Birthdays, Costumes and Awards

All the kids helping Brett stack the wood. What good helpers. Sadie turned 11 years old on October 18th.

Pumpkin carving was fun. The kids had "pumpkin guts" stuck to them everywhere!

Sadie the black cat, Jackson as Spiderman, Cody the pirate "ARGH" and Greg as "The Thing" from Fantastic Four.

The kids all drew pumpkin designs and then we used one thing from each drawing. The top pumpkin has Cody's eyes/brows and Jackson's mouth and the bottom one used Sadie's eyes and Greg's mouth.
Sadie holding her awards. One from the Post Register and the other from the school board here in Rigby.

OK, so here I am working on a blog post instead of studying for an exam I have on Monday. Don't worry, I think that I have my priorities right where they should be for the moment. There is always more time to study. As you can see from the photos above, we have definitely been keeping busy. At the beginning of October Brett and his Dad went and cut a ton of firewood and the kids spent an entire Saturday morning helping to get it all stacked. Sadie's birthday was spread out over an entire week. Brett was going hunting on her birthday, so we did gifts Friday night, she spent her day with her friends, and then on Sunday we did her favorite meals. The next weekend I took her and a friend to see High School Musical 3 in the theater. It was a fun girls "date". Halloween came and went without too much to complain about. The kids were really good about costumes. Jackson said that he didn't care that he was Spiderman last year, we live somewhere new, so nobody knows. I thought that was pretty good thinking. Greg was pumped that we got his costume off of eBay. I tried to convince the kids to be the Fantastic Four, since we have 3 boys and 1 girl, but they all looked at me like that was the stupidest idea ever. Oh well, a mom has to try right? Most recently, this past week, Sadie was recognized for an essay she wrote. The Idaho Falls newspaper (The Post Register) had an essay contest on diversity. Her language arts teacher told them that they could enter it for extra credit. Sadie, being the student and writer that she is (her goal in life is to be an author) entered. She wrote the essay without any help from us or her teacher. She received an honorable mention in the 6th grade division. You can read her essay online at http://www.postregister.com/essays/.

As for Brett, he is almost in full swing with his trap line. He has been concentrating on getting his bait caught first. Now he is focusing on his hunts. He has a pretty good deer and elk hunt this year, so he has been going as much as he can. He has been great getting the kids off to school everyday and helping around the house so much. I don't know how I could do this without him. I have been kept busy with school. I am finally learning how to use all the instruments that dental hygienists get to use. It is a bit stressful, but exciting too. Truly, school has been flying by. I only have 4 weeks or so left in the semester and I will be 1/4 of the way done with my program! It is going really fast.

I hope that all of you are well and, in this season of Thanksgiving, that you are beginning to focus on all that we have to be grateful for. I, for one, am grateful that I don't have to listen or view any more political adds for a while. Keep in touch!

Oh! Also, for a good laugh, check out my Brother/Sister in law's blog which is linked on the right side of my blog - living the high life. They have a hysterical video of our neice.