2-4) At our house, we have a prize jar. Each week, the girls earn points for doing different things or for good behavior. (They also lose points for other things.) Once a week, they are able to "buy" things out of the prize jar or trade their points in for money (200 points= $1.) These are the prizes the girls chose that week. Sariah's cost about 1000 or 2000 points, I can't remember. (They also have the option of putting their points in savings, where they can't be taken away, instead of buying a prize that week. Then they buy a bigger prize the next week.) Where Aurora's prize only cost about 100 or 200 points. I really enjoy discipline systems like this because I have no problems following through on a punishment or are able to double the points when I am in a real bind. It works great for us. (We did this a couple times before and sometimes they do get bored. So we simply take 2-3 months off and then when we start back up, they are all excited about it again.)
5) Just Tia looking cute in her braids and jean coat!
6) The Phantom Ghost delivered treats to our house. The girls were so excited!
7-19) We made cookies to take to two other families, as the Phantom Ghost. It was so much fun! And we ate too many, as well!
Our friends invited us to come to the pumpkin patch with them and we all had so much fun. The kids were really excited to go with their friends! They enjoyed running around finding just the right pumpkins together. Although, it became dark faster than we were all expecting (we both had afternoon soccer games.) Luckily, we had all pretty much found our pumpkins by that time (with the exception of one rotten one, which had to be traded). And it was a beautiful night! We really enjoyed our evening. After all, everything is funner when you have friends to share it with. :) (In fact, we were able to go out on a double date, just the adults, the night before. We went to a haunted corn maze. Though I have to say, the scariest part was running into my ex-boyfriend. LOL! We had a lot of fun!)
1-3) The leaves around here, in the fall, are so gorgeous! I always say I am going to stop and take a picture but never do. Well, I finally happen to have my camera with me and no kids, so I stopped and took a picture. Beautiful trees!
4-8) Grant coached Riana and Sariah's team to an incredible fall season. We had a little bit of a rough start, losing two very unlucky games (one by quite a bit), and worried a bit. However, things started really turning around when we beat our undefeated rivals 3-1! (The team that has half of the girls that used to be on our team, a few girls from Scott, our new assistant coach's old team, and our old assistant coach.) It was a definite nail-biter of a game! And it felt really good! Two games later, we beat the only undefeated team left in our league 4-0! That was an awesome game! All the girls on our team played amazingly well! And Grant had to pay up with ice cream for both games... but was more than happy to do it!! They ended up finishing the season in 2nd place, behind the team we beat 4-0. It was a great season with really neat girls and very supportive parents. Riana and Sariah especially enjoyed having two of their best friends on the team, Aimee and Autumn. (Riana and Sariah also scored goals, in addition to Riana playing a lot of amazing defense and Sariah stopping a lot of goals, as the goalie.)
9) My Mom's singing group, that I have been singing with too. A few ladies are dealing with voice problems, one lady has moved, and one of the ladies is leaving on a mission and so this was pretty much the farewell for the group. It was sure fun getting to know these incredible ladies even better (even though I grew up with them- they have been together for like 30 years!) and learning so much from them. (I also learned not to take pictures from the side when I'm hugely pregnant- LOL! Not too flattering!) Anyway, I feel lucky that they let me join them for a year or two. All of the ladies were so kind and fun (Lara was hilarious and made the early Saturday mornings fun!), but I especially appreciated Marcie and Judy, my fellow 2nd sopranos, who were so sweet and full of compliments for me. They both helped me feel very welcome. (Pictured- L to R- Sopranos: Lara- who joined the same time as me, my Mom- Karla, Marjean- came back just for this performance, 2nds: Marcie, Judy- going on a mission, altos: Janet, Anna, Marcia- came back from Utah just for Judy's farewell and sang with us, and myself. Unfortunately, our incredible pianist, Loraine, wasn't able to stay for the picture.) Before the mission farewell, which was amazing (I enjoyed Judy's talk and especially enjoyed how tender and emotional Mike was), that morning, we had our Primary Program. We sure have fantastic kids in our Primary. The spirit was so strong. They sang excellent! I couldn't have been prouder of all my Primary kids. It was quite a spiritual high all day!
10) I finally bought frames for our family pictures. It makes me very happy to see them up on the wall! :)
11-12) Sariah made and decorated this yummy cake!
13) Sariah created these wings for herself, when she was suppose to be doing school! She is one creative girl! Sometimes it's enough to drive you crazy!! ;) We sure love her!
