Thanksgiving, etc.

 Thanksgiving was just us and Timmy this year. I thought it would be kind of lame, but I loved how relaxed it was. So much fun and tons of pies (like more than one entire pie per person). I'm so grateful for this little family of mine and the happiness we have together.

Only photo I took on Thanksgiving.

I think it's a fair representation of our day.

A few days after Thanksgiving I took the little kids with me to help decorate the church for Christmas. On our way home, we passed a biker with no helmet going crazy fast down Wheel Road (a winding road with no sidewalks or shoulder for bikers). I remember thinking "That's a really stupid idea" as I drove past him.  As we came up the hill he just flew down, I saw another biker (also without a helmet) laying on the grass next to the road. Her bike was in the middle of the road. I immediately pulled into a driveway across the road and ran over to her. She also didn't have a helmet and was pretty scraped up. She had some blood on her head but wouldn't move her hand so I could see. Another car stopped and they called 911. She kept asking for her brother-in-law, who I assumed was the man I saw flying down the hill. Eventually he came riding back up and stayed with her while the ambulance came. I wasn't much help beyond covering her with a blanket, but we were trapped by the ambulance anyway so I stayed until they took her to the hospital.

These kids were SO patient as they waited! I think it was like 45-60 minutes total.

Thankfully a week or so later I got a text from her thanking me for my help and telling me she was a bit scraped up, but otherwise totally fine. It was so kind of her to reach out since I was really concerned about her head injury. If nothing else, my kids are now quite impressed with the importance of helmets. 

And, finally, with Thanksgiving over it's officially the beginning of Christmas!

Don't be too impressed. 

My only contribution was the candles in the windows.

Everything else was my friends Cate and Montano.

Montano has a deep and abiding love of Christmas lights and offered to put these up for free as long as she got to do whatever she wanted. She did ask the kids if they preferred a red and white theme or a blue and white theme. Half wanted blue, half wanted red. So we got red, white, and blue instead! 

This is by far the most festive our house has ever looked for the holidays. Montano is the best!

Joanna Gets Married!

 

Joanna married the awesome Rayne on November 19th!

I wasn't able to go because children, but Jonny got to fly out to Utah to celebrate.

All the Blood siblings were able to be there!

Ten Bloods and a Rayne

Round three

This was how I participated in the wedding festivities:

Did you know that Jacob, Joanna and Rayne were besties growing up?

Well, they weren't.

But thanks to my photoshop skills and Timmy's brilliant idea, it sure looks like they were!

We love Rayne and are so excited to add him to the Blood Family Collective!

My Elijah

I thought Elijah would love preschool. He seems closer to the Seth and Elise side of the social spectrum. But it's not love. It's tolerance. He usually doesn't want to go, but is quite happy when I go to pick him up. One day he came home enthusiastically babbling about "lower-case h". I don't know how they made it so exciting, but he was ALL IN for about a week.  

Best letter ever!

Another preschool gem:

"It's a coconut!"

Clearly.

Coconuts may not be the last thing I expect him to be thankful for, 

but they're definitely near the bottom of the list.

This boy and music!

He is ENTHRALLED by music.

Best way to calm him down is to sit him in the rocker chair next to Google and just play songs.

He'll sit quietly, staring off into the distance as he absorbs the new songs.

But this day the spirit moved him, and it was time to DANCE!

So, so cute!

His current favorite song is Particle Man, which we hear on endless loops right now.

Could be worse, I guess. 

We helped Catherine take care of cats Mika and Al again.

Elijah really, really wanted them to play with him (they are not used to kids).

So he was THRILLED when Al spent a good 15 minutes playing one morning!

(hard to see, but he was laughing and grinning ear to ear)

Favorite activity?

Construction vehicles in the flour while Mom makes bread.

This is not Mom's favorite activity. 

And REALLY not Dad's favorite activity. 

But someone has to run the construction site!

(Right after this he fell off the counter, gave himself a black eye, and knocked down the flour.)

He also acquired pink eye, which means eye drops. He hates eye drops, so I was shocked one evening when he asked for them. "Oh! You're ready for your eye drops?" He politely responded, "No, thank you. I was just kidding." He got them anyway. 

