Halloween and Other Fun

For Halloween we went to see Uncle Jeff at the fire station. He showed us the cool trucks and Easton liked sitting in the drivers seat.

Then we went trick or treating with Sarah, Jackson, and Gavin. Jackson was hilarious. He would have a full on conversations with everyone who opened the door and walked into a couple of houses. Easton caught on really quickly to how to get candy and would get his candy and immediately walk off to the next house. We were impressed with how far they went. Easton got tired for a little bit but didn't want to miss out on the candy so he kept going. Lydia did great until the very end, she was done walking in her high heels. Sophie on the other hand was ready to do another neighborhood she could have gone all night.

The next weekend we went to the Cops and Rodders show. The kids got to put together pine wood derby cars and race them. I completely forgot to take a picture of them finished.

Chad's work had a field day competition after and Chad's team dressed up in the 80's. We went to a thrift store beforehand to find some fun clothing.  I have been such a slacker in taking pictures I didn't get one of his whole awesome outfit. He had a hot pink puffy jacket that is missing in this picture.

 They played several different games and the kids had a blast playing at the park.

My parents are renovating their backyard and Chad went to help put new rock down for them. Easton was so excited to ride in "Papa Mirror's" Truck!!! He non stop talked all morning about getting to ride in Grandpa Miller's truck to get rocks. Chad took Jackson too and the boys had fun climbing the rock hill and loading the buckets.

Happy Birthday Sophie!!

Sophie turned 7 on the 29th....how on Earth did she get that old already? We decided to let them have a friend party every other year. This year Sophie wanted to have a Little Mermaid under the sea party.

Apparently I let them watch too much Cupcake Wars shows because Sophie was very particular on what her cupcakes needed to look like. She told me they had to be white cake, blue frosting, pink white chocolate seashells, and sprinkled with pearls. Silly girl. Lydia already has her design for cupcakes in to me for next month.

I had planned activities and games but the kids really just wanted to run around and play. So they had a blast. They did enjoy doing limbo though and even got Chad into it.

She was so excited for all of her friends to come over and had a great party.

For school we made play dough for all of her classmates and wrapped them up to look like pumpkins. Thanks to my awesome mother in law who cut cute little faces to put on the bags!

She has grown up so much this last year. She loves school still and is a perfectionist in pretty much everything. She has really started wanting to help with everything around the house which I am totally okay with. She is getting really good at reading now and needs just a little help when reading scriptures at night. She lost her two front teeth and while pulling them is a bit traumatizing she does enjoy sticking her tongue through.

I love having conversations with her on the way home from school since her siblings are usually asleep she talks like a little adult it is too funny. Happy Birthday to our awesome 7 year old!

The past few weeks

Holy moly I feel like time is flying! The past few weeks have been filled with doctors appointments, birthday party planning, and normal life. Chad was invited to a dinner for the credit unions in the area. He had no clue that this dinner was actually for Him! Chad won the HOPE (Helping People Everyday) award for the Southern Arizona Region! He worked so hard on developing a financial literacy program for teenagers and adults in the Tucson area. It has gone really well at the Boys and Girls Club of Tucson and is growing to other non-profits as well! We are so proud of him making a positive difference in peoples lives!!!

Chad got tickets to the Gaslight Theater which is so much fun to go to! Thank you Grandma and Grandpa Miller for taking the kiddos overnight! They had so much fun and so did we! We actually saw Henry Porter but these fun signs were out front.

We have been trying to catch as many Boise State games as we can and the kids love to wear their jerseys and cheer Boise State on! Before one game we took them to our favorite frozen yogurt place.

For family home evening this week we bought some pumpkins to carve. Easton dug right in while it took the girls a bit of convincing. Especially miss Sophie who hates getting dirty.

Easton of course needed a truck on his pumpkin while the girls designed a princess.

On Tuesday we went with Aunt Sarah and Uncle Jeff to their ward's trunk or treat!

Easton caught on very quickly that if walked up to anyone with a bucket of candy and said trick or treat he would get candy. He did say it to a few that didn't have anything haha. They had fun getting candy, playing games, and eating cotton candy.

Lydia and her friend Addyson performed some of the songs they have been learning in preschool yesterday. They had a little halloween party and it was so fun to see the two of them just happen to both be Elsa for halloween!

Recent Fun

A couple weeks ago we went to Safeway for Lydia's preschool field trip. They were awesome and showed the kids around the store and gave them little free samples.

The bakery was by far the best part of the store! They let the kids come back and the lady was so good with the kids showing them the big boxes of sprinkles and buckets of frosting! She let them have a little taste too.

She showed them all her fun tools and all the stuff she makes in the morning. She has to start at 2am! Then she had a cupcake for each of them to decorate.

She told them they can come back and say hi to her anytime and she would give them a free cookie. And she of course them gave them all cookies haha.

