Outings with Dad

Thanks to Amy for posting these photos so I can finally get around to writing about our outings. One recent Sat. I thought it would be the last nice Sat. of the fall, so we made time to go up the canyon. You can see the leaves were already down but it was nice and warm! The kids reminded me of our tradition of going to "the rock in the river."

Now David is too big to tell him that he can't get on it, too. Catherine took some really cool pictures of the river from the rock that you'll be seeing soon. At the playground by the campsite there was brand new wood chips! All the better for burying your brother and dumping on your dad's head.

On Oct. 25 the three older kids had their turn to go to a BYU football game. I picked UNLV because I thought it would be a blowout and essentially over at halftime so it wouldn't matter that we had to leave. Except it came down to the final play. But Emma and Spencer had it after the first drive. They remembered that LAST YEAR I had told them we could get hot chocolate. But in keeping with the nice warm weekends this fall, it was about 70 (I had to put sunscreen on them) so there was no one selling hot chocolate. That wasn't a good enough excuse for them, though. We left after watching the band at halftime. BYU won.


Catherine is really starting to understand the rules and likes to watch. She took this picture of us. She got to go to a game with just me earlier in the season - I'll post those photos when I get them off my phone.

Also, Spencer didn't get lost this time :)
Since I was wearing a hat, everyone decided they had to have a hat as part of their "gear," too. Even though the only one Emma could find was red

Piano Recital

The girls had first piano recital of the year. This time they were preparing for their ensemble (duet) festival. This was Emma's first recital and she played with her teacher. We were really proud of both of the girls. They did really well in their festival too.
This guy, on the other hand, was another story.

Adendum

A few more of Spencer's gems that we forgot in the last post:

Why does school teach us about the earth and letters?

How did Heavenly Father make us?

Why did Heavenly Father make 2 moons for Mars and only 1 for us?

Why is there such thing as girls underwear in this world?


And to go with this post. Another night-time discovery of Spencer. When I walked in the room I really didn't know where he was. :) Notice the pile of discarded pajamas. Also notice a Richard Scary book - they are his favorites.

Enquiring mind wants to know

Spencer has been full of questions lately. Just suddenly he'll ask some random question - half of which I have no answer for. But it's so funny to see the wheels turning in his head. So I finally started writing some of them down. Here's a few:

Why do dinosaurs always live by volcanoes? Oh, is it because they eat lava?

Why does Heavenly Father make thunder when it's raining?

How does water get clean?

How does a shoemaker make shoes?

How does Heavenly Father make vitamins in food?

Is there a vitamin that can make me run faster than Catherine?

How do you make water?

How do you make milk?

Do cows have machines in their stomachs?

Why is it called 'gray'?

Why do they have to bring the mom some food after they have a baby? (Like Jenni in the hospital.)

Why do people store food for the winter?

How old are Dads? (michael: "34") Why?

Does Jesus celebrate Christmas?

How do people make legos?

Why do ninjas (he says injas) wear masks?

How do Chinese people cut-up their food?

Do Chinese people wash their hands?

Why do they say "Happy Halloween"? Is it because they don't want to say "Mad Halloween?"



And one more recent quote: "Mom, did you know 'peeps' (our word for #1) are like ghosts because they both go through things . . . like my pants.

Halloween was fabulous

Halloween was really fun this year. I have to say that pleasant weather, makes it so much more fun. Plus, the kids are at fun ages. Poor David was pretty petrified by the scary guys -especially at the Halloween parade at the school. One helpful kid in Emma's class who was wearing a particularly gross mask came up to David's face making scary noises. That totally cemented his fear. But it also made him snuggly and I liked that part.

We went with a European motif for our Halloween costumes this year. (More by coincidence than original plan) and everyone looked cute, if I do say so myself. Emma wore her famous matador costume and looked as cute as ever. Dad was the bull she fought, but mercifully didn't kill.

Catherine wore a dirndl my parents bought in Austria about 20 years ago and went as Heidi.

Spencer's was the costume I was having the hardest time with. After a neighbor gave us this green dragon costume for David to wear, I decided Spencer should be a knight to go with the dragon. (This was the only costume I made this year.) And in honor of our trip to England this year, he is St. George - the patron saint of England - who fought the lengendary green dragon. Frankly, I didn't expect anyone but an anglofile-Humanities-major to get this one, so we just told everyone he was a knight. Spencer asked if he was "The Dark Knight." Since he's only heard his friend talking about that and really has no idea what it means, I just told him, "sure. What ever makes you want to wear your costume." :)
This was another cute costume. Catherine's teacher this year is Mrs. Merryweather. So she was Merryweather from Sleeping Beauty for Halloween. Loved it.

