Most of October--Conference, half marathons, and birthdays, oh my!

October was straight up BUSY!

I did fun stuff like take my Cub Scouts to the Provo City Center Temple to work on their Duty to God Footsteps requirement. They were awesome and one fellow even wore his suit for the occasion. Slay me, it was so cute!

Eliza enrolled in Micah's School of Mischief and Tomfoolery and she earned her first demerit badge by learning to pick the lock into her sisters' room in 15 seconds flat. The things you can teach a 2 year old!

Micah earned advanced demerits by trashing his room in 15 seconds flat. Down with the bookcase! Down with the dresser! Down with my sanity! For real, what is the kid gonna be like as a teenager?!?

Speaking of teenagers, our teenager had some big moments in October! He is in Advanced Band this year and was able to participate in a Fall concert in October. They did an amazing job and he was on cloud 9 after performing.

He also tried out Cross Country this fall. While he may not be the fastest kid on the track, but I love that he learned that he can do really hard things. He learned that his body really benefits from exercise and from pushing through. I was so proud of the energy and effort he put in.

October was full of some very, very precious and wonderful memories, for me. 

I was invited to be a part of the choir that sang for the Saturday Afternoon session of General Conference for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We started practicing at the end of August and practiced 2 hours every Sunday until October (then we added a Wednesday practice up in Salt Lake City at the Conference Center). Brother Jim Casen was our director and he brought the Holy Spirit with him into practice. He taught us not only how to sing these beautiful hymns, he taught us how to draw strength and share our testimonies through these songs. I expected to work on dynamics and notes, but I was amazed by how spiritually-filled I was each practice. I had no idea how spiritually hungry I was, and how the Lord could fill me so much with hymns of praise. The practices were a profound worship experience, even more so than singing during General Conference.

These two ladies were my singing buddies, and I am eternally grateful for the spiritual experiences we shared. This was music therapy at its finest.

Here we are, ready to finally share what we've prepared! We had to be there for our final rehearsal during the morning session of Conference.

My kids had a blast picking me out on TV! It's like Where's Waldo.

Don't worry, I made plenty of goofy faces, not even on purpose. It was so good for my soul to be a part of this choir, to share these spiritual experiences with this amazing people. God is good.

The weekend after General Conference, Tyler and I ran the SoJo Half!

We trained for months to get from being able to walk a couple miles to being able to run 13.1.

It started really, really early (and remember, I am not an early morning person!). It was really, REALLY cold to start (I could not feel my bum when I had to stop and use the port-a-potty along the way).

The SoJo Half reminded us a little of the Provo Temple to Temple, in that it went by two temples. There were a lot more hills and miles, though!

Guys, it was hard. My ankle was aching and Tyler was dealing with IT band pain. There were 2 pretty significant hills that we didn't train for. It just felt so much longer than the 10 miles we'd trained up to. 

But we did it! We scraped by with just under 12 minute miles, but the point was really to finish. Tyler had to keep reminding me of that when I got discouraged toward the end. 

And despite being exhausted and sore, we were so, so happy that we'd accomplished this goal. We realized that night that we'd set the goal exactly one year and one day prior!

We did hard things. I'm already thinking about what I need to do differently next time. But first I need to get this ankle checked out...

After those two huge weekends that we'd been preparing for over the past months, we kicked back and enjoyed the next few weeks. I mean, when I wasn't sewing like a woman possessed!

We took the family to Jaker's Pumpkin Patch and played in a giant corn pit (I don't understand this, but that's ok!),

we climbed giant piles of hay bales,

we went on a tractor ride through the pumpkin patch,

we took silly pictures and came out the other side of the corn maze (thank goodness Tyler figured out the map!).

Later in the month, we made our friend Jenni go meet some llamas. The Hari Krishna temple south of us has a herd (?) of llamas that we went to visit. Llamas have nothing to do with Hari Krishna religion, but they are apparently a great side business. Since Jenni and Sheridan both adore llamas, we thought we'd spend a little of our Fall break there.

2 llama-loving ladies!

Jenni trying to steal some kisses. The llama said, "No."

This picture was before one son was running around like a maniac and slipped in peacock poop (and ended up smeared all over with it) and our outing was abruptly ended. It may not have been a dream ending, but it sure was memorable! Don't worry, we still went to the library after. #priorities

We managed to squeeze in a trip the Thanksgiving Point during Fall break and Micah volunteered to fly us home. He takes making mayhem and safe landings seriously.