Then the kids got to go over to the seafood area and the gentleman there let them touch a crab claw and also had a little fun pretending it was his hand.

Then they took us to Starbucks where the nice ladies had chocolate milk all ready for them with whipped cream on top.

And last the nice bakery lady had a big batch of dough all mixed up and wanted to show the kids how the different machines work to make the different shaped bread and rolls.

To make french bread  was pretty cool. She would throw a chunk of dough like a frisbee into the machine and out it would come in a perfect loaf. We had so much fun at Safeway and the kids loved learning what went on behind the scenes.

Harley Davidson has built a new location here and about a month ago we drove past the building and Easton got all excited and exclaimed "it's a castle mom!!!" It really does look like a castle. I told him there was motorcycles inside the castle and ever since he has talked about how Dad needed to take him to the motorcycle castle. So last weekend we took him and also had Jackson with us. They were sooooooo excited to see all the bikes.

Then we headed next door to Ride Now to look at more fun toys.

Jackson and Easton really wanted to take these home. Jackson was hilarious because he was calling for Shama (Grandma Miller) thinking she would buy it for him. No luck kid haha.

Uncle Mike and his band played at the Sahuarita  Festival Saturday night so we went to check it out. It was a lot of fun. They had a free little ferris wheel and jumping castles. The band sounded great and the kids also enjoyed climbing the rock wall.

While I took the girls to the festival Chad took Easton to the U of A football game. His work gave them free tickets and Easton was talking nonstop on how he was going to watch football with Daddy.

Sadly the wildcats lost but Easton talked all the way home on how he did his cat cheers and he wanted the cats to win and he was a cats fan. Even when Chad asked him about being a Bronco fan he teased Chad and said he wasn't. Easton is a funny kid he is pretty talkative normally but if you end up one on one with him he talks your ear off. Chad luckily caught the conversation on video it was too cute.

30 Random Acts of Kindness for Our Favorite 30 year Old!

Since Chad turned 30 years old this year we did something extra special for this awesome man! His parents joined us on Saturday on a mission to perform 30 random acts of kindness! I meant to take a picture of all of them but kept forgetting but here is what we accomplished in 3 hours:

1. Chad spotted a gentleman on the side of the road with a flat tire and helped him out

2. We gave a box of candy to a Fire Station. When the girls gave the firefighter the box, mom told him it was in honor of their father's birthday. When they got back in the car Chad started laughing because he was sure that because of the way mom said it the firefighter thought "their father" was dead. So they were doing random acts of kindness to honor their dead father. haha

3. We also gave candy to the staff at University Medical Center Children's Center

4. We stopped at 2 Police Departments with no luck of finding anyone but Chad spotted some EMT workers parked in a parking lot! I am sure he scared them to death when he jumped out of the car and offered them the candy. They looked pretty apprehensive but then laughed and said thank you when he told them why.

5. Chad gave lollipops to the Boys and Girls Club 

6. We volunteered at Bens Bells

7. Mom donated some money to Bens Bells also

8. Smiled and made eye contact with 5 people

9. We took carts from the parking lot into the store

10. Held a door open for someone

11. Gave a compliment

12. We jumped out and helped a lady unload her groceries into her car

13. Picked up trash

14. We asked the Target cashier what her favorite candy bar was and bought her a Twix

15. We taped positive messages to the bathroom mirror in Target

16. We put quarters in the candy machines at Frys

17. Taped a note that said "You are an awesome Mom!" on the changing tables. 

18. The kids made thank you cards for military that said "Thank you for keeping us safe" I  am kicking myself for not getting a picture of this one. We stopped at Golden Corral and found a WW2 vet eating his dinner and the kids gave it to him. His face totally lit up and he told the kids they were so sweet. 

19. Passed out stickers to kids waiting in line at Target and Frys.

20. The kids put heads up pennies on the sidewalk for kids to find

21. Said hello to everyone we saw for 5 minutes

22. Placed happy notes inside books at Target

23. Gave popcorn to a couple renting a Redbox movie

24. Gave out Hi-Fives to people hanging out in front of the library

25. Left a note of encouragement on a random car

26. Let cars in front of us while we drove. 

27. Handed out lollipops

28. Picked up clothes that were dropped on the floor at Target and hung them back up

29. Left coupons next to items at Frys

30. Parked in the back of the parking lot everywhere we went to leave the front spots for others.

31. Handed out bottles of bubbles

32. Sent a picture "I Love You" text message to a bunch of people we love

Okay so we ended up doing extra since 2 were unplanned but it was a lot of fun. It was funny to see people's reactions. Most of the time they looked at us like crazy people but once we explained what we were doing they would smile and say happy birthday to Chad and say what a great idea it was.

Happy birthday to the best guy ever!!!