It's that magical time of year......

 Halloween!

 

Saturday we broke out the costumes and cobwebs.

Some people like to mix and match from the costume box. Here Eli is modeling your basic Viking Fairy with a twist of Michael Jackson. 

 

Our front porch and yard have been fully cobwebbed.....

 

 

.....and creepified.

 Before Brandon went home he begged me to give him a "Witch Finger" manicure. 

He likes to look his best.

She really is awesome.

This is what Ivy wore to school today.  The fancy necklace Grandma Pam got her for her birthday and her homemade shirt that says "I'm awesome deal with it!" (it actually says I'm awfsome, we ran out of Es so she used an F and a sharpie to make it work, when she's made up her mind to be awesome, there's really no stopping her) the part of the outfit that you can't see are her basketball shorts and her brown suede flats. I find that nothing says "There's no pinning down my style" like a fancy necklace and some basketball shorts. She would also like you to know that she can keep her eyes crossed like that longer than anyone else in her class.

Homecoming

This past weekend Mt. View celebrated their homecoming.  Wesley usually avoids events like these due to things like dresscodes, lame music, and "girls who used to stalk him" (don't ask me. The story goes, there was this one girl and blah, blah, blah. I'm sure stalking is all in your perception), anyway, somehow his "friend" Katlyn convinced him that it would be fun and not at all like Sixteen Candles.

Here's Wesley asking me if I plan to take "thousands" of pictures, as I take the FIRST picture. He is truly delightful. It's no wonder girls stalk him.

Putting on the corsage.....

...posing for picture #85....

You are NEVER going to believe this, but Jase is old enough to go on dates!!! How did this happen? It seems like only yesterday Wesley and Jase were just a couple of little chubby cheeked little boys. Now they are big boys with chubby cheeks.

Aren't they so cute? (Jase's date totally thought I was some kind of crazy lady for making her come into my house so I could take picutres of her. I didn't tell her I was going to post them on the internet, maybe I should have had her sign a waiver)

Turns out the dance was LAME. The music was all "poppy" and there were a bunch of weird kids. They did play some Journey though, so that was cool. (Sounds like every dance I ever went to.)

Occasionally we have weather

Last week it rained. Like real rain, not just little sprinkles.

We're not really used to that.

Eli was so excited that he ran out (in his pajamas.....at 4:30 in the afternoon....don't ask) and did a little dance.

Look how happy he is.

Then, as quickly as it came, the storm was over.

I feel like I should tell you, in case you've noticed and felt ignored, I've given up on the birthday blog posts. I just can't keep up. I know that's lame. I forgot a few, then a few more and I've just decided I'm lame and I can live with it. Hopefully you can too. We still love all of you and still hope you have happy happy birthdays. Sorry/Happy Birthday/Merry Christmas to all!

Edge made it to Columbia. Alive. Read about it HERE.

His first area is this horrible coastal town called Santa Marta (look it up, you'll feel soo sorry for him. I'm considering a Columbian mission myself right about now)

Back to school

School started on the 11th, as you can see everyone was SUPER excited about it.

Ivy is in the 5th grade this year and has the best teacher EVER!

Eli is in the 6th grade, it's his last year of elementary school. Where does the time go? His teacher is young and cool and doesn't give homework on Fridays. What more could you ask for?

Nate is a sophomore, his first year at Mt. View.

As you can see he was very nervous.

Sweet little Wesley will be graduating this year. Honestly, I don't know if my heart can stand anymore growing up and moving on.  Does anyone know how to prevent that?

Speaking of moving on.....Edge is still doing great.

Read all about it HERE

Unfortunately, it's all true.

Last night I finally uploaded all of the pictures that we've taken this summer, and frankly, I was a little frightened at the sampling of what we've been up to.

Eli turned 12. Had cake. Got his picture taken. It rocked.

Nate acquired fire.

These next two of Annie and Emma make me sad for a couple of reasons~

First, those bubble gum eyes on Dora kind of give me the creeps.

Second, if you click on either one of these pictures you'll see how sweaty these poor girls were from being outside for the 2 minutes it took to go to the ice cream truck. It is sooo stinking HOT here.

Wesley's friend Jorian came from Nevada to visit for a few days.

Aren't they cute?

One day, I was "The Meanest Mom EVER" and declared a No TV Day.

It was so stupid.

Finally after hours and hours of whining Eli and Nate decided I was serious, so they built this~

I thought it was so fabulous that I declared a No TV WEEK!!

Just kidding! I'm not really the meanest mom ever.

(plus that one day just about killed me!)

I have no idea what is going on in this picture, but I'm really glad school is starting soon so Nate can get some fresh air.

Did I mention that we got a kitten? Did we ever?! This is only 1 of the 30 pictures (nearly all of them taken at interesting angles like this one) that were on the camera (thanks Ivy!).

We are all missing Edge TONS. He's doing great and still claims that the MTC is awesome.

You can read all about it HERE.