and getting into the Halloween Spirit.  They had class parties on Tuesday that were lots of fun and had a ward party on Wednesday night.  We had a chili cookoff and Mark's chili won the prize for best sweet chili.  His prize was an oven mitt filled with candy!  This picture is of Clara holding the big prize!

Thursday we went downtown to trick or treat in the afternoon.  The girls scored lots of candy!  Then we came home and had pizza and then did a little more trick-or-treating.  Clara's costume this year was a fairy - she was adorable but the wings didn't last too long.

Samantha went as a gypsy!

Emma dressed up as a nerd.  She was so cute!

It was a fun day and we have so much candy in the house.  We are definitely ready to move on to Thanksgiving!  We hope your Halloween was filled with fun!

Pretty Girls

I love the fall season.  I love the changing colors and the mountains here in La Grande are full of bright colors this time of year.  We have a really large bush/hedge in our front yard that has turned the most gorgeous shade of red so I thought I would take a few snapshots of my pretty girls in front of it.  They are growing too quickly and I feel like I have to capture every moment!

They are probably so tired of me taking their picture but look at those faces!!!  I am one proud mama!

We hope you are enjoying this season as well!

Service Project

Since moving in to our new home there has been a section of our backyard that has been a huge eye sore!  There is several inches of gravel, lots of weeds, and old railroad ties.  The former owners used it as RV parking but since we don't have an RV we knew we wanted to turn this section into more lawn.  The only problem was that it is a HUGE job to move all the gravel and dig up those railroad ties.  If Mark attempted to do it on his own, it would take forever and it would kill him physically.  Luckily, my visiting teaching companion is the wife of our Elders Quorum President so we put our heads together and came up with the idea of having a service project at the house and getting some help.

We planned it for this weekend - we bought some donuts and juice to share and took some "before" pictures before a couple of guys showed up to help out.

We were expecting a few guys and to our delight we had about 14 show up!!  We couldn't believe it - the Bishop came, his counselor, our home teachers, one of the young men, elders, high priests, and even a couple of wives!  It was so wonderful!  They got right to work and within an hour they were completely done and we were looking for things for everyone to do!

They created our giant gravel pile and got the railroad ties in the trailer to head to the dump!

And stacked a bunch of rock that we want to save for a future project.

We couldn't be more grateful for the help we received and now we feel like we are on track for making the changes to the yard that we've wanted to.  It's such a blessing to see the way the Church works and to have willing hands to lighten the load.  We will do our best to find ways where we can serve and return the favor!

Making Applesauce!

Our family LOVES homemade applesauce so I always make sure to make a large amount each fall.  For several years I have been doing applesauce and borrowing an applesauce maker from a ward member but this year I had my OWN applesauce maker that Mark got me for our anniversary!  It sure worked great and the girls were anxious to help me!

We got our apples at the local farmers market and they were very large and beautiful!

Emma was the super helper and cut up all the apples into pieces to be cooked.....

Then she would crank while Samantha collected the hot applesauce.  It made me very happy to be canning with my girls!

On this day we made 13 quarts of sauce and they turned out beautifully.  The sauce will be a wonderful addition to our meals during the long winter months.

Sure love this season!

Pumpkin Patch

It wouldn't be the fall season without a visit to our local pumpkin patch!  The girls had a day off from school for Teacher Inservice a couple of weeks ago so we decided to take the girls and have a family activity.

You would think that as Clara gets older that it would get easier to take her picture but it hasn't.  She is still camera shy and it is rare that we actually get a photo of her looking at the camera.  Most of the time, if she is sitting with her sisters she will feel comfortable enough so I was glad to get this snapshot of the three of them!

Daddy is always a good sport when it comes to posing with his girls....

Happy Fall Y'all!

Conference Weekend!

Hooray that General Conference is here again!  We love Conference Weekend and look forward to it with great anticipation!  This time around we were lucky enough to have Jon and his family come up for the Saturday sessions to watch with us and enjoy some fall activities.  The pumpkin patch opened up for the season and the kiddos were anxious to check out all the different pumpkins.  We went there after the Saturday morning session.

Then we came back to the house for lunch and to watch the afternoon session.  Everyone was sprawled out over the living room doing various quiet activities.... Clara was really enjoying coloring, IJ was checking out a church activity book, and....

Hinkley did some file folder games with the help of Samantha.  He did great!  Jordan did some with his mommy, too.

Emma and Eliza were very engrossed in some fun coloring books!

So much going on in the house, but here lies Uncle Jon getting the MOST out of conference!

After the second session we headed over to Cove to an antique fair that members of our ward were putting on.  The kiddos went on a hay ride while the moms and dads did some looking around for treasures.

This was a great find for us - we love this beautiful desk.  Now we just need to find a place to put it!

I saw this adorable fall creation - I didn't buy it but I am hoping to recreate it someday with our own flower pots....

After the antique fair we came back to the house so the dads could watch Priesthood session which was being broadcast on TV for the first time.  I made a couple pots of soup and then us gals sat down to work on a fall craft while the boys stayed outside and got some energy out.

Emma and Eliza really had their creative juices flowing...

Jordan loves playing basketball so Samantha stayed outside with him and they bounced the ball around.

Hinkley found the chicken broom and thought it was great......

While Isaac played around with the bouncy balls - only one of the balls went over the fence. 

It was a great day and a wonderful way to spend conference weekend.  We were sad to see them leave!