Fall 2012

The start of fall or the end of summer means that Cooper finally gets to start school like the other kids.  Abby and Carson are on year round, so they start school at the end of July and Cooper just sits home wishing he could have somewhere fun to go.  This is his second year of Preschool and he is primed and ready to go!

 Fall also means fall sports at our house.  Cooper played his second year of soccer and had a much better time than last year.  He loved going to games and was really excited to play.  He mostly loved all of the attention and lived for the treat at the end of the game.  Carson started playing fall baseball this year and he and Chad created their own team called the Naturals. (pictures unavailable) They gathered some of the kids we know who are the same age and they started playing "big boy" baseball.  He had a blast!  He is suddenly really into baseball and sports in general.  He loves going to practice and he gets really excited for games.  They didn't win a lot, but he had so much fun while spending time with his dad.  Abby played fall softball again this year and at the end of the season their team took second place in the tournament.  Go Bullets!

 Bo seems to find his own way of entertaining himself at all of the ball games.  We usually bring him home covered in mess.

 Abby had a big 10 year old birthday.  We went to Leatherby's after one of her games.  We also went to St. George that next week, where Chad ran in the St. George Marathon!  Yay Dad! And while we were there, she and I went to Tuachan and watched the musical Hairspray.  Emily and Bailey Bird, who were also there to watch the race, got to come with us.  Abby loved the play and thought it was so fun!

 We did a lot of fun things for Halloween this year.  I love all of the holidays because my kids get so excited and they look forward to every little thing.  We went to Gardner Village to see the witches, we picked and carved pumpkins, went to plenty of corn mazes, saw a fun Halloween movie, had our annual family Halloween party and we had a lot of fun making goodies, which included caramel apples and monster cake bites.

 For costumes this year, Abby was heart set on being a dead softball player, so we ripped up a shirt and glued half of a hollowed out ball to a head band and poured blood all over her face.  It actually turned out pretty good.  Cooper wanted to be literally everything!  I could not get him to stop changing his mind.  Every time I would think that we had settled on something, he would tell me that he had a different idea.  He finally settled on Mario, which worked out for me because it was the cheapest thing in the store.  He got even more excited when Carson changed his plan of being a GI Joe to being Luigi.  They fit the part perfectly and ran around in character most of the day.  Boden was the classic superman and he was even cuter when i slicked back his hair and sprayed it black.  Chad and I were Oopma Loompas.  The kids thought we looked creepy and it took them awhile to figure out what we were.  We thought we were pretty funny.

 This year, Chad and I ran the Ragnar race in Las Vegas.  We had so much fun!  It was a little weird doing it in November, but it was so fun to be with our friends and go on a "runcation". We made a fun logo and t-shirts for our team, we stayed in a fun resort, and ate yummy yummy food.  Oh, and we had to do some running.  The disappointing thing was that we went to Las Vegas and I was freezing!! I don't think I was prepared for that.  All of our runs were in the windy cold, but we still had a great time.  We were also able to drop in on Amy and see the kids, yay! And since we ran two Ragnar races in the same year, we left with a bonus medal. (Saints and Sinners)

 In family news, Boden is officially in his "big boy bed".  It is weird how just changing where he sleeps, can seem to change everything about him.  He is getting so big and I really don't know how I feel about it.  It is a love/hate thing.  I love that he is developing his own unique cute personality, and that he is becoming so independent, but I love having my baby, so the whole thing is a little hard.  He slept great in his bed right away, with only a couple tumbles off the bed, which he didn't seem to mind, as he slept right through them.

 I also need to cut Bo's hair more often, but I am too lazy.  I think it looks cute long, but it is always in his face and in the way.  Sometimes to try to be funny and pull it up in a pony tail, but he does NOT like it at all! I also do it because I think that he looks so much like Abby when she was this age, and when I pull up his hair it just verifies it for me.

 Thanksgiving is one of those holidays that I think you start to enjoy more and more as you get older.  Maybe it's because I love food, or maybe because I love my family, or maybe because I love to be reminded of all of the things that I am grateful for, all of which, are good reasons to love Thanksgiving.  This year, we just had Grandma and Grandpa Grundy, Colby, and Amy and Justin and their two kids.  We also had a friend from Chad's work who didn't have family close by.  It was a smaller Thanksgiving, but not less special.  We made a thankful tree for our house, and played football on Thanksgiving morning.  It was a great way to start off the holiday season.