Trunk-or-Treat

This year’s Trunk-or-Treat we did a Princess Castle to go along with our Royal Family.  Nathan loves to hand out candy so he spent most of his time doing that while I took the girls around to get candy.  Maejae got tired of trick-or-treating so she played in the castle while Natalie and I finished up.  It was a lot of fun, and Natalie got too much candy!

As you can see, Natalie even got candy from her Daddy!  And, Maejae is eating hers in the castle!

I just think this is a cute Picture of Natalie.  She decorated a sugar cookie, and was so proud of it!

 

      

These are some of the games at the trunk-or-treat, and our friends handing out candy.

Sewing, Sewing, Sewing . . .

This year, I decided we’d do another family theme for Halloween.  I know that it won’t be long before my girls have their own opinions about what they want to dress up as, so this year is probably our last year of family themed Halloween.  Natalie chose our theme because she really wanted to be Cinderella, and dress up like her Cinderella Princess doll. 

I had planned on making all of our costumes, but my mom found a Tinkerbell costume for $1 at a garage sale for Maejae, and I found a Cinderella costume at Big Lots for $10 for Natalie.  Those were cheaper than it would have been for me to make their costumes, so we went with it.
 
Along with that, came mine and Nathan’s costumes.  Natalie decided that I would be Snow White (something I have wanted to be since I became a mother 3 years ago - because Snow White is my favorite Disney Movie), and Nathan was going to be Cinderella’s Prince Charming.  Now – adult costumes are EXPENSIVE!  So, I decided to make ours.

I took a trip to Goodwill and JoAnn’s.  This is what I came up with:

This is a old yellow graduation gown I got for $2.50, and a blue sequined shirt I got for $1.50.  I got both of these at Goodwill.  Then, I bought a scrap of red sequined fabric for $1.25 and some blue scraps for $1.00.  I had great ideas for these pieces, and at only $6.25, I knew it would eventually become the perfect Snow White costume. 

 

This is Nathan’s costume.  We had an old white church shirt that was a tad too small for Nathan’s neck, and had a stain on the pocket.  We used a pair of his slacks for the pants and I made removable side strips for them.  Then, I bought the blue fabric for $5.00 and the gold trimmings for $4.50.  So, all in all – Nathan’s costume would cost $9.50 . . . not too shabby for Prince Charming!

The results . . . Amazing!

Halloween Craft Night

Every now and then, some of my friends and I like to get together for Craft nights. 

This month, I hosted the craft night, and we did Halloween Crafts!

 

This is the wreath that I chose to teach the girls how to make.

  

These are some of the other crafts we did.  I didn’t get pictures of 3 of the crafts, but we had a lot of fun, and we each made 6 different projects!  Our houses were much more decorated, too!

Arizona finally had a good storm!

A couple weeks ago, we finally had a good storm.  Our house was nice and peaceful, with the girls napping, Nathan on the computer, and myself sewing.  All the sudden we heard thunder, and then pounding on our house.  Nathan and I ran up to the girls, who were awakened by the large hail hitting their bedroom windows.  Then, we all watched the hail storm as it passed through our neighborhood.  A lot of ward members got their windows broken so we were very lucky to have survived the storm with no problems!  All of our porch items got blown to one side, but it wasn’t bad at all.  All in all it was a fun storm to watch and Nathan had fun playing in the hail!

Time our for Women

I went to Time Out for Women this year with some of my girlfriends here in Arizona.  We had a wonderful time, shared a few good laughs, shed a few tears, and learned a lot about gratitude, holiness, and love.  It has already changed my life in the 2 weeks following the event, and I know that I will continue to reflect on the wonderful words that were spoken, and the testimonies that were shared. 

Pam, Jenn, Jillian, Carissa

* For a recap on the event we were blessed to take part of, check out this or this.  It was Amazing!

Grandma Larson’s 90th Birthday

Right as we were about to leave my sister’s house and head back to AZ, we got an e-mail letting us know that Grandma Larson’s birthday party was going to be held in Utah over conference weekend.  So, I prepared myself for a long car-ride home, a 3 day rest at home, and another car-ride back to Utah with Nathan.  But, the girls actually did AMAZING and we had a great time in Utah with the Larson clan.

