Cute Kids!

It is time to get some updated kid pictures.  I have honestly been trying since the summer.  Those didn't turn out well enough so we tried again.  This time we headed out on a Sunday after church to the local nature park.  It was a nice day and we got some good shots.  :)

Here is Grant!  He is so easy to photograph!

Handsome Clark!

Cute Lorna Bug

Sweet Punkin

Beautiful Chica!

Our Teen Talmage!

The three boys!

The three girls!

Our 7 beautiful Kids!  

We just love our cuties!
I sent off to get the kids individual photos printed so I can hang them on the wall.  Well, let's just say that after printing they just don't look right.  I went and got our money back, but that means that I am still working on new kid photos!  More to come!!

Our First Teenager!

Talmage has been so excited about his upcoming birthday!  He has been planning what he wanted to make for dinner and what cake he was going to help make.  I love that he enjoys being involved in the whole day.  It makes my job less stressful and shows that he likes make it a special day all on his own.  Well, the plan was that the cousins would come over and that they would help him make a cook to order dinner for everyone. 

That sounded awesome, until we got word that we would be having a special meeting where our ward, and 2 others, would be realigned that evening.  Having church that doesn't get out til 4 makes doing a dinner a little tricky anyway, but now we had to be at a meeting by 7?!  We talked to Talmage about the options and we decided to move his birthday celebration to Saturday so that we had more time to enjoy with family! 

It really worked out perfectly!  That was also the night we had planned to go to the Haunted Forest ... even more birthday fun :). 

Here are some of the photos of the evening.    

Talmage cooking the pancakes.

Grant was in charge of the sausage.

What the orders looked like when they were all ready :)

Lorna and Clark enjoying their meal!

Talmage lighting his candles... with a zombie Bree behind him :).  I also had zombie makeup on!

Make a wish!

Talmage's present from Nathan and Tiffany!

On the 18th we celebrated Talmage's birthday with presents!

 The kids had fun making presents for him :)

Lorna donated from her collection of "goodies"

 Books!

Couldn't believe he got plants!

Yay!!

Seeing what types of plants they are... broccoli, onions, strawberries, and lettuce!

 And a watch!  

Talmage with his present haul!

His present list was organized into 3 categories ... most desired, would like, and would be nice to have.  In the top category was things like: seeds and a watering can.  In the second category was the watch.  The last category (would be nice) was stuff like a phone.  Talmage sure isn't your typical teenager that is for sure!  Now you know why he got plants and a watering can ;).  Let's just say that the stores weren't stocked with seeds in mid October ;). 


Talmage is a great kid and a fabulous oldest child!  He is responsible and really loves trying to figure out new things.  He does well in school and loves so many subjects!  He is so creative and thinks of new stuff and even how to accomplish what he dreams up.  He is working on a book and I love seeing him work with others as he pulls his book series together! 
We love you and are so proud of the teenager you are!  Stay sweet! 
Happy Birthday Talmage!

The Haunted!

We enjoyed our third annual trip to the Haunted Forest!  It was early enough before Halloween that there weren't long lines.  We also got there right as the sun had gone down so that also helped with traffic!  We borrowed a trailer from a friend in the ward and hauled everyone around the campsites in that.  Tiffany brought some mattresses to sit on so it was even comfortable!  We had a great time as usual and maybe one of these years we will actually rent the camp site to do the scaring for ourselves!  

Before we left the cousins got their costumes on... since all of ours weren't ready I didn't bother.  Tiffany did share some of her face makeup though... so Sandra got to be a zombie!  At the end of the night she decided that she didn't like being a zombie... and she didn't like makeup!  Sounds like a plan to me ;)

Here are just a few shots before we left.  It's always too hard to get good photos while we are driving.

Sandra - zombie girl!

The kids... all ready to go

Oh, and while Tiffany had the face paint out I had her turn me into a zombie too!  It was fun being zombie mommy for the night.  Lorna wasn't thrilled about my face though.  I did think she would make a tasty snack ;)

Zombie Mommy!

Happy Haunting!

The Texas State Fair!

We went to the Fair!!!  This is the first year we have gone.  Back in May someone posted something about how to get free tickets to the fair if you are a homeschooler.  That sounded fabulous to me and so I did it.  It may have been early, but it was awesome to get my free fair tickets in the mail!  It was a great day and even better to get to spend it with the cousins!

I made Tiffany pose with the awesome Tiki man!

There was a lady there showing off fossils and such from the Perot Museum

The kids really enjoyed listening to her.  They asked her lots of questions and knew lots of answers!  After a little while she asked if they were homeschooled.  We said yes, and she told us that she could tell.  She mentioned that homeschool kids tend to have a better attention span and ask better questions.  Kind of cool to hear from someone who is around kids a lot ;)

While at the Fair we saw this awesome can exhibit.  Their were lots of exhibits where it was built out of canned goods.  Seriously I was so impressed!

Here is a huge storm trooper robot.  It even had laser lights that light up and "fired" if you stood in front of it. 

The kids in front of a cool hot air balloon display.

Everyone had to have a turn sitting on the awesome tractors!
Grant

Mhari

Sandra

Lorna

The kids got to do a spin art craft.  Here they are listening to how it works.  They got to pick three colors to have dropped as their paper spun.  It made for fun art!  I love that Talmage is giving Lorna a piggyback ride ;)

Our cousins had to head home before us :(. 
We decided to stay for another hour or so and check out more of the fair.

We found Big Tex!
Clark, Mhari, Sandra, Grant, and Talmage

We also found the car show!  We were sad that Daddy couldn't join us and play in all of the awesome Ford vehicles.  We had a great time with all of the awesome cars and trucks!

Mhari

The kids all fell in love with the Ford Transit Van.  It is so large and spacious.  I love the seating!

More awesome trucks

and cars!

The kids weren't too patient waiting to sit in the convertible.  They decided that they could just sit in the empty seats with this gentleman ;).

Before we could leave the kids had to sit in the van again.  Seriously there was some van love going on!
Check out Lorna hugging her seat!

Clark had to get in on the action... HUGS!
We loved the transit van!

It was a fabulous day to go on a field trip and see some awesome stuff at the Texas State Fair!  I think next year we will try to stay the whole day and see as much as we can.  I know we missed a lot of stuff, but we had a great time!  Yay for getting to go to the fair!