HALLOWEEN DAY

MJ, Sierra, and I went with a few of her friends to trick-or-treat on main street. MJ got her first lesson in trick-or-treating. She loved every minute of it.
Today was an eventful day. It was Sierra's teacher's last day of school. She decided to stop teaching and be home with her baby Bridgette. Sierra will be getting a new teacher this week. I have been a little nervous, but I hear her new teacher will be just as amazing. We will see how the transition goes in a few days.
Also, it was her best friends last day at her school. She is moving to a new home and will be going to a new school. We are really sad about that too.
She had a awesome time trunk-or-treating at our church. Then she decided she wanted to come home and pass out candy. She set up station right in front of the door. She opened the front door and shut the screen door in front of it. She placed her chair right in front of the screen door and put the bucket in her lap. She just stared out at the pathway up to our house. She sat like this for at least twenty minutes until her daddy caught her. He said she was being creepy and she needed to shut the door and wait till the trick-or-treaters rang the door bell.
I hope you had a Happy Halloween too.

BARBIE and a KITTY

BARBIE! I know, I am in love too. Don't think I am going to let her take it off. She will be sporting her costume at church every Sunday until she grows out of it. I just think she is so cute.



Just in case you think I didn't dress up... I did. I love Halloween

KITTY CAT COSTUME

In my brain Halloween should comprise of little girls in overly frilly dresses. They can be a princess, a fairy, or even a cute witch. There are only so many Halloweens and one can't be wasted on being something unfrilly like a kitty cat. Apparently, that held true until Madison came along. She asked really sweetly if she could be a kitty. I caved!She loves prenteding to be a cat. The mask has been around for a long time. I had to make her something, it is my favorite sewing holiday, so she got a tail. Don't worry.... Sierra will hang true because she understands what her mother knows, Halloween is about being beautiful and in a dress. She even looked at me confused and said, "Why does Lu want to be cat?" I am confused too but this girl dances to her own beat and that is okay. However, I am glad Sierra sees things my way, she is going to be Barbie. Pictures coming.... SO EXCITED!

P.S. Madison hasn't taken her costume off in two days and is obsessed with being a little kitty. It really does warm my heart and it makes me reconsider my ridged ideas of Halloween.

MORTIMER MANTIS

She loves bugs. She found this Praying Mantis on her walk with her daddy. She let it climb in her hair. It liked being there, so she gave it a ride home in her hair. I have to admit, when I saw it my first instinct was to flick it out of her hair, but I just said, "That is so cool." She can't get enough of moving things.

SHE IS 3!

I love this little girl! She is the sweetest thing alive. Here are somethings I want to remember about MJ at 3.

-We call her Madison or Lu.
-She says, "Your welcome." It is so stinking cute. If you say thank you for anything she does.
-She is still a Kling-on. Her favorite place to be is beside her mother with her arms around her neck.
-She doesn't like to be around people she doesn't know.
-She is so quick to giggle and her laugh is so contagious. She is constantly laughing when her sister is around. It makes church really hard.
-She loves to read. She insists on reading to me every night before she goes to bed.
-She loves to sing. She sings around the house all the time.
-She is very obedient. She will do anything I ask her to do, when I ask her to do it.
-She says the kindest things to all of us.
-She is Sierra's little cheerleader. She is always telling her how amazing she is and telling her she can do anything.
-She loves her daddy. She gets more excited about pulling in a big fish than he does. She will dance on the shore. She will insist on holding the fish before it can be put back in the water.
-She never let's us forget to pray or read the scripture power.
-She hates having her hair done.
-She loves getting dressed herself.
-She is constantly giving me kisses.
-She loves putting together puzzles.
-She loves her grandparents and constantly asks to see them.
-Her favorite show is Go Diego Go!

BIRTHDAY

Madison's birthday. She wanted a Diego party. I drew a little Diego scene on some paper. She insisted we needed confetti, ballons, birthday hats, candles, and cake. We got it all. We had hamburgers and french fries for dinner. She loved it. She got her present earlier in the month, so we just had a little dinner party.

BIRTHDAY FISHING EXCURSION

Nate wanted to take MJ fishing on her birthday. She really does love to fish. She gets so stinking excited about it. She spent more time with her boots in the water than she did fishing. Sierra and her giggled the whole time. They waded out in the water and found long pieced of grass and tied to fishing line to the ends and pretended like they were making their own fishing pole.

The morning of her birthday was spent at Super Saturday. I signed up to do a really beautiful picture of the temple. She came along. Nate and Sierra were off on a Daddy daughter campout and weren't back. Luckily, while we were waiting for my picture to dry, we found out they had kid's crafts there. For a couple of dollars Madison made herself a plate and a frame. She has so much fun doing it.

SWIMMING LESSONS

Sierra has been enjoying swimming lessons. It has been so fun to see her learn how to really swim. She is great and will do whatever her instructor tells her to do. She just jumps in and does it. In the spring she will take another class that will actually teach her how to do the butterfly stroke and the back stroke and the breast stroke. It has been so fun to see her progress. I told her that at the end of her class she gets to go jump off the diving board. She is so excited.

