The F's of Fall!

I love fall...such a great time of year! This year, our fall has been all about F's - fair, fun, flu, football, and finding employment!

The Utah State Fair started fall off nicely!

Here's Dave milking a "cow"! Yeah, he likes to milk it, that's for sure. For those of you who don't know, our first date was at the Fair, and so we go every year.

The unusual is always found at the fair. This year, we ran into this crazy robot man.

As soon as the robot started talking toward Cal, he began screaming! It was pretty sad!

Now he's happy!

The butter cows - I think Emma is drooling! She loves butter and tries to eat it plain!

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mma riding on the "sweet John Deere" (as she described it to us) that was at the Little Hands on the Farm exhibit.

We also always go to Peach Days up in Brigham City. Our favorite entry in the parade are the Star Wars characters each year!

Dave at the car show. He really liked this car.

Emma waving at the parade! She loves parades!

Our family under the shade of the tree. Little did we know, right where we were sitting is where the new temple will be built! How exciting to have another temple within close driving distance!

Fall is oh-so-fun!! This year, fall began so warm! We were able to play outside lots and have fun, even swimming at the end of September!

Fun with friends! We've been having Aidan and Maddie Mead coming over twice a month all day, and there have been lots of good times. Here's Emma and Aidan with their messy hands making some playdough.

And the googly monster eyes they made.

Vampires!

For Callahan, it's always time for FOOD! Here he is after falling asleep in his food.

Emma doing her makeup. Yep, she's growing up way too fast!

Callahan eating, again! He loves to eat and loves to get it all over, too!

Emma's favorite activity lately is dressing up. She loves to play pretend! We go to the D.I. and find new dresses for her and she just has a ball!

Cute little boy! He's getting so big though! He loves to watch his big sister, that's what he's doing in this picture.

Emma posing for a picture in the high-heels she was dancing in. She was eating an orange, but she's always ready to ham it up!

Callahan - so much fun! His sore on his face is from a sunburn. He wasn't out in the sun long, but with the skin cream he has for his eczema, we thing he had a wierd reaction.

And now to the not-so-fun F of our fall - the FLU! Dave, Cal and I all got the swine flu. Luckilly, Emma never got it. Needless to say, we're glad that's over with. Poor little Cal didn't want to do anything! He just wanted to hold me and moan. He had a hard time breathing. It was pretty scary, but he got over it.

Here's Dave in my "original snuggie". My mom made these for us for Christmas when I was a teenager. Amazingly, it kind of fit him. Usually, he'll pick up my clothes and say "I wore that size in 3rd grade!" We'd get the chills and then be really hot when we got the swine flu. Dave and Cal also got the stomach flu this past week.

The next F of fall is FOOTBALL! Dave loves football! And I can say, I'm trying hard to enjoy it! I like football, but for me, it's kind of slow.

Here is the painful TCU vs. BYU game we went to. We have season tickets that we split with Dave's brother Randy, so the boys go to 2 games together, Dave and I go to 2 together, and Randy takes a date to 2 games.

Notice the smiles on our faces? Yeah, that picture was taken before the game. He he! We have the coolest people that sit by us. All of these old ladies who scream the whole game and get more into it than their husbands, and Dave's bosom buddy on his left that he discusses the games with.

We went to the WSU homecoming game. Cal had a good time, but got sunburnt, as I mentioned. My mom is a Weber alum, by the way.

Emma is a little wildcat fan! Here she is holding her purple kitty!

Weber State, Weber State, great great great!

Viewmont Vikings! Dave played football at Viewmont High School, so we went to a game one friday night. Emma loves letters, and thought this V was so cool!

Emma wanted to take pictures at the game. Here's one she took. Callahan really just wanted to get down and crawl in the stands. You can't really see it, but Dave has a Vikings football shirt on.

Finding employment takes us to our last F. Dave has been searching, applying everywhere (well, every hospital or clinic) for the last 3 months! It is so frustrating for him because he tries his hardest, and nothing. The lower grade jobs all go to those without degrees, because he's overqualified and they'd have to pay him more. And the higher-paying college degree jobs all want people with 3 to 5 years of experience. And it's really to the employer's advantage right now, as there are so many applicants for each job. Many other jobs applications or resumes have been sent on to the next level, but then Dave will get an e-mail saying they are canceling that job all together and giving that work to another person to do to consolidate. So poor boy! He has had kind of a hard time. But he has an interview Monday, so everybody wish him luck. Thanks to everyone who has been praying and fasting on our behalf. We really appreciate it and have been greatly blessed by the Lord.

Speaking of jobs, I kind of started my own little business this past month. I named it Jar Bazaar! (but I'm also considering "All Bottled Up", what's your vote?) and I make things with jars. I got the idea because I hated throwing away all of the baby food jars, because we don't have recycling for glass, and I knew there must be something that I could do with them.

