Today it very suddenly got very cold.  And then it snowed!  Didn't stick much, but it made me very grateful for my heater blowing full blast and my cozy bed that night.

 Just look at that little guys' smile!  Can you possibly keep from smiling when you see that face?  The mom in the picture watches Baby A for me when I accompany up at the university - she asked me to take a quick family pic for Christmas cards - I was happy to oblige! :)

 Every time I see something pretty our little town grows on me a little more.  The adjustment is getting easier.

 Baby A got sick tonight.  We woke her up from her nap to take her to a musical fireside we were performing in, and she did okay while we were out, but we got home and she just wanted to snuggle snuggle snuggle.  Which was fine with me!!!  We both fell asleep on the couch while Joseph put the other two to bed (Joseph snapped this picture).

 There is a farmers' field behind our house that was full of soy bean plants when we got here.  One day they turned from green to gold over night, and a week or two later they were gone completely.  Looking at the empty field reminds me of that line from Sunday in the Park with George - "White.  A blank page or canvas.  So many possibilities."  (Like so many things in life, I'm sure that actually farming the land is not as romantic as that makes it seems. :)  But I like the idea anyway.)

Doesn't it look like he's waving off the paparazzi??  He was actually waving goodbye as he headed into school - unlike K-lady with her hard and fast rule prohibiting any verbal expressions of affection in public, this little guy always waves and blows kisses and shouts out, "I love you, Mom!!!  Bye!!!"  Until K-lady finally grabs his hand and pulls him into the school.  :)  

 Veteran's Day parade!  I want one of these little cars.  Probably don't need the hat, but can't you see J-boy terrorizing the neighborhood in one of those cars?  :)

 With all of that getting-stuck-at-the-train-crossing I've gotten pretty good at finding the under-and-over passes in town - I drive this road at least 2x a day now. :)  And my kids groan every time there's a train and I say, "We're going to get run over by the train!  AHH!"  :)  They can't stand my jokes now - just wait till their teenagers!

 K-Lady had her second graders music program at school tonight - I had double booked myself (DOH!), so I couldn't be there, but sent Joseph with strict instructions to video tape the whole thing.  :)  I love to watch her sing!  :)

 We've already addressed this.  Just a few more weeks of diapers, baby - just a few more....

 Getting used to our new town for me means finding pretty things to take pictures of.  We live in a kind of run down part of town, which is kind of depressing to me on occasion.  So it's nice to find spots of beauty here and there. :)

 I love fitting all 6 of these monkeys in my car. :)  We spent Friday night up in the city to play with friends and do some shopping (Joseph got new computers for his practice and wants to trade my home desktop for one of his beefy new ones, but he just reinstalled this one a few months ago....  And my terabyte hard drive is full, so I can't just back up and do it - I have to actually go through all 1000 gigs of duplicate back ups and old pictures and previous computers' files and clean house.  So until I find an entire day with nothing to do, I'll keep plugging away on my old trusty stead - I think she needs a name....  I like Murphey - you know, as in anything that CAN go wrong......)

 Heidi's having a BOY!  That's right, 3 girls and 1 boy to top it all off - a tie-onesie was definitely in order (in my very very very messy craft/food storage/mud room/garage space.

 Baby A loves to look at pictures on the computer (takes after her mother).  She even knows how to open picasa from my desktop and flip through the pictures using the arrow keys.  And she's only two - this child has digi-scrapper written all over her, don't you think?

 Joseph brought a little work home - treatment planning....

 She insisted.  I had nothing to do with this (except for purchasing the potty).  I take the lazy-mom's approach to potty training - do nothing till they do it themselves.  But I'm not ready for this - that's right folks, I'm going to fill our landfills w/ disposable diapers for three more weeks until after our 36 hours of driving time for Christmas vacation.  I'm just not interested in a pee'd-upon car seat on hour 3 of 18.  And I don't have 3 days in a row to stay home between now and then while she gets the hang of it.  (I'm sure she'll get over it, in time, with counselling)  :)

My vegetarian friend got me hooked on mushrooms in my fajitas - yummmm.  But I still stick ckn or steak in there, too.  The best of both worlds, right?

