Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a nice thanksgiving with Aaron's family. It was fun and I was glad to hang out and relax in a comfy home. I feel cold at my house.

Things have gotten better for us. The car is fixed and so is the oven. I'm feeling much better. My back gives out after too much strain. Otherwise, we're back to being a boring family.

It's raining...

...misfortune, that is. I wouldn't say it's pouring yet. Our oven's bake element went out. Aaron didn't know to turn off the breaker before removing it and broke a piece. We had to wait three days for the repairman to come out and fix it. Aaron refused to buy the element from the repairman, which is frugal, but we have to wait. He took two days to find and order one off the internet. It is frugal. We still have 5-8 days left to wait for our element. I'm tired of eating soup! I am also not yet going out. I took Caitlyn to dance class this week. I was in such pain from bending over to buckle Ben that we stayed in the car for an hour in order to not have to buckle Ben again. I am not going to the store and we are out of bread products. I would bake bread if only we had an oven. Then the other night as Aaron was traveling to Salt Lake for Bell practice his car broke. It was fixed yesterday, but it broke again on the way to work. Ford paid for the tow truck the second time and didn't charge for labor. The first time they replaced a part broken by the origional broken part. I'm so glad Aaron got a good bonus.

Last week while I was couch-ridden I sent Aaron to the library with the kids. He came back with a book on the linguistics of Tolkien's Hobbits. It was so interesting that I engaged in reading The Lord of the Rings. I'm in The Two Towers now. It is an engaging story, but I am not yet a fanatic (I doubt I ever will be.) as are some like my husband.

Events

A week ago I took advantage of a sale on powdered and brown sugar. I had one bag of 16 pounds of brown sugar. The other had 8 pounds of powdered sugar. I was in productive mood and went flying down the stairs with my sugar to put away. When I was 1/3rd of the way down my foot slipped and I felt the sensation that I was flying. I started unconsciously screaming and I don't scream. I went to the doctor. I've pulled some butt muscles and bruised my tailbone. I'm still in a lot of pain and can't sit. I wish I could have broken my arm instead.

Ben got his 5th tooth last night. The sixth should be in any time soon. He's been sleeping with me at night. I really want this tooth business to end so he will be back to his own crib. We tried the "mommy shirt trick" last night. It lasted about an hour, which is more time than he had previously been spending in his crib.

Aaron's big news is that he is now a member of the Tabernacle Bell Choir. He's a substitute until someone quits or becomes pregnant. It's exciting.

Halloween and pumpkins!

We had a lovely Halloween. Okay, it was busy and crazy, but the kids had fun. We baked most of the day and then carved pupmpkins. The kids drew their faces (or Emily drew hers, Eric's, and Karen's- all the same and Caitlyn drew hers.) I took the liberty to make Karen's different.


Then they got into costume. The girls were Mary, Laura, and Carrie. Eric was a crocodile and Ben a dragon.




They went out and got tons and tons of candy. I need to find someplace to donate it.

The day after Halloween was pumpkin cooking day. I cooked all four jack o'lanterns.



Caitlyn's


Karen's


Emily's


And Eric's. (I forgot to take the picture prior to slicing in half.)


What I did with the pumpkin after baking it. This is Karen's and maybe Eric's.




This is Emily's and Caitlyn's.



This was last night's dinner: Pumpkin Chili. It was really good!


Here's my giant pumpkin which I haven't carved yet.


I am tired of pumpkins!!! Today is a day to take it easy, clean house, and order pizza.