This is Nathan’s Grandma Larson.  She is 90 years old, and still very sharp of mind and fun to be around.

 

This Grandma (Nathan’s Mom) was so happy to be surrounded by some of her out-of-Idaho grandkids. She had 6 out-of-Idaho grandkids, and 1 in-Idaho grandkid to cuddle, spoil, and spend time with!

And, here are 2 of my cutie-pies!  Can you tell she’s a Daddy’s Girl!

  

This was the beginning of the party.  We were anticipating about 30 people to come, but we ended up extending the room and had over 60 people there to celebrate Grandma Larson’s 90th Birthday.  Happy Birthday Grandma!!

A week with my Sister in Utah

The girls and I took a trip to Utah with our friend, Ashley (who happened to have a photo shoot there).  It was so fun to stay and play with my little sister for an entire week.  I miss her!

We spent time playing at the house, driving the gator and playing catch with Sumo (their Boxer Dog).

 

We went to the new park!  It had a splash pad, and park.  Natalie and Gavin had a lot of fun playing in the water with Uncle Russ.  But, Maejae was more content bear crawling around the perimeter of the water area!  She’s a girly-girl sometimes.

 

We spent time tackling and cuddling with the dog, each other, and our siblings.

 

We had a family day, with my Sister and her husband (my bro-in-law), their baby boy, my girls,  one of my sister-in-laws from Nathan’s side, and my other little nephew.  We saw a ton of animals, but this was by far the biggest Tiger any of us had ever seen!  It was HUGE.

This picture does NOT do it justice!

   

We took the kids swimming!  All 3 kids jumped in the pool (well, Natalie jumped – the babies sat on the edge of the Pool and scooted themselves forward until they fell into the pool).  And then, Natalie decided to ambush Aunt Shelly!!  I think Shell-Bell secretly liked it!

New Project

A little while ago, we started a new project at our house.  It is mostly done, but not quite.  We took a trip to Utah and the project was put on hold.  It will be finished this week (I hope).  The painting is done, but the wall treatments are not.  I will post more pics when it is completed!

 

Natalie helped paint, and Maejae threw toys in the tub!

I love working on projects with my girls – even if it does take longer to finish them!

Mining Town

On our small tour of Arizona, Nathan and Scott found an old mining town.  We decided to stop and look on our way home from the Dolly Steam Boat, and I’m quite certain I will be returning again when it is NOT so hot out.  It was over 100 degrees that day, and I was not in the mood to tour an old mining town.  But, it was so fascinating, and I can’t wait to go back an enjoy it more.

 

These were the tracks leading to the main mine, and some of the carts that were used.  There is also an outhouse, as you can clearly see!  I did NOT attempt to use it, but it was pretty cool looking.

     

This picture shows the room that actually made me feel a little creepy.  The bed was so old, and obviously broken down.  On the other side was a small shelf.  But, peering through the door, you could feel the COLD draft coming from that tunnel.  And I’m pretty sure that tunnel turned pitch black when you rounded the corner.  Obviously not something I would like to do, but mining is actually a pretty cool, risky, and amazing business!  And, after watching the rescue of the Chilean miners, and crying with everyone of them that I watched get rescued, I have a greater appreciation for mining.

 

The old tools were so interesting, and a lot of fun to look at.

We almost stepped on this tarantula.  I didn’t know they were just out in the wild like that!  It was a pretty good sized one, but not the biggest I’ve ever seen.  After showing every one, and standing around it for about 30 seconds, we realized it wasn’t moving at all.  Turns out the dumb thing was dried out and dead!  But, it would have been cool to say I saw one chilling on the rocks in Arizona – cause I actually like reptiles!

 

And this was one of Nathan’s favorites – the house that looks like the one on the movie “Psycho.”  I have never seen the movie, but I am told it is a very old scary movie, and actually took place in Arizona.  So, whether or not it is the house in the movie is beyond me, but it was still kind of cool (and it had a creepy looking girl pointing out the top window).