Private? Hmmm....

Have recently thought about making our blog private....
Any thoughts?
I've always been of the opinion that I don't care who looks at this, but recently I'm rethinking that.
I can't decide.
Let me know what you think.

Halloween - Finally Over!

Halloween was a bit weird for us this year. Bryan was busy doing some side work for his mom's boss, and I had the joys of having to work overtime. So it was kind of hard to stay in a "festive" mood when we had so many other things going on.

And I swear, Halloween lasted for over a week. We had our ward Trunk or Treat last Friday (no pictures, I know, lame), and the celebrating just continued on from there.

Here's Lo with some kids in her class for their little Halloween party. LOVE Miss Elissa's costume -hilarious.

Lo & Sage (Glenda the Good Witch)

(Lo was supposed to look like Tinkerbell, but ended being some strange ballerina/fairy princess/Tinkerbell combination. Whatever - she loved it.)

Originally Mya's costume was a bumblebee. I made a yellow & black tutu, she had wings & antennae, adorable. But she broke her tutu at the Trunk or Treat, and I didn't want to fix it, so she got to wear Lauren's elephant costume from last year. Which was actually cuter, and really warm, so it all worked out.

And Lauren was so cute - I thought I'd have to take her up to every door & stand there with her, but she marched her little fairy self right up to the door, knocked, shouted "Trick or Treat" and then an appropriate "Thank you!" when candy was dropped into her bucket. But she did get very distracted, and a little freaked out, if people had too many scary decoration on their house.
Mya just sat happily and quietly in the wagon and talked to everyone walking by.

I opened the door to my favorite dressed up trick-or-treaters. I hope you can make the picture bigger to see the detail on Jess's awesome jacket! And yes, it did smell faintly of smoke, which made it even more awesome. And again, yes, Greg is definitely wearing guy liner.

Ty, Jennie, Makayla, Annie, Greg, & Jess all came over for some soup, cookie decorating, and pumpkin cheesecake. Mmmmm. And I have no idea why I didn't take any pictures of everyone! I'm telling you, I wasn't myself that night. But thanks guys, for making my night much more enjoyable! Lo & Makayla got to do a little more trick-or-treating with eachother - those 2 thoroughly enjoy eachother. It's so cute!
I know it's sad, but I'm quite happy to have Halloween over and done with this year. I just couldn't get into it! Let's just move on to Thanksgiving, shall we?

And here - thought I'd share this with you all. I'm probably about 7 in this picture and I have NO idea what I'm supposed to be. Little Miss Muffet maybe? Anyway, my aunt posted it on her blog, and I very much enjoyed it.

Called to Serve

TREVOR

Rover, Roark, Roadkill, Roro, Trev, Ears...and I'm sure there are countless other nicknames for my baby bro that I don't even know of.

Today the girls and I ran down to see him one last time before he left to the MTC.

I'm gonna miss this lurpy kid - always smiling, always joking around, always laughing at himself.

It's amazing how it really, truly feels like yesterday he was 5.

Sometimes I feel a little cheated - being so much older than him, Scott, & McKell. I've missed out on so much of their teenage lives.

But over the last year or so, we've all become closer as adults.

We enjoy eachothers' company so much, and we always have so much fun when we're all together.

I can't wait to see how his mission helps him grow.

After he was set apart last night, I couldn't help but see him as a young man now, instead of this little kid. (I use the term "little loosely - the kid is 6' 5")

We're all so proud of him, and I can't wait to hear every detail of his mission and the amazing experiences I know he's going to have.

LOVE YOU TREVOR!!!

Karma

This just goes to show you that sometimes when you give a gift that you actually want for yourself, the hubs just might come home with a pepto bismol pink one for you!

