First Snow

What is this? Our first big storm was a good one, snowing for 3 days and sticking around for a good week. I don't know how much Rachel remembers of snow from last year, this was the first time to go walking in snowsuit though. I had to think hard about where snow gear might be for after checking pictures on Miriam to see if we had little boots and such.

My little snow bunny was soo cute! The kids all had a good time playing in the snow. Miriam wanted to make a snowman, but didn't seem to know how to by herself. No big people were up to going out with her so she didn't get one this time. Rachel was pretty game to play, but not for too long.

What do I do know, I think was Rachel's question when put into the snow. I think this was biggest storm in her life. One late afternoon Miriam wanted to go play and Aaron was asleep so she made do with Rachel. When Rachel had enough Miriam hadn't and was soo sad not to have anyone to play with. She is definitely not content by herself like the other two are.

Miriam and Aaron were so excited to get into their snow clothes and go exploring. They wante me to get their "boat" ie sled and pulled it around. Daddy took Miriam sledding over to the school where there was a small hill; Aaron was either asleep or in trouble. The biggest problem was a lack of gloves. Aaron also needs all new gear having grown out of his though Miriam should last another year.

I'm done!

Fall Fun

This year we actually raked leaves and put them on some of our plants as mulch. Miriam was a great raker and they had a blast playing in the leaves. I realized they never have done much with leaves before so this was a new experience.

We had to take turns with the rake, but Aaron found his own way of helping. We started in jackets and before long had taken them off. November 3 was a beautiful weekend that we used to tidy up the yard and finish off the garden.

Hard work that even Rachel was getting into. Miriam, my beautiful girl in the leaves.

So we had to take a break. Miriam and Daddy tried out the new bike her cousins gave to her.

I wasn't as excited when they brought the leaves inside and coated the sitting room floor on November 9! When I asked why they decided to coat my floor, Miriam told me she wanted some pretty leaves to decorate for Thanksgiving. This seems to be getting more common, Miriam pitching and helping, Aaron dragging his feet, and Rachel being happy and proud to help. The girls did a great job cleaning up.

Garden Wrapup

I'm probably not the best one to do this blog since I feel disconnected from our garden this year due to being pregnant. Eric did a great job as always and I believe we had a good harvest.

Here is Eric in April planting a new almond tree because the first died. We added several things to the garden this year including extensive herb/flower beds, got our blueberries planted; and tried corn, watermelon, cantaloupe, and potatoes. The corn didn't turn out to well and the watermelon never never got super sweet. We had some trouble figuring out when some things were ripe for picking, sometimes waiting too long and not being very good (which was the main issue for the corn).

We were thrilled to get peaches and bumper crops of raspberries and blackberries for the first year of producing fruit (blackberries were particularly hard to tell if ripe- any tips?). We were especially excited to have some great grapes. I loved seeing the blossoms and leaves change through the seasons. There was something fulfilling seeing our whole yard green up this spring.

Here is Eric putting down the black plastic for the tomatoes and peppers in May. Another addition this year is Eric designed a drip system for the garden. We had a few problems that made us wonder if we were watering enough, boy is it getting more complicated getting everything watered and picked in good time. I decided the kids would be in charge of picking berries and maybe we could keep up. Eric also got top notch super big sturdy tomato cages which worked great so we didn't have to wade through a sea of vines.

The two cantaloupe plants sent out bumper crops; we had cantaloupe (Aaron holding a specimen) nearly everyday and the chickens got plenty of over-ripe ones also. Miriam is holding the best cucumber we got- they grew, but not many and not well.

The kids did enjoy helping pick things. Here they are Oct 6 digging up all the potatoes. You can also see the tomato cages. We got 3 nice size pretty good pumpkins also that can see on the left. We thought we were doing red potatoes, but the interior of the potatoes seems white, despite the red skins.  We also got quite a few volunteer tomatoes.

We also got a baby, momma, and papa watermelon. Here are the kids on Oct 6 with the papa watermelon. It weighed in around 45 lbs!

 Rachel upper left after eating all the strawberries on September 8. We have been surprised how long the berries have kept producing. I feel bad I didn't get more/better pictures of the garden and the new flower/herb beds. The purple flowers are larkspur which I really like how they turned out. The orange ones are gladiolas, also a pleasant surprise (Eric picked most varieties). We are not real sure on the rest of the specimens, if you know what they are let us know. In the white flowers you can see some chamomile flowers. Some things didn't come up at all, and we didn't do a very good job harvesting so the experiment goes on into next year. Maybe soon with seeing we will remember the difference between perennial and annuals!

Welcome Benjamin!