My friend Calena Miller asked me if I wanted to do a boutique with her, so I decided I'd do it. It was a fun experience! And I got an idea for what people like, and if there is even a market for this type of thing.

I make "Greeting Jars", like greeting cards. It's like a card/little present in one.

Some have candy or treats in them.

This is a "Date Jar". Dave and I started our own date jar 5 years ago, and a friend suggested I make some and sell them. They are filled with fun date ideas. Each week, the husband/wife is instructed to take turns picking an idea out of the jar, and do the necessary planning for a great date night! I also made kids/toddler's idea jars, so when kids say "Mom, I'm bored!" they can pull an idea for a great activity to do at home.

This is a "warm fuzzy" jar. None of these picture have the labels on them, but the finished product has a quote by President Monson.

I make holiday jars with things in them - candy, ornament hangers, batteries with labels that say "batteries included", and Christmas countdown chains. They are for giving as little neighbor or friend gifts.

The large holiday jars have all of the symbols of Christmas in them, and attached is the story "Teach the Children the True Meaning of Christmas". Each jar has a chocolate santa, star cookie cutter, red and green ornaments, candle, mini-wreath, pine sprig, a candy cane, and chocolate gifts.

This is the Thanksgiving jar, filled Thanksgiving Blessings mix and a label explaining what Thanksgiving is all about.

I can make custom jars for weddings, party favors, place settings, gifts, etc. Here are a few of the wedding rice jars.

I made these little pincushion jars also. They turned out pretty cute.

So that's about it! This blog brought to you by the letter F and the number 2!

This is Halloween!

I know it's been a while, and I need to update, but I just had to get to Halloween! Halloween is probably one of our favorite days of the year! We love it! Take a peek at some of some of our fun Halloween happenings...

The Halloween Carnival at Tolman Elementary. Here's a pic of the kids with Grandma Sue and Auntie Julie!

Rat football was Emma's favorite thing at the Halloween Carnival.

Pumpkin Party Toddler Time at the Treehouse. Their costumes weren't done yet, so we put Cal in his Batman pajamas, and pulled out Emma's Cinderella dress from her birthday.

My Prince came to rescue me!

We made some fun Halloween crafts, including Mr. Bones, our milk jug skeleton, and here are some bat finger puppets we made.

My Wicked pumpkin I carved! I thought it turned out pretty well.

Our family of pumpkins. We had our pumpkin carving party and watched "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown", made caramel popcorn balls for the neighbors, and ate pizza and pop.

The kids pumpkins. Emma's was a kitty and Cal's was a baby.

This was the night we went to the Halloween block party in Grandpa Dan and Grandma Sue's neighborhood. The kids warming up afterwards.

Emma drinking her Jones soda, candy corn flavor. We hung out with Amy and Kolby at Grandma Di and Grandpa Scott's, ate jack-o-lantern pizza, did spooky sidewalk chalk and more!

Cal with his "Got Candy?" shirt. We let him try a few tastes of chocolate and suckers and he loved it and got the biggest grin on his face when it melted in his mouth. When we took it away, he screamed!
Emma trying on my Elphaba tights.

This year for Halloween, we were the cast from Wicked. These costumes were months in the making, as we really get into this holiday in our home and we are planning well in advance. I think they turned out pretty well, what do you think?

I was Elphaba, the witch.
Dave was Fiyero, the stud of the show.

Emma was Glinda (or Galinda) the good witch. Here she is at our ward Halloween party with her cute friend Arianna. Our last day in the University 15th ward was this past Sunday, we're moving on to the family ward. We'll miss everyone!

How does she compare?

Callahan was a flying monkey, and unlike the slightly frightening version in the musical, he was a cutie!
Trick-or-treat! Emma really got into it this year. We went with Tayla and Kaison, our neice and nephew. She kept asking me "Mom, is it really Halloween?" like she was in disbelief. And her and Tayla would run from house to house, so excited! It was pretty fun! I loved seeing all of the other cute kids in the neighborhood.

While trick-or-treating, many would say to Emma, "Oh, what a pretty princess!" She would look at them and tell them simply that she wasn't a princess, she was a witch. "I'm Glinda the good witch." It was also funny because Tayla was the wicked witch while Emma was the good witch.

We always have a chili party on my side of the family for Halloween. We ate chilli and all the fixings, had Halloween cookies and more. We had a great time playing ghost dart ball, and pin the nose on the pumpkin. Here's the Stoddard crew. Marko dressed up like an emo boyscout, my Mom was Sherlock Holmes and my dad was a Utah fan.

Happy Halloween!