 We caved and let the kids trick-or-treat just our little street on Sunday. :)

Joseph had to do Halloween-Saturday solo (I flew in late late late that night) - I'd say he did pretty good (minus Baby A's lovely pirate wench hair-do. Can I get a bandana please?)  :)

Planting the WA raspberries Dad brought back after his last trip - note the super muddy jazz hands. You should see Mindy try to 'pull up' her jeans w/ no hands. Just about died laughing.
Actually, that was kind of the whole trip - I think Mindy and I woke Grandma up at night with all our laughing - So Much Fun. I really needed to laugh like that!

I got to go to the Logan temple w/ Mom and Dad my last day home - I am so blessed! I love all of my family so much, and I so want to be with them always. That possibility makes the promise of forever very sweet.

I'm flying!!!!!! :) SO FUN.

So we couldn't find 70 candles, but the candles spell out 70. :) And that's a Costco pumpkin pie. Only the best when dad turns 70! :)

Mad skillz. :) I got to see the final run through of their marathon practice - so amazing! I had no idea high school marching band was so cool! (In WA it really wasn't cool at all - sorry, Mindy, but it's true) ;)

Delayed flight, missed the connection, waiting 3 hours for the next one. I thought this sign was funny at that point. :)

It's all behind me.... Heading up to the airport, all by myself, in the sweet sweet silence. The radio doesn't work, and I didn't have CD's, and come to find out I really really REALLY like silence. :) (at one point I did burst out into song for about 2 minutes, but other than that...)

We had a really fun night carving pumpkins - Joseph helped J-boy, and I helped K-lady. I think next year I'm going to chuck the patterns, though - WAY too many cuts! I'm glad we got took pictures right then and there - the next day J-boy got angry @ K-lady and broke the cat pumpkin. Gr. Descructo-boy-temper-tantrums have got to stop.

I spent alot of time with these stacks of photos my wonderful mother and aunt sent me - 70 years of photos to be exact. Dad's birthday was coming up, and a slide-show-movie was in order. :)

Practicing his letters via green bean (obviously he's on O - the M was a little harder to decifer).

It was gorgeous and warm, so these two and I played on the big hill next to the bleachers in the stadium while we waited for K-lady to have her piano lesson. I love that he's sliding his fingers through her hair as he runs by. :) That's my J-boy!

Oh yeah, we got style. Don't worry that we're hanging out in the front yard with this kind of awesomeness - my neighbors already think I'm nuts.

no clue what she's doing, but it's still cute. :)

I was playing w/ frames - I took the picture to remember where they were so I could take them all down and paint them and hopefully get them back in the same spot... Joseph was a little worried this was the finished product. :)

I try really hard to be grateful that she wants to help with the laundry.

This girly loves her accessories.

Still sick - this pictures' actually from the 9th, but it'll do.

A rousing game of Mother-May-I to finish off Family Night - Baby A's doing her somersault-step.

I got sick and stayed home from church today. At dinner Baby A begged to sit on the trash can instead of a stool. :) (These low light pictures are killing me w/ no flash - we do NOT have enough natural light in our apartment. bleh. I want a new camera.)

Finally! I remembered to take my camera on an outing! Joseph spent the day on a temple trip w/ the youth in our ward, so the kids and I hit up the park to pass some time with Rebecca & her kids (who was also husbandless for the day). Beautiful beautiful weather!

The tail end of the sunset behind our house.

This monkey LOVES chips and salsa. Even when the salsa is a little spicy. But if it's TOO spicy, she needs a napkin on hand to wipe off her tongue. :) (excuse her nakedness - a rather frequent part of Baby A's 'perfectly ordinary days')

The desk AND hutch AND ottoman are DONE! Dad helped me design and cut wood for the ottoman the week before we moved (I love me a deadline). I love how it turned out! A little stool for non-dangling feet, file storage in the bottom with a shelf for art supplies on top. Perfect!

a few little touches of Halloween around the place (with leftover vinyl lettering from 2 apartments ago)

one more project done! (I actually did this while listening to conference on Saturday.)

We watch most of conference at home over the internet, but we always try to make it to the church building for the Sunday morning session - Baby A was all ready to go. While she waited for the rest of us, she put on K-lady's costume and said, "all ready! go to church!" :)

We got out the Halloween box on Saturday - it kept the kids occupied while we listened to General Conference.