Thanksgiving 2019

Happy Post Thanksgiving (now that it's a week until Christmas). For this Thanksgiving, I was planning on being lame and eating Thanksgiving dinner at the Hospital. Sam's co-residents got together a previous weekend to have a dinner of their own. I wanted to go as well but our kids got bad colds. Sounded like a grand time, but since I wasn't there, I couldn't really tell ya.

Well, Sam suggested going to Albuquerque because he had most of the week off due to the Holiday. Don't have to convince me! We loaded the car after his last appointment on Tuesday and drove into Albuquerque around midnight. We stayed at Sam's parents' new house and it is mighty nice. It is currently on its way to getting even nicer as they decided to redo the kitchen. At first I was a little sad that they were moving because I had a lot of memories of their old house (we got engaged there, we first held hands there, our reception was in the backyard, etc) but Jessica and her family moved in so it's nice it will stay in the family!

Eden just loves babies! Kinda interesting to see that after having two boys.

 EPIC SNOW STORM! So glad we left the night before this happened! This is in the parking lot of a restaurant we went to.

The boys loved the new house and its furniture. Good thing we don't live around here to wear out that furniture, eh heh.

Both boys spending quality time with Grandma on Thanksgiving morning.

 Then we had to go play in the snow! South Texans don't get very many opportunities.

Do you want to build a snowman?

Eli called him Fritzy and the name stuck for this guy.

Joey lasted the longest. He says he wants to live in Antarctica when he grows up.

We had the Kartchner Thanksgiving at the Prestwich home (Mike and Judy were very kind to let us use their house). We took a Kartchner family photo and it didn't turn out bad. We just missed Zach and his family. I thoroughly enjoyed spending time with family. Realized I should have taken way more photos. Whoops.

In true New Mexico fashion the snow melted the next day. But I did spot a road runner!

Sam found this picture on Facebook. I guess one of his friends spotted Fritzy and took a picture of him. What a coincidence! He was pretty much gone the next day. RIP Fritzy.

Other things that happened on this trip:

• Sam's parents got a pool table with the house. We got to play a lot of pool.
• I surprised my siblings. Our van was the giveaway but it was still fun to see their faces!
• We had breakfast at Wecks and ate probably the hottest green chile. You know it was hot if Sam had to scrape it off his burrito!
• We had our Kartchner dinner at Texas Roadhouse. My mom was really happy we came since some will be gone for Christmas. This way all of us could be here.
• We got to see Jessica's cute "new" house! I'm glad it worked out for them to buy Sam's parents' old house! The schools are great and there is a lot more space for the kids so that's nice.
• We also got to eat steak with them on Thanksgiving. I'm glad we got to spend time with them because they will be gone for Christmas too!
• We probably got Sam's family sick. We were on the tail end of our sicknesses when we came to Albuquerque, but I guess we were still contagious. I feel really bad about it still. It's no fun being sick at the busiest time of year!

We will be making the same trek soon for Christmas! Hopefully we'll get to do more and see more people!

PS. This is Kiley if you can't tell ;)

Halloween 2019

There are a lot of pictures here, so I think I will let the captions do the talking for our Halloween this year!

Joey wanted to be a praying mantis this year and they don't sell those costumes.
I did a makeshift costume and it worked out well! I convinced Eli to be a bee
and I bought Eden's costume at a second-hand store.

Went to Sea World for their Trick-or-Treating event. This is the hay maze.

My heart!

We decided to check out the Haunted Section of Sea World as a date.
It was too busy to see the Haunted Houses but it was fun to be there with just us.

We decided to decorate cookies. Sadly, we were in the middle of stomach bugs when we started this activity.

 Joey had a character book parade. To keep his costume,
we found this cute book from the library, My Fun Summer, by P. Mantis.

We also enjoyed Story Time and Trick-or-Treating at the library.

Joey's school had a Trunk-or-Treat and Dance.
Forgot to take a pic of our Trunk, but here is the costume contest.

Trick or Treating at Target.

The church where Eli goes to MDO had a Fall Festival. It had a bouncy castle!

Joey and Eli going on a hay ride with me. Forgot to get a pic of the horse! 

Face painting!

There was also carnival games, a dunking booth,
and a guy that came with a lot of wild local animals.

At our ward Trunk-or-Treat. We made our trunk a garden and you can't tell, but I have butterfly wings to match our kids.

Pumpkin decorating time!

Eli wanted a silly face.

Sam made an eye.

"Eden" had a pretty face. Her pumpkin was tricky to carve. 

Joey wanted-you guessed it-a praying mantis.
I free-handed the drawing on the pumpkin and Sam carved it.

Halloween night I started getting the kids in their costumes. I dressed Eli first, and when I was helping the others the doorbell rang. Thinking it was Trick-or-Treaters, I opened the door to find our neighbor with Eli. Yep, Eli was too excited and left without us noticing to go trick-or-treating. Luckily our neighbors were kind to bring him back. That kid!

Start of the 2019 School Year

A little behind, but we are full swing in the 2019 school year for Joey. I even got Eli into a Mother's Day Out program two days a week.

Joey has been in school for over 50 days and still seems to like it! His reading skills spiked and he is doing well in math according to the last progress report. Compared to last year, he hasn't once pretended to be sick or fight me in going, so we're happy about that.

It was iffy whether I could get Eli into MDO, as he had to be potty-trained. I told them to hold off this summer and then he miraculously potty-trained after a failed first attempt. It all worked out. Eli seems to like his school as well, except for the napping part!

Pic 1: The crown Joey made first day of school

Pic 2: In front of his classroom- that smile!

Pic 3: His first library book he chose- love of sharks is still strong

Pic 4: His desk first day

Pic 5: Blurry picture of his school picture

Pic 6: Sunglasses Joey picked out of the goody basket at school

Eli on the first day of his school.

 Now for random things!

My sister and BIL came for a visit when his brother was getting married in San Antonio and stayed with us. We enjoyed having our cousins over for a visit!

I made this wreath above our TV. It took a while to figure out what I wanted but I'm glad I figured this out! 

If you search certain animals on Google you can create a
3D image of their life size. Joey loooves emperor penguins
so we had to show that it is roughly the size of a 6 year old child.