14) My friend, Jen, took me to Trader Joes. It was the first time I had ever been there and I have to say that I was very impressed! Here are a few of the things that I bought... not everything I bought was this "healthy"- LOL! The prices were reasonable, the food was delicious, and they had a lot of healthier options.
15-16) Grant and I went to court to fight my ticket, that I received back in June (see my "Basketball- May/June" post.) Luckily, I haven't received a ticket in 15 years, and Washington state has a ticket forgiveness program, where they will defer 1 ticket every 7 years (with a few exceptions like school zones), as long as you don't get another for the next year. I was so thankful for that! Too bad you have to choose that option before you ever explain your story because I was all ready to plead my case. However, I decided that it wasn't worth taking a chance to have it on my record. Afterwards, we went out for brunch. I decided to order a bear claw, and thinking it wouldn't be much, I got two sausage links for protein, as well. Boy, was I wrong! It was HUGE! I could only finish about half of it! Grant enjoyed his meal, as well, even though he wasn't able to finish it either.
Carving pumpkins this year was a lot of fun because everybody helped! Usually, Grant cleans them all out, the girls pick a pattern, and Mommy and Daddy carve them. This year, everybody cleaned out their own pumpkin, even Aurora did (7th picture), with a little help. Riana carved her pumpkin and chose the hardest pattern in the entire book too! It was a spider web (9th picture). Unforunately, it didn't stay intact for very long and she was quite upset. I was so proud of her when she made her "lemons into lemonade" and turned her pumpkin into beach, complete with umbrellas (2nd picture.) Go Riana! I also let her carve my pumpkin. This time, she picked a simpler pattern and went with Cinderella's shoe (4th picture.) Sariah carved her pumpkin freehand (8th picture.) She then proceeded to carve Karina's pumpkin with the ghosts pattern Karina picked (5th picture), which we had to pin with a toothpick in one place because it started to break, and then freehand Aurora's too (10th picture.) I carved Tierra's pumpkin with the Princess Aurora pattern she picked out (1st picture). Then Grant carved his freehand (12th picture). Despite a few little mishaps, I thought they all turned out great! And it was so much funner to let them just experience and learn. Good job girls!
The girls really enjoy dressing up for Halloween and luckily they had the opportunity to do that twice this year. The first party they attended was put on by their cousins' and the amazing Auntie Mandy and Uncle Chris. (I'm sure mostly the amazing Auntie Mandy!) They were so excited and had a blast! Aurora went as a lion and kept trying to growl at and scare people. Unforunately, she was just too cute! Karina looked beautiful as Princess Aurora. Tierra went as a fairy princess. Sariah created her own costume, to be Rapunzel. And Riana dressed up as a 50's girl, in my old poodle skirt, that my Mom made me. They all had a ton of fun and especially enjoyed scaring people in the haunted garage (even though they scared themselves a bit in the process.) Earlier in the month, Riana and Sariah attended friends, Autumn and Savannah's, Halloween party and dressed as "Twitches"= Twin Witches. On Saturday night, we attended the Trunk or Treat, where they received plenty of candy!, and then went to the Barn Bash, for our ward. Aurora wasn't too keen on dressing up that night but I finally convinced her to be a cheerleader (which the girls decided was for the Crushers, their soccer team. She kept saying "Go Shruckers!", while trying to say Crushers. It was cute!) Karina dressed as a fairy princess and Tierra as a fairy bride. They were excited that Brooke (one of our favorite babysitters and a dear friend), who they wanted to go Trunk or Treating with, was also a fairy! :) She was so great to take them around and just great with them. They didn't even want me but I tagged along, just in case, while Grant handed out candy. Riana and Sariah again went as Twitches and we finally let them run around with their friends, to get candy. (Autumn- the vet, Aimee- the witch, Summer- the witch, who is in 6th ward and in their dance, and Kiana- the madhatter, who isn't a member but they were so excited that she came to the Trunk or Treat and Barn Bash, along with her family. She is on their soccer team and lives close to us.) Anyway, I think they felt very grown up to be able to go themselves and I felt totally comfortable with it, since it was all done in the church parking lot, with people we know. Anyway, it was a fun night! Since Halloween fell on a Sunday, we spent the evening making pizza and having donuts and apple cider, and Grandma's homemade cinnamon rolls! :) My parents and little brother, Joe, came over and we handed candy out to the Trick-or-Treaters. We had a nice relaxing evening but the girls were excited to hear that Halloween won't be on a Sunday again until 2021! :)