Star Wars Halloween!

R2, stay with the ship!

 Hey there little fella!

 Luke, I am your father!

May the Force be with you!

 a-da, a-da!

 watch out, here comes Darth Vader!

 (me and my little ewok, he's the cutest ever!)

 bee-boop, a-weeooh!  (Katelyn really practiced her R2 language beforehand!)

 Darth, Leia, Wicket, Luke, and R2-D2

 Help me Obi-wan Kenobi, you're my only hope!

 Bro and Sis

 Oh no, the baby ewok was captured by Darth Vader!

We had a great Halloween!

"He's a troublemaker, never been a faker...

... doin' things his own way, never givin' up" - so goes the song by Weezer.  

And so goes our boy!  

Here are a few pictures we've caught of him in the act.

bolting for the stairs:

 climbing onto the table to get the library books:

 reaching everything on every short table (this picture was taken with our almost-5-year-old neighbor (left) Owen's hands, and Whitney's hand on the right.  Owen's hands are almost as big as our little neighbor girl's!)

 random side note- I moved him out of the baby carrier car seat about a month ago into this one!

 He's always trying to eat  things from the garden (usually leaves)

 standing up to my legs- makes it hard to move!

 first time getting into the toilet paper, he looks like a little mummy!  He's only crying because he just bonked his head.  He also flushed the toilet for the first time today!

 He managed to find an intake vent that wasn't screwed shut- it makes a really cool loud noise when you pull it away from the wall and then let go!

 this one's just cute.  Eric thinks this zebra hat is girly, haha.

 He LOVES to play the piano.  That's not troublemaking, except that if the piano is open and I walk by while holding him and don't stop to let him play, he cries out in protest.

 and here's the boy kneeling, about to crawl right over to the TV, VCR, DVR, DVD player, or Wii.

He's 9 months old now, I can't believe it.  So big and cute.

the race

This year the girls really did outstanding in the BYU Homecoming races!  They were both doing the same distance as last year and were the oldest age in their group (Whit-200 meters, 1-4 year-olds, and Kate- 400 Meters, 5-6 year olds) so they ran well!  Here is Katelyn (in purple) on the last curve with 100 m left, (and you can see Derek cheering her on on the side) she really stayed strong and didn't die out at the end.  And she was 30 seconds faster than last year!!  She took 8th place.

 Here's a not-great picture of Whitney about to finish, I couldn't see so I just held up my camera and shot it, she's in a blue shirt and bright pink pants, you can barely see the edge of the girl in front of her who took 1st, that's right Whitney took 2nd place!  She did SO awesome, I first saw her at about 50m in, and she was passing everyone!  She came around the curve looking SO strong and determined and in the zone, her legs and arms were just pumping so fast, I saw her look up and see the finish and she kept up the pace to the end!  We'll have to teach her about kicking, because she totally could have taken that 1st place girl if she picked it up a tiny bit!  But wow, she did awesome!  40 seconds faster than last year!!

 So she got a medal and got to stand on the podium, the same one the state track champs stand on, and they announced her name and asked her a question and everything!  So cute.

Me and Owen cheering

 cute little runner girls.

 with the Y and the misty, fall-colored mountains behind them!

st. george cravens!

a couple of weeks ago we went down to see katrina and her family in St. George!  They are liking it down there and we can see why-- it was a really fun trip!  Here are some of the fun things we did, but really the best part was seeing Katrina and Phillip and Derek (who came with us!) and especially playing with Lydia!

We went to a little splash park, and swam in Katrina's neighborhood pool twice.

 As soon as we discovered you could make mud by rubbing the wet red rocks, Derek of course war-painted himself!  That kid is the king of random fun!

 I just love this picture Eric took of himself and Owen on our hike- more pics below

I love this 5-generation picture-minus my mom!  I really think my nose and cheeks look just like Grandmoms!  I love family resemblances, so cool.  Even though I look more like my dad than my mom in general, I can still have my Grandmom's cheeks!

 Whitney LOVES Lydia.  She was so excited to see her and play with her and they had fun.

 Grandmom got to hold Owen sleeping- sweet.

 We went to an extremely AWESOME parade in Santa Clara. Before it started Whit took pictures with this Genie...

 and was shy but agreed to take a pic with storm troopers with Uncle Derek, her buddy.

 This parade was seriously awesome.  Every parade we've been to in Utah County has been nuts, beyond crowded.  At this one, we could only see like 10 other people down the street!  People on the floats were seriously dumping candy on us, and the girls got as much as they do on halloween!  It helped that they had on their BYU hats and Lydia was so amazingly cute!

 Owen also enjoyed it.  I LOVE this picture, look at my twins!

 The girls in the river at the splash park

 cute cousins!

 Lydia loves Owen!

 Our last activity was a hike I'd done before (and luckily Phillip knew how to get there!)  It was super awesome, even though we learned you can't get through that skinny crack holding a baby!  Katelyn loved it and did it 3 times,  but Whitney got too scared and Uncle Derek had to rescue her.  Then I got too scared and backed out, then a few minutes later decided I didn't want to be the only one to wuss out- I think I must be smaller than Derek, come on!  If he could squeeze through then so could I.  So I pushed on through and did it. also Katrina and I had a little adventure hiking up to the top of the crack with Whitney and our babies.

 kate waving behind Phillip

 in a little hollow

Katrina and Phillip are great hosts and we will be back again sometime!  It was a fun quick trip.

uniform

as promised, a couple of uniform pics.  I made this halter-top jumper out of a pair of old khaki capris of mine- not jean material.  There's two ruffles running down the side, the limit is 3 ruffles (a rule they made because of a ruffly jumper I made last year, haha.  My next idea is to make a navy blue maxi skirt.  See what they do about that. :)  Also funny- I am on the board that makes dress code decisions!  I just got outvoted. :))

 And here she is in her skinny-khakis with her new boots from Grandma.  Thanks!

soccer overload- Whitney still pics

Here is Whitney right before she scored her first goal, in the first game she actually decided to play in! Notice her awesome shoes, and great pose.  Oh and she never lets me do her hair, in case you didn't know.  We were so happy that she finally decided to play.

 Here she is tripping over a fallen player (she's #27), a common sight in pre-K soccer!

 She always goes all out, here she is bracing herself as she comes to a stop after sprinting toward the ball.

 And Whit with Leo the Lion (Real Salt Lake mascot).  We're excited to go to a game in a couple of weeks with the free vouchers we got! ( we tried to go to one already, but it was sold out!)

I love my crazy Whitney.  And Eric and I are so happy that she didn't quit. She even played her last couple of games with no drama.  So her first experience with organized sports ended well and it should go more smoothly next time. :)