Oh! And we also celebrated Micah's 4th birthday!

He asked for a Toothless cake. This one is shooting out his night fury blasts, not smoking thankyouverymuch.

Good thing someone stole the little fondant fish from his mouth before it was time to light the candles."No, I didn't eat it!"

Micah is smart, mischievous,enthusiastic, and energetic. 

Micah's favorite animals are tigers and dogs and dragons (duh).

He loves to pretend to be a baby tiger named Camo. On a related note, his favorite show is Wild Kratts. His favorite movies are Cars and How to Train Your Dragon.

Micah's favorite color is orange.

His favorite food is mac & cheese.

He loves playing with his bff Richard.

Micah knows all his letters and has started sounding out CVC words.

He loves breakfast and eats like a Hobbit early in the day (again, what am I facing in his teen years?!?).

His names (according to Micah) are: Micah, Mikey, Michelangelo, and Buckaroo. Oh, and Stinky Bum.

Happy birthday, Micah Man!

September Celebration!

We had so much to celebrate in September! Eliza turning 2! Our cute niece/cousin going to serve a mission! The end of soccer season! Where to begin? Clearly, with Eliza (you know, since her birthday is really early in the month...)

So, Eliza turned 2! She was so happy and enthusiastic about everything birthday-related.

We got a have dinner and cake up at Tyler's sister's house and she loved her cute Very Hungry Caterpillar cake (several months later, it is one of her favorite books).

She thoroughly enjoyed opening gifts from her siblings...

but her very favorite gift was a trio of helium balloons. You want to make a 2 year old's day? Give them helium balloons (clearly, with supervision so they don't die and all). Since we actually celebrated on the 1st, we also had cake on the 2nd--which is her actual birthday.

Since her favorite animal is a kitty, we made her a slap-dash kitty cake.

Why slapdash? Because we started with the stomach flu in our family that day. 

Could have done without those sort of fireworks.

But she never caught the bug and happily devoured her cake. Eliza dug the birthday thing!

Her favorite color is pink.

Her favorite animal is a kitty. She also really likes monkeys, pandas, and puppies.

Not long after Eliza's birthday, our favorite Brynn came and visited! We plied her with BYU ice cream and tried to convince her to stay, but she was going on a mission for Jesus Christ. She was called to serve in the Pocatello, Idaho mission, and even though it's close we can't really go and visit her. Mission rules! So we were so glad we got to spend some time with her. Brynn has a soul like a bright yellow light, and we just soak up every ounce of her glow when we spend time with her.

September also brought Tyler and Henry the chance to go to a BYU football game! We celebrated some big wins with the Cougars this season. There were also some rough losses, but we didn't so much celebrate those. Go Cougars!

Sheridan and her cute friend competed in a "Battle of the Bands" at their school carnival. They didn't win, but those girls were fearless and performed, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," excellently. 

September finally brought somewhat cooler weather (by cooler, I mean you didn't feel like you were baking alive when you stepped outside at midday--just maybe like you were in a slow cooker). The shady trails by the river are a great place to cool off in September.

Those trails are also a great place to battle for supremacy.

This fall, Tyler coached Cole's 1st grade soccer team. Go Orange!

Amelia played 3rd grade soccer and had a love-hate relationship with it. She's pretty sure she wants to play in the spring, even though every practice and game was a battle to get her to go to. 

Micah honed his artistic abilities by getting into a paint fight inside his friend's brand new house. Micah then learned the value of hard work and that cleaning up after a paint fight isn't worth the thrill. I learned that Micah is going to be responsible for a lot more grey hairs and probably heart issues for me.

Amelia and Tyler got to celebrate an awesome year with a Daddy-Daughter date. Howdy do, pardner.

And Tyler and I continued to pound the pavement, since we signed up to run our half-marathon in October! Eek! Thank goodness for the aforementioned river trail, since we put in most our mile and hours there!

September also brought change for Tyler--he left Utah Valley University, where he had worked for two years as the Assistant Dean of Development for the Woodbury School of Business. He started as the Executive Director with the Alpine School District Foundation. The years at UVU brought a lot of opportunities for growth, along with opportunities to raise millions for the Business School. While he was grateful for the chance to collaborate and make a difference with some amazing people through UVU, he is looking forward to using his talents and skills to make a difference in the Alpine School District.