Halloween

Well, check off another successful Halloween. Throughout the week we went to a couple of different parties for the kids, and got them all sugared up. Then On Halloween night we decided to boycott the trunk-or-treat. I HATE trunk-or-treat, like, real hate. So we had a party with a few friends who have the same opinion. We had chili, bread sticks, spinach/artichoke dip, Fresh apple cider, candies apples, and plenty of candy. We did some trick or treating, and a lot of visiting, and then it was time to go home and go to bed. AND THEN WE GOT AN EXTRA HOUR TO SLEEP! I LOVE THIS TIME OF YEAR. So here are the pictures:
Ethan didn't have much interest is getting his picture taken. He wouldn't pose or anything. Adia, on the other hand did this little foot pop thing. In every. single. picture. I don't know what that was all about.

But it's really in every picture-every one.

My mom grew these unbelievably gigantic pumpkins for the kids this year. They were really exciting.

Adia had to stick her whole head in to clean it out.

Ethan was so excited about the slimy mess. And the pumpkin seeds. I made our favorite yummy sugar and spice pumpkin seeds. He loves them.

This is a really bad picture, but it shows the giant pumpkin my mom grew next to the pathetic little tiny ones I grew. I thought it was funny.

Adia's pumpkin is supposed to look like sleeping beauty.

Ethan designed his own, but wouldn't pose next to it. By this time he was so over the pumpkin thing.

I made that!

No, not the girl (though I have kept her alive for over 4 years, so I deserve a little credit, right) No, I mean, I made the darling skirt that she is wearing. (I also made the cute little notebook/purse that she's holding) Cute huh? I also made this cute puzzle

And these pretty plates...


And this sweet buttercup bag

And this stationary box...



Full of cards, tags, and a notebook...

Plus a ton of other things that are either not quite finished, or they are gifts for people who read my blog, so I'm not posting them yet. I belong to a craft group. It's actually called our "Not a craft group" because we are too cool to belong to a craft group. (We obviously aren't as cool as we think we are, or we could come up with a better name, but that's another story...) I am really enjoying it, and just wanted to share a little bit. But then I realized that this is my 300th post! That's a lot of posting, don't you think? So I thought I should do something special. I have decided to give away one of my creations. So leave me a comment with your name and the item you would most like to win. (You can do this even if you don't have a blog yourself)(Oh, and if you like the puzzle blocks I would obviously use your pictures, not pictures of my kids:) For an extra entry tell me what your favorite post on my blog has been. The deadline to enter will be Friday November 6th at midnight.

The Pledge of Allegiance, Adia Style

Adia is learning the Pledge of Allegiance. I love it, it's so cute. But I was wondering if she really understood what it meant, so we broke it down and talked about it line by line. Here is what she says, and then what she says it means.
I pledge allegiance to the flag
I promise the flag gives me allergies

Of the United states of America
That's what flag it is that gives me the allergies

And to the public where witches dance
It's like when the witches dance down the street, like a parade or something

One nature thunder God
It's like being outside when Heavenly Father sends a thunder storm.

Invisible
No one can see you

With Liberty and Justice for all.
That means EVERYBODY has a Libby and a Justis (friends of ours)

Update on Gary Thornbaum and my car.

