Happy Halloween!

If elementary kids voted for President...

Tonight at dinner I happened to mention something about Emma not having school on Tuesday because of the Elections. She asked me what elections are. I told her that's when we go vote. Well, she still didn't understand. So I explained that this year we are going to vote for a new President of the United States. Emma then asked me who it was. I tried to explain that it hasn't been decided because we haven't voted yet. Well, typical of most 6-year-olds, she asked several more times who it was. Finally, I told her that John McCain and Barack Obama were running. Emma immediately shouted out "That's who I voted for!!!" What? She said they voted at school and she voted for "Barakugan."

It all makes sense now. Maybe that's why he's ahead in the polls.

It's beginning to look a lot like ...

Fall! One of my favorite times of year. And out here it is even better. The colors are just starting to change, the evenings are cool and crisp. We ate dinner out on the deck so we could enjoy it all.

Saturday is a special day...

We spent most of the day working in the yard. I was digging out the "mulch volcanoes" around our trees. I got a nice spider bite from it too. Perhaps I killed it's mother earlier this week...

Clay spent most of the morning digging out a rock that was causing a dead spot on our lawn. We soon realized we needed to enlist some additional muscle. Our wonderful neighbor, Dwayne, come to the rescue (though he refused to be in the photo). He and Clay finally got this +150 pound rock out of the ground and rolled it off into the woods.

The einsy weensy spider...

Okay, there is nothing einsy weensy about this spider!! I guess it comes from living right next to the woods. I walked out our door this afternoon to meet Emma after school. I walked right through a web. Yuck! I turned around to see if I could find the culprit and this is what I found!

Not only is that the second largest spider I have ever seen (tarantulas not included), but she was guarding a sack of eggs. Well no longer! I promptly got out the bug spray.



..It gets better...



I decided to do a thorough job of spraying the entire porch. As I did, six or seven more spiders came crawling down the walls towards me!! I screamed and ran!

New Church Building

When we moved out here, over 6 years ago, there has been talk about a new church building for us. The land had been purchased, but city building permits have delayed it. The new church location played a key factor in our choice of where to buy our house earlier this year. Our new home is 0.6 miles from the location for the new building.

I was so excited today when I drove by and saw the framework going up! I can't wait for it to be finished. We have been promised it will be completed late spring, and the church has given them extra incentives to complete it early.

If a tree falls in the woods...

We had a very tall dead tree on the edge of the woods, just beyond our property line. We called the park service and ask them to take it down b/c we didn't want it landing on our house during a winter storm. They told us it would be taken care of while we were on vacation. Today, they finally came to cut it down.

Here you can see the indent it made on our lawn when it fell and all the logs they cut and rolled into the woods.

Rebekah and I were sitting on the couch watching them work. I realized it was about to come down, so I ran to get the camera so I could shoot a video of it. I couldn't find the camera. When I finally did, I heard the creaking of the tree and the thud before I could get back to our viewing spot.

Rebekah saw the whole thing. She was terrified. As soon as I sat down she buried her head in my lap. For the rest of the day (week actually), to everyone we met, she signed "tree", "ouch", "helicopter" (for the sound of the chain saw). Check out the look on her face as she signs "ouch"!

Conference Weekend

I love General Conference weekend! We get the opportunity twice a year to hear from our prophet and other church leaders. They speak to us today on the things that we should be working on. There are two 2-hour sessions on Saturday and on Sunday. Now that we have cable, we can watch it at home on TV.

Another great thing about being on the East Coast is that General Conference doesn't start until noon. We spent the morning organizing our basement and food storage organized.

While we worked on that, the girls were marching to the beat of their own kazoo!

We got the girls to sit and listen to conference by feeding them POPCORN!! We also had some other activities for them to do while we listened, but I loved this picture of them sitting together on their couch just happy for the special treat!