He also passed a speech test with flying colors. I had him tested because he just didn't seem to be quite where his siblings were at this age, plus our neighbor girl Juliana (who is a year younger) is talking circles around him. He passed with absolutely no areas of concern! When we finished, one of the evaluators questioned why I had him tested since he was even excelling in some areas. I guess we just need to stop hanging around Juliana!

King and Queen Seat

Jon and I have a goal of going on one active/fun date (aka not just watching a movie in the basement) a month. And, since Seth is in school, Elijah gets to come on these dates generally. This time we decided to hike to the King and Queen Seat, which we had never visited before (with good reason, now that I've been there I would NEVER go with lots of little children. SOOO easy to fall off the edge).  

Elijah investigates the rock tunnel

"PEOPLE OF MARYLAND! BEHOLD! YOUR NEW KING!"

(It does actually look a bit like Pride Rock, so we just had to)

Stinky and Mommy:

Sitting by the edge:

(It's quite a drop off any of the sides of this rock.

I was very anxious just having Elijah this close for a photo.)

Daddy and Stinky:

(This time featuring much safer rock formations!)

It was an easy, beautiful hike. Next time we'll try to go when the fall colors are peaking. But probably still without all the kids because my heart just can't handle it.

Random November

 Celebrating Grandma Cathy's birthday with delicious angel food cake!

And, of course, the unicorn candle!

And now, all the majesty of this year's school pictures:

Freshman Seth

6th grade Catherine (she was pleased with this picture)

3rd grade Aaron

1st grade Elise

I would have actually purchased digital copies of these, but at $40 for ONE digital photo? I'll take pictures with my cell phone instead. Ridiculous. 

Aaron Masterpieces

Aaron  has really been creating art prolifically since school started. Possibly he's very bored, but he hasn't mentioned anything, so maybe he's just really inspired??

(not sure why this is upside down, but it is what it is...)

Mo' arms, mo' weapons.

I have no idea what this is, but welcome to your next nightmare:

This is what was on the back of it, so apparently a haunted house?

Gaping plothole: his story fails to explain the void of darkness floating in the sky. 

Inspirational posters by Aaron:

This is literally my new favorite.

I have it hanging in my bedroom.

I just...I have no words...

Yep. 

Still no words.

Found this gem hanging out in the office:

Jon did not think it was as funny as I did. 

"Seek and expect sadness." (snicker)

And now, the most glorious piece of Aaron Art ever to grace this world...

COMPLIMENTARY COLOR TURKEY!

I fell in love with this the moment I saw it.

But then the school art teacher spammed me with this and perfection was born:

Did I purchase several of those "JOY" turkey ornaments as gifts?

You bet I did.

I think my favorite thing about Aaron's art is that he's so completely clueless about his work. He's not trying to be terrifying, or hilarious, or really, really weird. It's just his natural style. And half the time he either doesn't remember why he drew the thing or doesn't remember drawing it at all. It's the greatest. 

Other Aaron things (not art-related):

-he doesn't love school, but he tolerates it for the sake of his friend Oliver. And then, without explanation or even notification, they changed Aaron's classes and he's no longer with Oliver. Why?? Fingers crossed he can find Oliver 2.0 in his new class.

-I often use tea tree oil in my cleaning and sometimes in my diffuser if I think the house smells particularly offensive. I think it has a nice, clean scent. My family disagrees. Aaron especially hates it. Last time I put it in the diffuser he asked, "You're not putting in the treachery oil, are you?" Treachery, tea tree... It's now officially treachery oil around here. 

The Catherine

Oh, Catherine. Still just doing things your own way, like you always have. You are thriving in middle school, loving the independence and the increase in autonomy that comes with leaving elementary school. I was worried you'd be lost in the shuffle of your gigantic middle school (1,800 kids!), but you are quite pleased with all of it. 

Well, maybe not so much pleased with your annual pediatrics appointment. You were more ridiculous than all your younger siblings combined! 

Hiding behind the hair to avoid getting a shot.

Sorry to say it didn't work. 

I promised her a treat for her pains.

I did not expect her to pick this:

Apparently white bread is a rare treat when your cruel mother only buys whole wheat stuff!

She jealously guarded her bread and enjoyed every slice while commenting repeatedly 

about how much better white bread is than disgusting wheat bread...