I have had a lot of e-mails regarding the status of my car situation, and I figured instead of writing it a million times I would just fill you all in together. Well, 10 days after my accident Gary Thornbaum finally cleared it with his insurance that it was, in fact, his fault, and he should pay to fix my car. So one afternoon I was packing our rental car because we were going to La Sal. (for a trip to see my newest "nephew" get blessed, that we thought we were invited to, and turns out that even though we had received two invitations, we may not have actually been invited to... But that's another story...) I was in the house getting some things, but the front door was open. All of a sudden I hear a truck stop in front of our house and a guy yelling "Hey in there. Hey! Hey!" SO I run to the door and the guy yells if I had a car that needed to be towed. I said yes, then he asked if it was drivable. I said that I could drive it, but because of damage to the breaks and the alignment I was told not to drive it very far. He said "good, do you think you can drive it up onto the truck for me?" He is still sitting in his lazy bum yelling out the window at this point. I told him that I probably could, but that he needed to guide me so I didn't fall off the edge or something. Then he got really grouchy and yelled "well, if I have to get out of the truck anyway, I might as well do it myself, don't you think?" I'm not sure what he was expecting me to say, but he looked pretty surprised when I said, Yup, your right, I'll grab the keys for you" Then he got it all loaded, and I signed some paperwork, and he went to leave. I noticed that he hadn't strapped it down yet. He was just going to drive way without it strapped to the truck! I commented on it and he told me that he had put the parking break on, so it would be fine. What?! I explained that the breaks were one of the problems with it, so that might not be a safe thing to count on. Then, all grumpy and eye rolling again, mumbling under his breath he strapped it down, and then took off before I could make him do any more work. This was probably the most he had worked all day long.
So all weekend long I worried about whether my car had actually made it to the shop or not. On Monday I kept calling and calling trying to check on it, and could never get a hold of anyone, and no one ever returned my messages. So finally on Friday, out of the blue I get a call from the shop telling me that they can START work on it probably the first part of NEXT WEEK! Again, WHAT?!? This is two and a half weeks after my accident, and still nothing has even been started. GRRR! And then I get a call from the rental people saying that Gary Thrnbaum's insurance didn't want to cover an SUV for me even though my original car was an SUV, so could I take it back and trade for an economy car? That is fine, I don't really HAVE to have an SUV, I don't mind having something smaller, but the problem is that the rental company is 30 minutes away, and I have a pretty busy life, and don't have time to just run down and change cars in-between all of the other stuff I had crammed into my day. I tell this to the rental place, and they say I should call the insurance company and tell them about it, so I'm feeling pretty feisty about the whole thing, and I do call the insurance company, and they tell me that they only talk to insurance companies, so I have to call my insurance company who calls Gary Thornbaum's insurance company and tells them that I shouldn't have to trade cars, because they are responsible for providing an equivalent to the vehicle that was damaged, but if they insisted on doing that they would have to pay for the rental company to drive to my house and trade out the car. (Which is pretty much what I would have told them if they would have talked to me, but whatever) So then Gary Thornbaum's insurance company called the rental place who called me (Because the insurance company really doesn't talk to "the offended party") and said that I didn't need to change cars after all. (Even though I had waisted my day making unnecessary phone calls, and cleaning out the rental car in anticipation of trading it, all for nothing.) So finally four weeks after my accident I get a call from the body shop telling me that my car should be ready in the next few days and they would call me when it was ready. Yay! Except that I didn't get a call, and I waited and waited, and still no call, so finally on Friday (four and a half weeks after my accident) I call them back and the lady who answers tells me "Oh, your car has been done for three days (THREE STINKIN' DAYS!) didn't anyone call you?" No, nobody bloody called me lady! "Oops, we told the rental company that we finished it three days ago, so I bet you have to pay for the extra days out of your own pocket. Bummer. Giggle, giggle." One more time WHAT!?!?!?!? So I call the rental place and tell them what happened, and they say the same thing that the body shop said, so I call the other insurance, whoops, I forgot that they don't talk to me, so I call my insurance who spends all weekend fighting it out with Gary Thornbaum's insurance company, and finally I don't end up needing to pay, Whew! And I have my own car back, Whew! and the whole thing is finally over, and hopefully I will never have to worry about Gary Thornbaum ever again. Crazy disaster of a life...

Sick, Sick, Sick

No, it's not the swine flu. It is a crappy sore throught, ear ache, and cough, and I am ready to be done with it. We have had it for over a week now, closing in on a week and a half actually. It started out with Adia, then got passed to me, then Adia felt better, and I felt crappier (Pretty sure I am going to get "spell-checked on that one)Then Adia felt crappier, and I felt better. They we both felt better, and Grandma and Grandpa came, then we felt crappy again, then better, and now this morning Ethan woke up feeling crappy. UGH! Will it ever end? Darn these low immune systems! Anyway, that's it for that news, tune in again soon, for more exciting stuff.