Benjamin was born on Thanksgiving at  5:56 pm after my water broke the morning before. He was in a hurry to get here I guess. He was 6 lbs 12 oz (we think there was a scale discrepancy) and 20 in by far my smallest baby! I'm still not really sure what to do with such a little baby.

His siblings were so excited to come see him a couple of hours later. They all wanted to hold him and Aaron was so upset he couldn't take his baby home. Now a family of six, I can't believe it! I guess I now have "two sets of twins". ;) Though Miriam told me she needs another sister so she will be even (not the thing to say right after delivering a baby!). They are all set to be big helpers, which is good because mommy will definitely need them!

Happy Halloween!

Once we got through the pumpkin patch the next thing was constantly asking about was carving the pumpkins and she wasn't much convinced that we had wait so as not to have moldy caved in jack-o-lanterns for Halloween. Follow the night arrived, we asked Uncle Ryan to help. He came over with his curly fry cutter and we had french fries, hamburgers and hot dogs for dinner.

Here we are on October 23 digging into the pumpkins. Miriam chose Uncle Ryan to help her, Aaron chose me and so Eric helped Rachel. The kids still didn't really want to help "gut" the pumpkins though they dictated what kind of face to put on it. Eric did feel a little gypped as Rachel didn't participate at all. We saved some seeds to plant and Eric tried baking some others. Our garden pumpkins were easy to clean out- not much stringy stuff, but the pumpkin patch ones were really slimy.

Uncle Ryan and Miriam with their finished pumpkin. We are glad Uncle Ryan moved back to Utah!

Mommy and Aaron's pumpkin, complete with star eyes.

Next on the list was to go trick-or-treating. They wanted to go earlier in the month but I said nobody was ready for them. I did allow them to put on costumes and trick-or-treat up our hallway. They went to about every door in our house and knocked on it for me to give them a little piece of candy. 

Jones Pumpkin patch. We all wore our pumpkin shirts on Halloween.

We started the evening with our annual tradition of pizza and apple juice. While we ate our yummy pizza we watched Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin. We were also excited to have my mom spend the evening with us. The kids loved handing out the candy to our trick-or-treaters. Though it didn't seem like we got as many this year even though the weather was fabulous- warmest Halloween on record, I believe.

 After dinner it was time to suit up to go trick-or-treating. Someone gave us the skeleton costume and I was always going to get rid of it but never quite could bring myself to. A month or more ago Aaron found it and became entranced and there was no turning back for him. We don't have a lot of costumes so it was Rachel's turn to be a snow tiger. First Grandma Delta had to sew the tail back on because the other two had managed to pull it off. Those two were easy picking costumes for, Miriam on the other hand kept changing her mind. At different times she wanted to be a ballerina or a fairy, but after we found "glass slippers" at the store I insisted she be Cinderella. She gets kind of funny with her clothes and if they are scratchy (seams) or tight so she balked a little because it was scratchy. Then at the last minute we almost couldn't find her new shoes (may I just say I hate hunting for shoes practically everyday!!).

The kids had a great time handing out candy (pictures on the right). They were excited to have Grandma come treat-or-treating with them. We went around the block, mostly only on one side then the older ones went farther with Daddy. The only probably is I got side tracked talking to someone so we missed several people waiting too long. Unfortunately, they got too much candy- they really got into it even Rachel for her first time. The look on Rachel's face the first couple times was one of bewilderment, whats going on, but then she decided it was really a good deal.



Ahh the loot at the end of the night. I showed them my holiday candy tradition of dumping everything out and putting all the like candy together.

Pumpkin Patch

Miriam was over the top excited for Halloween this year. Sunday before October I brought up the decorations and our Halloween clothes and she was so hyper bouncing across the house as we started decorating. Unfortunately, Aaron was asleep so we had to wait for the rest the next day to do with him. Then Mon October first they all had to wear Halloween clothes.

Here they are on October 1 with Rachel being a bridge between the other 2 as she was wearing the same pants as Miriam and same shirt as Aaron. Then wearing some Halloween pjs that night. The next thing Miriam started talking about constantly was going to the pumpkin patch. Though as time went on I realized she was combining memories of the the red barn hayride and Hee Haw farms. She was disappointed not to go to the farm, but everyone enjoyed the Red Barn. Miriam kept asking and asking when it would be time to go and when it was hard to schedule with all the cousins she was getting a little frustrated. She kept asking me to call Grandma and see when we were going.

Here is the gang on October 16 with all the cousins except 2. Lucky for me the older cousins took charge of a younger cousin and made it a lot more easy on me. It was a pretty nice day though it the sky started spitting on us and a great wind came up as we headed back home. They have increased attractions each year so I felt we barely had enough time to do everything.