Catherine was super excited to learn about a lunar eclipse that would be visible in our area.  It was really, really cool to see! And I loved getting to hang out with Catherine. She was almost giddy with excitement. Glad it was worth her getting up at 5:15 am on a day when she has school off! It was super cold out there, but watching the moon turn red and dark? So cool! 

Also, my new favorite Catherine saying is "on style." I still don't know if that's actually what the kids at school are saying or if she's misunderstanding "in style", but I love it. Glad I have a happy middle school Catherine!

Seth Man

This picture is a completion of a dream! With Seth and his buddies all attending a magnet program for computer science, they all have computers on the brain. Apparently the new dream this year was to build their own PCs. Jack had built one earlier with his brother's help, so he was the leader and main consultant. Actually, he did a lot of the physical labor as well after declaring Seth and Gabe to be generally incompetent (one of Jack's favorite terms of endearment). It was ridiculously expensive and can't be hauled around like his laptop, but he is thrilled. And now he can play all his games without any lag. Woo hoo! I'm grateful Seth has awesome friends who are just as nerdy as he is. 

Elise and Company

Elise is our little social butterfly. I love that she makes friends wherever she goes. Thankfully between school and soccer she was quite entertained in the fall! Her soccer team even had an end-of-season pizza party that the families were invited to. This picture is a fairly good summary of the general chaos: 

The grand finale was attacking Catherine:

It was a most excellent soccer season for Elise.

Elise also gets to play after church sometimes with some friends from our ward:

River and Ripley are SO much fun and SO much energy!

Another Sunday, another playdate with the twins.

But the bestest of friends is Miss Freya, who has been in Elise's class for two years now!

Thankfully we live super close so we get to see Freya whenever we want!

Elise is living the dream here!

Youth Activities

With Seth in Young Men and me in Young Women leadership, we spend a lot of time with the youth of the Bynum Run Ward! We were super excited in October to finally get back to the DC Temple after four years of it being closed for renovations.  

Next adventure: an ENORMOUS bonfire!

The stake fall youth activity was at our friends' farm and they built the most epic bonfire ever. All the stuff they had cleared off their land (including entire trees!) was tossed in there to burn. 

Catherine is NOT in YW yet.

But she does get to tag along with me sometimes.

And eat marshmallows.

This fire was so, so hot.

This is Catherine basically crawling on the grass trying to get close enough to roast her marshmallow.

She failed.

Catherine and Alena, with unroasted marshmallows.

And then this majestic photo:

At least Gabe looks normal?

And, finally, the last of our singing telegram birthday visits!

Alena loves The Flash, so we came and sang her some song related to the show.

She mostly thought it was super awkward, but we leaders had fun!

Working with the youth is a lot, but it's also a lot of fun. 

Halloween

 Halloween felt like a series of never-ending parties this year. 

It began with the school trunk-or-treat:

Catherine the shadow,

Aaron as Dipper,

Elise as Mabel,

Elijah as a ghost.

Then we had the ward trunk or treat.

Then co-op costume day.

And probably a couple more that I've forgotten. 

But finally it was ACTUAL Halloween!    

Mabel and Aaron the shadow

Elijah and Catherine the ghosts

Gabe and Seth snuggling in Gabe's bed, staring at screens.

They went to a Halloween party instead of trick-or-treating.

One phase of life ends...

Pre-trick-or-treat Halloween dinner with Knoxen and Kraczeks.

We were worried it was going to be raining on us, but instead we had lovely warm weather with just a hint of misting rain. The kids made it through the full loop of houses and came home LOADED with candy. Elise and Elijah's little buckets were full to overflowing:

The mass candy sorting:

Elise's haul of candy:

For Halloween Elijah's preschool got to trick or treat through some of the high school classrooms. We didn't think the ghost was a good idea since it was difficult for him to see, so we opted to resurrect Aaron's old Dobby costume instead:

This will never not be my favorite.

Extra fun was when one of my YW texted me this photo saying, "Isn't this your kid?":

She totally gave him extra candy. 

I did laugh when he came home with a whole bunch of not-safe-for-little-people candy, like suckers with gum in them and super sour/hot candies. But he was still pleased with his haul even after I removed a small pile of it (and gave it to his older siblings). Glad we survived this Halloween!