**sigh of happiness**

Teething = My Enemy

Why does getting a couple of molars spark this demon within my baby??
Wednesday night - had to be held ALL NIGHT LONG in order to sleep. Slept in bed a total of 2.5 hours.
Thursday night - actually slept in bed from 10 until 5:30
Friday night - once again had to be held to sleep. Total time sleeping in bed? 45 minutes!!!!
Left cheek is BRIGHT red.
Drool amount is incredible.
You may be thinking "Hey Kiersti, maybe it's not her teeth?" Yeah, I thought that too, and Bryan took her in to the Dr. Thursday night.
Ears? Clear
Throat? Clear
Everything clear
But funny story came from the on-call doc. He asked Bryan if we had ever talked about our kids and organ donation. Weird, right? Then he said "Because if there was ever a need for cheek donations, your kid could donate for at least 5 others." Classic.
Anyway, so it's the teeth.
I don't know how much more of this I can take.
I'm chronically sleep-deprived anyway because of our schedules, but this is ridiculous.
No one can sleep comfortably on a couch for any period of time with a 20 lb. baby on their chest.
And now I have a sneaking feeling that this whole "hold me while I sleep, my teeth hurt" is going to turn into "hold me while I sleep, because I decided that I really like it, so now I'm going to scream until you do".
And I won't.
This could be a REALLY long next week or so.....
Wish me luck.

Back from the 619

This is a little taste of the pictures my awesome cousin Suz took of our family a few weeks ago - and I can't wait to see the rest! I also think it's a great representation of me & my cheesy siblings. If we are asked to pose for pictures, this is what you get.

I have NO pictures from the actual trip.

That's what happens when your husband takes the bags out of the car at the airport.

Anyway. here are some things I learned while down in mostly-sunny So Cal:
You can fit a Ford Focus basically anywhere
I offiicially HATE football talk
I officially HATE football on TV
But I very much enjoy a live BYU game
The late 80's, early 90's was not a good time in interior design history
9 people can stay in the same house and still be laughing when they leave
Boys stink
My hubby gets the shopping bug on vacation just like I do
Airports are very flexible on what they consider to be a "carry-on"
I wish there was a fro yo joint on every corner here
My hair does hilarious things in the morning fog
Window coverings are a necessity
When you think everyone will forget your b-day, you log on to find over 50 Facebook "happy b-day" wall posts
The San Diego temple really does look like a princess castle
I think 75 is the optimum temperature
You can fit 7 people in a Ford Edge, you just have to be creative
Mya has the craziest "I've missed you!" freak out I've ever seen
You can eventually tune out anyone
Lauren actually prefers that we leave - which I guess is better than crying and screaming
Holly packs a great little b-day package "from Davis" - thanks Holly!
Pidgeons can still walk with broken feet
Beaches can be really creepy at night
Satellite radio is.....interesting
I will take a paper map over a GPS any day
My baby looks a whole lot bigger then when I left
Carlsbad has a killer Outlet Mall
And a killer fish/steak restaurant
I don't know how I feel about 29
We're so blessed to have such great family we can trust our girls with, and who are so willing to take them so we can run off & have fun
My family is hilarious, and I love them so much
I still can't figure out why when the question "should we eat here" is posed, 8 faces automatically all turn in my direction
An unexpected birthday card & gift from a friend is a great pick-me-up
San Diego is apparently a hot spot for childhood friends to vacation the same weekend
4 days is almost too long to not see my girls
And not quite long enough to spend alone with Bryan

Good to be home

The Zoo in the Fall

Monday I decided that I wanted to take the girls to the zoo one last time before it got too cold. And we all know, living in Utah, that could be at any minute. So we packed up the new wagon and headed up first thing in the morning. It was jacket weather, and it was fabulous! No crowds, and all the aminals were out.

One of the tiger cubs

The new baby elephant
Lo got really mad after I took this picture, because I was supposed to be taking pictures of the animals. Not her.
I'm so glad we went, we had a blasty blast and I was glad we were finally able to go when it wasn't raining or we had somewhere else we had to be. We just took our time and really enjoyed ourselves. Can't wait to go again in the spring!