GINGERBREAD GIRL

Sierra did a little play again this year with her school. They have such a great Music teacher at the school. She works so hard to put these little productions together. Sierra has been so excited for this little play. It was called the GingerBread Girl. She rehearsed with Madison all week. She would teach Madison all the parts in the the play. The two of them have been singing the lines around the house all week. Madison and I were so excited to actually see the play we had been hearing so much about. We went in the afternoon to watch her perform and then Daddy got to see it with all of us that night. At first Sierra just wanted to go and see it alone with daddy she said, "You saw it this afternoon and it wouldn't be fair if you got to see it twice." Then she changed her mind and decided we all could go.

BEAUTIFUL DAY

Today was a beautiful day. I forgot to photograph it, so all you get are my words and this cute picture of the fall leaves.

My girls have been wild since they woke up this morning. They have either been screaming, laughing uncontrollably, crying, getting hurt, or teasing and sometimes all five things at the same time. I feel like I have left order and I am now residing in an insane asylum. It has been like this for three days. I had to get out of the house.

I took the girls to MUNCHIES. It is a little hole in the wall restaurant in our little whole in the wall town. It serves hamburgers and fries... I know awesome comfort foods. I sat down and ordered a large guacamole burger and I have to say it was better than a long nap and good book. It was really calming.

Then I took the girls to a state park. Sierra rode her bike around all the trails and Madison followed her in her Diego bike. Then they went and played on the little playground they have there. It wasn't long before they left the playground and started exploring a nearby pond. They started catching small minnows with their bear hands, and when I say they, I mean they. Little Madison was chasing minnows in water up to her knees, while wearing her snow boots. They were both covered in mud and water. They built a little minnow castle from sand on the shore. The castle was complete with walls and a moat. They flooded the moat with water from the pond and then placed their minnow in it. They were laughing and throwing mud at each other when the state park ranger came over and informed me that, and I quote, "High levels of e-coli have been found in that pond. You can let your girls play in there, but I wouldn't recommend it." Great. We went home.

We stopped by at the Sister K's farm. I was glad to see her. It has been too long. We are going to work hard on Monday. I am glad. We are going to do grape jam and strip the tomato plants. Yeah.

SICK KIDS

Sierra was sick on Monday and Tuesday. She threw up at school. It was embarrassing for her. They had the whole class leave the classroom and go out to recess, so someone could come in and clean up the mess. The nurse came down and got Sierra. She said it was a little embarrassing. The nurse has shirt she gets from the thrift store for kids that have accidents like these. Sierra got a new shirt. (New to her.) She was really excited about the new shirt. It is really cute on her.

Yesterday, Sierra had swimming lesson. Madison didn't like it one bit. She didn't want to wait on the side of the pool while Sierra swam. She wanted in the pool. She put her little hands on either side of my face and said, "I needing go swimming right now." I said, "But you don't have a swimming suit." She said, "I will swim in my nudee." I laughed. She wouldn't calm down. I finally had to take a walk with her and get her some skittles out of the vending machine.

Later that evening Nate came home sick, I know ridiculous. Madison brought her daddy a blanket and wrapped it around him. He said thank you and she said, "Your welcome." Then she said that daddy needed one of her stuffed animals and ran to her room and got him one of her stuffed animals and tucked it in with him.

Around 12:00pm, Madison woke up and told me she threw up. I made her a bed on our leather ottoman and put it next to our bed. A few seconds later I hear her vomiting again. I took her and put her in the bath tub. She acted just fine and then vomited all over in the tub. I actually have a picture of it but decided not to include it. (You can thank me for that in the comments section.) I started on the laundry and cuddled her up in a blanket and laid her on the couch and turned on conference for her. I climbed on the couch with her around 1:00am. (The reason why we didn't go back in Madison's bed is because it was still wet from wiping up vomit. The reason why we didn't go lay in my bed was Nate was taking a computerized sleeping test to see if he has sleep apnea. I think Madison had already thrown the test off enough. So, we slept on the couch.)

GO DIEGO, GO!

She has begged for this bike for a solid month. I told her she could have it on her birthday. I should have done an unbirthday for her a month ago. The weather is changing. It is getting cold. I broke down and bought it for her today. She is the happiest girl in the world. I asked her are you sure you don't want a barbie bike, or a dora bike, or a princess bike, or even a pink bike, nope, she wanted a Diego bike. Happy Birthday MJ! You have brought us so much joy in the last three years I can't even begin to say how much we love you.

CRICKET HUNTING

Well, you know Mr. Lizard, or as MJ calls him Mr. Wizard has to eat, so we went hunting for cricket's for family night. My favorite picture is the last one, Sierra is dancing and singing, "La, la, la, I got a cricket."

CONFERENCE

I love conference weekend. We played conference bingo for candy. The girls loved it and really paid attention at least through the whole first session of conference. We made our conference doughnuts, a family tradition. We invited a few families over, only one family made it. I am secretly glad. It is fun to have a lot of people over but it is really fun to just have a few. I love Amanda Sparks. She cracks me up. It was fun just hanging out with her and her husband. We watched this video and laughed our silly heads off. I know absolute blasphemy. I shouldn't laugh, but it's just funny.