Our search for the Great Pumpkin

Every year, one of our favorite October traditions is to go to our authentic pumpkin patch in American Fork. A real farm that grows pumpkins. Well this year the farm decided to just go comercial and sell the pumpkins from a parking lot. Since the highlight for us is tromping through the patch and actually picking our pumpkins off the vine we drove around trying to find another patch. We found one that was part of a big halloween activity place that included a corn maze, petting zoo, bouncy castle, hayrides,etc., but since it cost $5.00 a person to get in and by the time we got there we only had about a half an hour left, we didn't want to pay $30 just to pick some pumpkins. We did get to walk past part of the petting zoo on the way in and out, so we felt like we got some of the flavor of a pumpkin patch. Then we caved and went to the parking lot.

Emma and the witch.

We did get to talk to the nice farmer, so that made it feel a little more authentic.
The cute bunny-village at the petting zoo.
Next year we're going to have to find another patch. Or finally grow some big pumpkins ourselves!

The day before we also got to have a fun outing at Thanksgiving Point with our friends the Kapps! Yea for Fall. Yea for UEA weekend.

Happy Halloween

Hope everyone is having a Happy Halloween. The kids costumes have turned out cute and I'll post them, plus our pumpkin patch pictures soon. In the mean time, I give you: Pac Man. If only I still had that bobble-antennae headband.

The need for Sunday naps

Sundays around here are kind of crazy. Mainly because we have 1:00 church. I am SOOOO excited for that to end after Christmas. In the mean time, David's Sunday nap schedule is totally messed-up. I used to be able to get him to take a morning nap before church, but no longer. So this is what happens about 5:30 when he hasn't had a nap all day. In the middle of dinner. My favorite part is how he wakes-up, eats something, then nods-off again.

After we all got such a kick out of this, Spencer decided that he would "fall asleep" during dinner too.

First day of Fun Fall Weekend #2

Last weekend was Fall Break for all of the public schools in Utah. Michael had to go on an overnight business trip so I thought the kids would like a fun outing to sleep over at Grandma's house. I always think "this time things will go easily - now that the kids are getting bigger" - but every time we do it I remember, "oh yeah, this is why we don't do this very often." :) This time David was up until 11:30 - singing and being cheerful, but up never the less!

So anyway, Thursday morning Jenni and I were trying to come up with a fun outing that wouldn't be over-run with half the kids of Utah and where we wouldn't have to stay forever to feel like we got our money's worth even if the kids got cranky (namely, my night-owl kids.) So she suggested: Wheeler Farm. Close-by and Free. Perfect.

And it was! I hadn't been to Wheeler Farm since I was a kid. It was great! Plus it was a gorgeous day and not even crowded. The perfect activity.

Our visit was enhanced by my friend Elisabeth coming with us. This was somewhat poignant as I have vivid memories of going to Elisabeth's 6-year-old birthday party at Wheeler Farm.
I couldn't get a good picture of the adorable 10-day-old baby pigs. I could totally see why Fern wanted to keep Wilbur. They were so cute! Their mom: not so much.The collection of old and new tractors were as appealing as the animals to the boys.

Feeding the ducks was a highlight.

I caught the cutest ever video clip of Spencer doing a charming duck-walk. I even thought it was YouTube-worthy. Then . . . I realized I had pushed the wrong button and it hadn't recorded. So here is me trying to get him to recreate it, with only a little-bit of success. Bear with the quickly-panning camera. It gets better.

The Fruits of our Labors (or someone else's labors.)

I can take no credit whatsover for this produce. Isn't it gorgeous?? The apples came from a tree in our backyard. A tree I have largely ignored for the 4 years we have lived here. And this year it produced gorgeous, delicious fruit. I think it's pretty just sitting in the bowl! (If only I had Martha Stewart's photographers and lighting technicians to catch the true beauty.) And for once I can have something live on my dining room table that doesn't trigger Michael's allergies.

Then: A neighbor gave us tons of grapes from their yard. They'd been eating grapes for the past 2 months and didn't want anymore. So they let us pick 4 BIG bowls full. I decided to attempt to make grape juice. Last fall I overheard a lady talking about how she makes a year's supply of grape juice every fall, and I thought, "Oh, I could never do something that domestic." Then this fall I saw my mom do it and realized how E-A-S-Y it was and I thought I might actually be capable of doing it. . .