The first year we went all they had were these picture boards, then hey added a tractor, a maze and this year a big slide and sand box. I didn't get a picture of slide because Miriam went down while I was still in the maze and Aaron went down when we were supposed to be leaving.

Of course the main thing is the pumpkin patch and finding the right pumpkin to take home. Grandma has the rule that you have to be able to carry the pumpkin you pick by yourself. We found some good ones even though we had 3 nice ones in our garden. I love our jack-o-lantern shirts, perhaps instead of just bringing home 3 pumpkins I brought home "6 pumpkins"!

On the way back; where we then went out to eat at the Family Tree. Thanks Grandma for a great afternoon!

Trafalga

Since Eric's company became independent of BYU they have solidified company parties to a fall family one and a Christmas couple one. Generally they do something different every year and its pretty nice. This year as well as last year was at the Lehi Trafalga Fun Center. Last year I firmly decided my family was too small to really enjoy it much.

Last year the party was in September (might have to get back with date as all pics were taken with my moms camera and her date function wasn't working) the same day as my mom's Uncle's funeral. Jennifer watched Miriam and Aaron while mom, Rachel and I (which was why I'm in a dress) went to the funeral then afterward all of us including Eric met at the fun center. We checked in then went to ride the outside rides while it was still light. Aaron was devastated to find he wasn't tall enough to ride anything. Miriam went on the boat ride with me where she enjoyed till some other kids out there sprayed us with water then she was done. She also got to ride an airplane and the race car with daddy. I didn't see the race car because at that point Aaron and I went in to spare his feelings of not getting to ride it too.

Thank goodness for the carousel that we all got to ride on! Rachel even got her first ride! I was highly disappointed that they had dismantled the carousel this year, I couldn't tell if it was permanent or just moving it to a different place. We headed in where each of us had a card to use in the arcade games, I was strongly reminded that I'm not into arcade games in the slightest.

Also provided by the company was pizza and drinks at their food court. We took a break and ate. They had the tube area for toddlers, but Aaron got scared up top- we didn't even go there this year. They tried bowling for the first time on their mini alley, enjoyed rolling balls even if they didn't knock down a lot of pins! One of the favorite arcades was a hunting one, they enjoyed shooting the guns even though they needed a lot of help. Thank goodness for Aunt Jennifer and mom holding baby Rachel so I could interact with the other two. The biggest moment of excitement was when Aaron crawled into the stuffed animal claw game to get a toy. One of the workers opened it up, got him out and gave him a Curious George for the trouble. Finally the agony of choosing what prizes we wanted to redeem (I would have said none because its all junk!).

Fast forward and lo and behold we find ourselves back at Trafalga for the company fall party (first time they have done the same thing twice in a row), though this year it was on October 18. That meant by the time we got there it was already getting dark not leaving much time to ride the rides. Aaron was thrilled to ride them this year and it was Rachel and I that were left out (something about being pregnant). First the three of them went on the boat ride and lucky for them they had it all to themselves (no spraying). Miriam got a chance to drive it and enjoyed it a lot. Then Miriam and Aaron became Ace pilots and rode the airplanes. Finally they each took a turn with Daddy on the race cars which I think was Aaron's favorite. As mentioned the carousel wasn't put together which I felt bad on Rachel's behalf. We moved inside where Eric and Miriam went and did laser tag, Miriam thought it was the best thing ever. Eric said she did well enough particularly because being much shorter than other players she didn't get hit much ;).

Aaron and I attempted to bowl while we waited for them but I couldn't get the cards to work so we ended up going to find dinner. This year we also got to have some dippin dots that I had always wanted to try (pretty good). Then we set out to use all our cards up to get the prizes. We did get in a game of bowling (Eric is much trickier than I) and the kids did pretty good. Miriam even got some strikes though Aaron's balls would barely make it to the end. They did get awfully excited with some dancing around.

Rachel decided to get on the action here on the racing car otherwise she and I mostly did the games where you hit a button and that's it. Have I mentioned I don't really like arcades? We were some of the last to leave after choosing the prizes and getting everyone into pj's for the ride home. Wonder what well do next year?

Update on Payson temple

At our stake conference one of the speakers brought up the Payson temple. He said he hadn't heard much about it for awhile, announced on January 25, 2010; the groundbreaking was October 8, 2011, and wondered what was happening. He encouraged us to go see it, prepare our families and make it apart of our families even though it wasn't completed. We decided to go check it out for ourselves in between Sun sessions of general conference.

We drove down, and of course Rachel fell asleep on the way, and walked along the length of it talking to the kids about it. There wasn't much to see as you can tell and what there was you could hardly see because of the tall green fence surrounding it. Even so the kids seemed to enjoy the outing.