I know, I know...

I have been a blog slacker. It's true, I have plenty of excuses, but I'm sure none that you want to here, so I'll just blame it on life, and move on. Anyway, this is the first of many many posts that I want to write, so check back often to see what has been going on in the last nearly two weeks.
First of all let's talk about Grandma and Grandpa Fuller. They came up to Park City to get Grandpa Lane a new Snow Mobile, and even though we live an extra hour and a half out of their way, they came up for a little visit. I do mean little, they were here for less than 24 hours, but we LOVED having them here. They brought presents, and took us out to dinner. They let us order WHATEVER we wanted, which of course, meant an Ice Cream Sunday for dinner, for a certain little girl who may be a little spoiled. We stayed up late visiting, and got up early to do some more visiting. And even included Grandpa showing off his new toy. Then they were gone again in plenty of time for us to make it to church. Thanks for coming Grandma and Grandpa. We love you.
Oh, and on a side note, I didn't even take a single picture, can you believe it? But even if I had, I am having some problems posting pictures lately. It shows up as a code instead of a picture. If anyone knows how to fix that, please let me know. Thanks:)

Family Night

This week for our family home evening activity/treat we made this hunted gingerbread house. (Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the kit) We had a lot of fun with it except that the black frosting stained the kid's fingers, tongues and faces. (And did even worse things in the toilet the next day!) It didn't turn out quite as nice as the photo on the box, and Ethan kept saying "Good thing this is a HAUNTED house because it's looking pretty scary." The kids were really good about not sneaking candy off of it. It lasted until this morning when our friend Hannah, who is staying with us for a few days, decided to take a hunk of it for an after breakfast treat. (I'm sure her mom is groaning as she reads this-sorry Melissa, I'll try to take better care of her from now on:) After that it was free game, and there was no holding back. We did this activity after having a lesson about the temple to be built in Brigham City, and Adia kept trying to make comparisons between us building a haunted house and workers building the temple. It was cute because you could tell that she had listened a little bit to what we had said, but also a little disterbing because by the comparisons she was making it was obvious that she had missed the point a little. Oh, well, that's usually the case with our family nights. It will get better as they grow up right? (Just say yes, I really can't handle the truth yet:)




No Mom, I haven't been sneaking frosting!

The weekend

After THIS weekend we couldn't stop talking about all the fun we had. Grandma and Grandpa Eberling decided that they wanted in on the action, so they booked us two rooms for Conference weekend. We had a great time. The rooms we stayed in were suites, and they were beautiful. I especially loved the backsplash in the kitchen, I have been looking for one for our kitchen at home, and when I saw this one, I fell in love (That explains the really unflattering picture of Troy eating left overs. I didn't want to be a dork and take a picture of tiles, so I tried to capture them while taking a picture of Troy. It didn't work, so I finally broke down and just took a picture of it, so there you have it, I'm a dork, are you surprised?)We watched conference, ate out, did shopping, and went to the Living Planet Aquarium, Oh, and of course the water park. We had a really great time. Thanks Granma and Grandpa.

Have you heard?

This weekend was Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It is a time when we are able to learn directly from the words of our Prophet, his counselors, and other great leaders. It happens twice a year, and is a highlight for me. I always come away feeling spiritually fed, and ready to conquer the challenges in my life, and try to be more like my Savior. Another thing that they do every once in a while during Conference is announce new temples to be built around the world. This Saturday they announced Five new temples! All of them are important and special, but one is especially exciting for our family. A temple will be built in Brigham City Utah! WE LIVE IN BRIGHAM CITY UTAH! We are getting our very own temple. Pretty cool right? I can hardly wait. What a huge blessing.