. . . And . . . I did it! I actually made grape juice! I made 11 quarts - which doesn't seem like as much as it should considering how long I had that juicer going - but I am still proud of it. I think there would have been 12 quarts, but we drank a lot right out of the juicer. It is SOOOO good!

Before:


During:
After: Ta-dah! It really wasn't hard at all. My only recommendation - don't let the plastic tube fall on the stove burner and melt 4 inches of it while at the same time filling your kitchen with toxic smoke. Especially when the juicer belongs to your kind neighbor. Argh. I'm so stupid. Fortunately I could just cut-off the plastic part that was melted and re-attach the end valve, but now the tubing is 4 inches shorter. I did confess to my neighbor and she is an understanding soul. She had done the same thing to her mother's juicer. Phew.

This was our best vegetable harvest in the past few years. And I take great pleasure and pride in it. I finally realized that I am officially a tomato-snob. I can no longer eat grocery store tomatoes. They literally make me gag. But home-grown ones are heaven!! So for the past few summers I've tried, with not so successful results, to home-grow some. Mainly because I had nursing babies or really little ones whose audible cries were more critical than the non-audible cries of the tomato plants (who were probably crying none-the-less.) Well, this year I tried our plants in a new sunny spot, actually remembered to water them, and: VOILA! Deliciouso. The little ones are Sweet Hundreds. SO GOOD! And in other culinary experiments I tried roasting cherry tomatos for the first time. And they were GOOD! And it was so easy. Here is a great explanation.And here are our cute little white mini-pumpkins. I love white pumpkins and I love mini-pumpkins and I can't believe I grew my own hybrid!! Thank you Gregor Mendel. Amazing! This was not the original plan, but by the time I got myself down to the nursery in the spring (read June) most of the plants for the regular, larger, orange pumpkins were gone. But they had these ones so we gave them a whirl. Yea! They are very adorable. Almost as cute as my own children.

Fun Fall Weekend #1

October has been a great month so far at this house. Last weekend was packed with fun stuff. First of all, we got to have Grandma Rosie and Poppy Dave and Uncles Tim and Matthew come visit! The temperature had suddenly dropped a lot cooler, but it was a gorgeous afternoon for their visit. We got to show them our backyard, give Grandma a tour of the house (including the very messy basement), have sword fights, read books, and eat Michael's homemade pizza - with pesto and tomatoes from our garden!

Somehow in all the excitement I did not get any pictures with the girls in them. Oh well. Next time.

Saturday, Michael and I went to the BYU vs. New Mexico Game. (Back when they were still ranked in the Top 10. Sigh.) Other than freezing our bippies off, we had a great time. Michael goes to all the home games, but it's a rare thing for me to go too because of my work schedule and/or the length of baby-sitting time required.

Besides being cold, it was a beautiful fall day. And the snow held off!
Here is Austin Collie's touchdown catch in the bottom-right corner. Sorry about the people standing in the way. But at least you get the flavor. :)

And then we woke-up to this Sunday morning. Not sure I was quite ready for it, but the kids were sure excited! (Doesn't everyone need a hoola-hoop to have fun in the snow?)

Soccer Sisters

Title suggested by Catherine. And how could we be so lucky as to get pink AND purple uniforms?September was soccer month at the Smart household. This was Catherine's third year playing soccer and Emma's first! We had double-header games every Wednesday night and Saturday afternoon. Plus practices a couple of times a week. Makes for kind of a crazy month, but it was a fun family activity and we were proud of our girls! They both improved a lot from the beginning of the season. Catherine really had to step-up this year as one of the older girls on her team. She plays defender, but scored a goal! Emma made a lot of progress as well and also scored a goal!
Catherine: My mother mentioned I scored a goal and I must admit that It was scored in a very funny way. At the time I was playing center defense, I went up to the person coming at me and took the ball away then I dribbled it down the field when I got past the defense on the other team I went up to the goal to score but the golly came up and tried to take it away from me so I moved to the right ended up getting tripped and hitting the ball into the goal with my body. Weird isn't it?

Here are Spencer and David keeping themselves entertained during game 2 one night.

Watching Conference

Here is how we enjoyed a few minutes of peace during the Saturday morning session of Conference. Michael offered to let Spencer 'help' him put together the new bookshelf for the boys' room. Spencer found the styrofoam packing materials enthralling and had a great time shredding it with a screwdriver. Our floor is now covered with bits of styrofoam, but it was a small price to pay for a little peace and quiet. :)