Here is where they were at the beginning of October, not much there. Basically the first floor walls are complete. We'll plan on another excursion when it is farther along.

Halloween 2011

Making cookies is always a well loved holiday tradition, and I have been gathering up lots of holiday cookie cutters. We tend to have the kids help me mix up the dough and then Daddy help cut and cook them, I get a little impatient with their inexperience plus I really don't like rolling dough out. we made cookies on the 2rd, yum yum! I love how well and studiously Aaron is rolling out that little bit of dough.

Of course you have to carve your jack-o-lantern. We did the honors on October 26. Most of our pumpkins we grew in the garden were very small so these are from the pumpkin patch. Miriam and Aaron with their finished products.

I helped Miriam with her pumpkin and she drew what she wanted on it (how is it moms aren't hardly ever in pictures?). Eric and Aaron were much more technical, first drawing it out on paper so Aaron could see his choice and then carving it. The process seems to have worked as he looks quite pleased with the end result.

Rachel's first Halloween. Grandma  Delta bought this cute outfit with striped pants and figures on the shirt. She is quite proficient on rolling over at this point. I loved the range of emotions over all the pictures. The one of me and her is on Halloween. I can't believe I didn't take more pictures of every one's cute clothes. Grandma also got Miriam a cute black corduroy jumper with Halloween pictures appliqued on.

The big night. We always order pizza and we started watching a move. I believe we watched Care Bears Halloween. Pictures on the left are the kids watching the movie. I actually let them go trick-or-treating around our neighborhood for the first time. They had to be prompted at every door with the necessary door dialogue. I took them around while Eric stayed home with Rachel and handed out candy. It wasn't too bad temperatures but Miriam was a little chilled by the time we got back. Miriam loves this Snow White dress the best of all her dress ups. I added a little face paint for Aaron's snow leopard costume. Happy Halloween!

What we were up to last year

It is fun every once in awhile to look back and see how things have changed both in how kids have grown and the different activities from year to year. Here we our first snowfall last year on October 6- the kids were so excited they had to go out immediately. The snow was earlier than this year which came on Oct 28. Neither snow stayed long as kids were out playing again on the 16th.

Miriam was soo excited to push Rachel on the swing. I love having a "Jones pumpkin patch" ie all matching pumpkin shirts. I was definitely glad winter wasn't here to stay.

On October 8 we went to a cousins birthday party. He always has a party and this year he did a Halloween dress up one. Miriam was Snow White, 3 pics above of her twirling. Daddy and Mommy went Hawaiian as you see Eric on bottom left holding tiger Rachel. This may have been the only time we put her in a costume otherwise it was typical Halloween clothes. Aaron was the snow leopard as you see him on bottom right next to some haunted pillars, Aunt Nicole always goes way out on decorating the parties. We even have Grandpa dressed up as a cowboy of sorts. Another cousin was Hermione, we had some way cute costumes there. On top right you see Miriam, Aaron, and another cousin peering through the window at the swimming pool longingly- they do that every time we go there. Other pictures are the birthday boy with his cake and one of the games they played.

On October 7 weekend we went up to Logan to see Eric's friend Nate York. We went up after work Friday, stayed the night and then Saturday the guys went hiking. This picture is the kids eating french toast. Poor Aaron squashed smack in the middle of 4 girls. Zayda on the right is only 8 days older than Miriam. Then Kelcie is like 6 months younger than Aaron. We did Joy School together and hung out till the guys made it home from a cold hike (encountered snow). We went to dinner at Chuck-a-Rama including my cousin JJ and wife then headed home.

We made our monthly (or so) trip to Delta on October 14. One of the first things they always have to do upon arrival is go down to the toy room to plan, and often its to have a tea party. Miriam loves tea parties though this one is more unusual to have some dollies as guests. I loved seeing Aaron "cutting the bread".  Poor Aaron got stuck in a slightly feminine ghosty shirt to match Miriam, but he doesn't mind. Somehow we don't usually get a lot of pictures in Delta.

It has become a tradition to go down to the Red Barn in Santaquin to go the hay ride and pick a pumpkin from the patch. Every year they seem to add more attractions. We gathered up the cousins for an outing on October 13, 2011.

It was Rachel's first time and Miriam took good care of her. Middle top is Miriam and Aaron on the hay ride over. On the right they are picking their pumpkins- Grandma has a rule that you have to be able to carry your own pumpkin. Bottom corners are Liz helping the kids through the maze of old storage containers. Sure glad the big kids help out! Middle left is an own tractor they added this year for kids to "drive" on.

I'm not sure if she was dressing up on October 18 or just getting ready to be a missionary. The hat is from her Strawberry Shortcake costume, and the dress is from her dress up trunk. I love that she still wants to carry around her Book of Mormon.