Happy Birthday Mike!

We had big plans for Mike's birthday, cinnamon rolls to campus, out to dinner with friends, a football game, cheese party, dinner and cake with April and Glenn. We started off with bang, opening presents Friday afternoon.Then we went to dinner with friends and came back for apple pie only to find sick kiddos! Most of our other plans were changed or cancelled at this point. Mike is such a good sport was good to just enjoy what we could and be a good daddy to sick kids. Tanner was Mike's date to the game while I stayed home with the sickies.
Instead of going to April and Glenn's we had cake at home and a movie night.

Isn't this the saddest face? Despite having sick kids, I think Mike had a great birthday! The fever and sore throat made the rounds with each child and we were confined to our small student housing for ten days! We were so happy when everyone was well and we could get out again!

Happy birthday, sweetheart! We love you so much and love the way you love our family! Thank you for being such a good daddy and husband, we couldn't ask for more!

Happy Halloween!!

We definitely wanted to take advantage of being near grandma and grandpa for one last Halloween, so we headed to Bountiful after the race and carved pumpkins, had Jack-O-Lantern pizza, and headed out for some trick-or-treating, despite the rain!

This last summer, Andrew really got into checking out old Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle episodes from the library. The boys started playing TMNT all the time and in July they decided what they wanted to be for Halloween! No matter what else was suggested, they held true to their decision and so I whipped up these costumes and they were so excited!The boys suggested that Amelia be April O'Neil, but I just couldn't have my sweet baby girl be April O'Neil for her first Halloween! She made an adorable Dorothy who had made peace with the Wicked Witch just for Halloween! I was in charge of the BYU MBA family Halloween party (for 200 families!) and I wore Amelia in the Ergo through the whole party. My friend, Melissa, commented that it was funny to see the Wicked Witch with Dorothy strapped to the front of her! I wish I had gotten a picture of me being the emcee with my little Amelia strapped to me.

Meghan came up to Bountiful to join the fun and Grandma hardly recognized her when she answered the door! What a great costume!Here's the pumpkin lineup: Tanner, Reid, Andrew, and Grandpa's pumpkins look great!Mike and grandma took the boys out while Amelia and I stayed home (grandpa was out of the country). They came back wet and cold and were quick to put on dry, warm jammies and sort candy. Tanner was the cutest sharing all his candy with everyone. He was offering up pieces of candy without people asking for it, melt my heart! Amelia was hilarious going after Andrew's candy. He was getting worked up about it and she knew it! She kept going back for his pile over and over. Funny girl!

Here's Reid in Meghan's wig, funny little guy. We had a great Halloween with a BIG party, a race, and a great night trick-or-treating at grandma's!

We've got a tooth!

After a week of the crabbies, being sick, and more crying than we've ever heard from this sweet girl, she finally broke her first tooth! Welcome first tooth, we're glad you're here and glad our sweet, happy Amelia has returned!

Halloween Half Marathon

I've always thought of myself as a "pretend runner" because I like to run, but then there are people like my husband who are built to run, born to run. While I can't say that I fall into either of those categories, I can say that I'm loving running right now!

Natalie is my wonderful running partner and we had a great run last Saturday morning in Provo Canyon. It was such a fun environment with everyone in costume and the weather couldn't have been more perfect.
April also ran the race with us, we went as incredible moms!My neighbor Rachel also ran the race. She ran with her sisters, Glenda the good Witch and Dorothy!
I'd like to think we were original with our costumes, but we were more functional than anything else. There were many others who had the same idea of Incredible function with a costume. It was fun to see what people were willing to wear while running 13 miles.
This man is the best! Mike is always so supportive of everything I do and seeing him get our kids into costume and on the sideline to cheer me on makes me fall in love with him even more. Sounds cheesy, I know, but it's true!
This hearse has been driving around town advertising the run. I think it's awesome!Incredibles and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles combine powers with a hug! These two are such special little friends.
It was such a great run and a great feeling to cross the finish line after running 13.1 miles! So fun!

California Part II

After we spent the afternoon with grandma and grandpa Evelyn, we headed to Pebble Beach where we spent a few days with April and Glenn in Glenn's grandma's house, which happens to be right on Pebble Beach golf course. It's got to be the most relaxing place to vacation!
Doesn't April just look so relaxed?
Mike and Glenn definitely looked relaxed!


Every evening we'd take a walk out on the golf course and the kids (and dads) loved looking for golf balls!

We went to Louie Linguini's for classic clam chowder. It was delicious and Amelia loved the sour dough bread. She's so funny!
After lunch we walked down to the beach and checked out the tide pools. This kids had a great time finding all sorts of sea life and also enjoyed watching the sea lions.

The water was cold and I didn't envision us getting in and....I was wrong! My boys started by running from the waves, but then they each tripped and totally fell in. Within a matter a minutes T&R looked like this.

This kid cracked us up the most! He just kept going in and was full of continual laughter. He loved it!


Here we are on the 6th hole (maybe 9th? can't remember) that sticks out over the ocean. So beautiful!
One of my favorite parts of this vacation was running with April in the morning. We'd get up at 6:30 and run along the beach. I love running (and consequently talking) with April! The run was beautiful, the conversation was great, and we were at sea level so it felt like we could go forever! When we were done, we found a great bench looking out over the beach and ocean and stretched and talked. I think it's become my new happy place I go to when things get crazy in our student housing with four kiddos!
The kids had so much fun at our impromptu beach experience, we decided to go again another day and it was so much fun!




Mike just can't contain himself! He can't go to the beach without jumping in, especially when the waves look like they did that day. He pumped himself up and then ran into the freezing cold water.
Glenn couldn't stand on the beach watching Mike have all the fun, so he had to join him, of course! They rode some good waves and came back cold!

We had a great time in California and were sad to drive away and leave April and Glenn to play without us for a few more days. It was a wonderful get away from school and normal life, we only wish we were still there!