Carving Pumpkins

Since the weather was nice, and I didn't want the mess in the house, we carved our pumpkins outside.

All bundled up ready to go.

Finished product: 

Dad made us a nice warm fire. 

And some yummy hot chocolate (or waisal) 

Kate's first ever cheerleading/dance performance

Westlake High School dance and cheer teams held a fundraiser that offered dance and cheer classes along with a performance during one of the high school football games.  Kate signed up right away. (Lauren declined although now she regrets it.)  After three practices they performed.  First the dance:

It's REALLY hard to pick her out but she's in the back row ready to squat down.

A HUGE group.

And the cheer portion.  We were able to see her a little better here. (She's right in the middle)

In the middle again.

Not sure if she wants to do it next year, but Lauren's ready to sign up.

Kate's 7th Birthday Party

Kate wanted a horse-themed birthday party this year. She also wanted to do carnival games for her party.  We asked everyone to come dressed in their cowgirl clothes.  I wish I had a better picture because they all  looked really cute in their outfits. (A few of them were missing in this picture)

This was one of the carnival games.  Can't remember the name of it but they knocked the bottles down with a ball.

Ring Toss

Wells and Marci came to help.  Wells got really tired of all the girl attention

Pin the tail on the donkey (or horse if you use your imagination)

Marci had to make sure the game worked correctly.  :) 

And the infamous homemade cake.  It's official, I'm done making homemade cakes.  All store-bought from now on.

Sand Dunes

Here's some awesome pics Jaron took of Todd. This was last fall.  Todd, Jaron, Tyson, Braden, and Nathan all went out for a boys weekend.

2010/2011 First Day of School

The girls were excited to start their first day of school this year, especially Kate who was starting a full day of school (I wish they were still excited about going. :) )  I wanted to make them their favorite breakfast, which is waffles with strawberries and whip cream.

Here they are in their cute uniforms and backpacks.  How cute are they???

Kate's Horse Lessons

Kate LOVES horses, so out of all the activities she had to choose from, she wanted horse lessons.  Although I thought it would be a phase, she still LOVES going after almost a year.  The horse is her teacher's horse.  Her name is Breezy and she's an old, gentle horse.  The pictures are horrible, I know, but we were inside a dusty, dimly-lit barn, so it's the best I could do.

 We had a fun hail storm one September night.  Madsen't were over for dinner, and as they were leaving, it started to hail.  We all sat watching on the front porch until it ended.  The girls were amazed the hail could be so big.  They spent 5 minutes trying to beat each other by finding the biggest hail in the grass.  (Don't look at my UGLY bare-feet in the first picture)

July Activities

I'm trying to catch up on my posts so I'm going all the way back to July.

Lauren had some flavored tootsie rolls she was eating one day.  She was sitting quietly at the table for awhile and I finally asked her what she was doing.  She brought over a tootsie roll flower she had rolled out and made.  I asked her where she learned to do it and she said she made it up by herself.  She's always liked playing with her food.  :)  So creative.

 This was our trip to Fairview for the 24th of July.  We camped at the campsites there at Skyline Resort and attended all the 24th activites like the parade, city breakfast, etc.  We also went to the drive-in in Mt. Pleasant.  We hauled the four-wheeler trailer behind the truck and everyone laid out their sleeping bags to enjoy the movie.  Half the kids were asleep when it was over, but they loved it!!!

 We did a lot of swimming too.  The diving board was a hit this year.  Even though the girls weren't daring enough to do any tricks, Todd was up for the challenge.  He had to show his nephews that he could still do a flip off the diving board.  I got half of him in the pic, but he did it.