Friday, October 29, 2010

Utah 2010.... Follow and drop it....

Leah, Ethan, & I just got back from a 4 day, 5 night stay in beautiful Provo Utah at the luxurious Gibbs Bed & breakfast...

Our first day out there, we just happened to know a BYU professor who scored us tickets to the game versus Wyoming. It was actually Leah & Ethan's first college football game. Leah loved the cheerleaders, Ethan loved the band, and we did our best to learn the fight song.... rah rah.rah..... GO Cougars.... It was VERY cold so we bundled together and got some Hot Chocolate from the vendors in the stand. (I thought it was VERY funny to hear them hollering ... "get your Hot Coco here or Red Vines.. get your red vines... instead of " Get your Ice Cold Bud Light") Sunday we of course joined them at church where it just happened to be the children's turn to speak & sing. Abbey got to stand up and say "she could set the WHOLE table by herself" and Leah loved the singing and we heard her singing later in the day "follow and drop it... follow and drop it" (it's suppose to be "Follow the Prophet"... but what can I say her Daddy's a fire fighter and stop drop and roll is ingrained in her head) we got a good chuckle out of that. I also love seeing the kids all dressed up! On Monday we found ourselves at Kangaroo Zoo.... if you visit Utah, you have to check this place out! It's a Warehouse full of bounce houses and slides and decorated with ALL IKEA stuff! It was so fun! As you can imagine the kids worked up quite a sweat playing and bouncing so we threw them all in the tub together. I thought a bubble bath would be so fun, and then they found the button that turns on the whirlpool bath.... notice in the first picture how low the water & bubbles are.... well it didn't take long for there to be TONS of bubbles... up to their ears....they had so much fun! Even if that meant there was water & bubbles all over the bathroom! You can see Ethan showing off his bubble muscles! One Tuesday we celebrated Abbey's 5th birthday (Leah & I have been at Abbey's birthday party EVERY year! The theme was based on Abbey's favorite book "The Berenstain bears Old Hat/New Hat. First Danielle read the book, then they made NEW hats. The kids even had a chance to pin the flower on the hat. (is that cute or what?) It was a great party and we got to meet a bunch of Abbey's new friends! Can't believe Abbey & Leah are both 5 years old!!! I also had made the all 5 kids matching pajamas, here they are fresh out of the bathtub ready for bed on our last night! I love these kids SOOOOOO much! And this is of the newest members of the Gibbs family, Little Mariann. She was sick when we first got there so she slept alot the first few days. This was the first day she was feeling better and I get to see more of her little personality. She's a sweetheart, but a bit of a Momma's girl! She is going through the "I only want my Mom" stage. but as long as Mommy wasn't in sight she was quite happy with me!

We had the BEST time and are so thankful that we were able to come visit them! The kids played together non-stop and it was like it had been only days not months or actually more than a year since they'd been together last. We had some great talks after the kids went to bed and I'm relieved that when we all die we'll still get to sit together in the cafeteria (Ben's analogy for the Celestial kingdom)

I still wish they lived down the street, but.... I'm so glad that they are finally enjoying living in Utah and making friends! I was trying to put my friendship to Danielle into words, and ended up borrowing a line from the TV show Grey's anatomy If you watch the show you know about Christina & Meridith's friendship and in a recent episode one said to the other .... "Yes we have husbands that we love, but you and me, we're soul mates"

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

How is it the middle of October already?

I seriously can't believe it's October 19th already, this month is flying by! We've been busy with camping trips, visits from My Dad & Connie, a trip to Circle S to get pumpkins, and..... we leave Friday for our trip to visit the Gibbs! I guess that's partly why I'm surprised this month has gone by so fast, usually when your waiting for something your excited about it seems like forever while your waiting.


Up first our camping trip.

We somehow convinced My Mom and her husband, My sister and her husband to join the kids and I on a camping trip in Old Man's cave in Hocking Hills. This area of Ohio is absolutely BEAUTIFUL! when we went this past summer i thought that it would be twice as gorgeous in the fall with all the leaves turning colors. We were a bit early for the best fall foliage, and it didn't help that it rained ALL night long. It was cold and the grownups were kinda grouchy and just wanted to get warm and out of the rain so it wasn't exactly the camping trip I had hoped for, but the kids had a great time. Up next my Dad and his wife Connie and her daughter Hannah made a quick trip from Illinois. They have had a CRAZY busy fall so we were so glad they could squeeze in a quick trip. We took them to the Italian festival Saturday night. We were able to grab this quick group shot before they leftAnd my Dad loves profile shots, but I laughed when i saw this because we all look like..... well to steal a line from the movie up.....

SQUIRREL!!!! And I love this picture of my Dad with the kids! I wish we lived closer and he could swing by on his way home from somewhere and pop in a read the kids a book or help Alex with his homework. I miss him the most right after we get to see them. I just love my Dad! And then as is our fall family tradition, we took the kids to Circle S Farms to pick out the perfect pumpkins and eat the best donuts in the whole world!!! The kids get to go down slides into huge piles of straw, wander through bales of hay made into a maze go on a hay ride out to the field to pick their own pumpkins and then finish it off with the best pumpkin donuts. This is one of my favorite traditions! It amazing for me to see the pictures from just 2 years ago when Ethan was just a little baby! I asked Theo if he thought we'll be able to drag them to
Circle S farm in 10 years... he says no... but.... I hope we can!