The rest of October

I can't believe how fast October flew by! We were all very busy! 

Here are a few highlights...

I am watching these two cute things on Tuesdays and Thursday. They are a highlight of my week. 

Not sure what she was looking at??

He discovered the trampoline and loved it!

Jack learning how to drive!

 Company

One of our very good friends David Demars came to visit us. He was in town for a meeting so we had him over for dinner.  John was one of Davids counselors when he was our Bishop back in the Liberty Lake ward up in Spokane. He is amazing. We just wish Sheryl could have come with him! We had a great time catching up on our lives.

Buddies

Relief Society Retreat

We had a Relief Society retreat up at Brenda Jacobson's cabin in Pine Valley Utah. I have been suggesting one ever since we moved here. (we used to do them in Spokane) 

Before I got released from Relief Society I planned one! It was such a blast! I hope they make it a tradition! The cabin was beautiful, the company was great, the food was yummy! and we laughed so hard we cried! We stayed up until about 3:30am talking and laughing! 

Melody, Kathy and Christy

 We woke up and had breakfast outside and enjoyed the sunshine! It was just gorgeous out! It was dark when we arrived, so it was our first view of the surroundings. Their cabin was nestled up against a mountain and the leaves were changing and it was beautiful!

Jamie, Teresa, Teresa, Corine, Lynette

Corine, Lynette, Sonya's sister and Joan

Amy, Chantelle and Amber

Michele and Sonya

Brenda, Jamie, Teresa and Teresa

The beautiful view out back

Enjoying the sunshine and visiting

Carrie and Marianne 

Abby, Michele and Sonya

Out front

 The rest of the month has been busy with wedding planning!!!!

It has consumed my life... my thoughts, my dreams and my time! 

This was a trial run for a possible dessert idea. It was a failure. (just so you know, caramel doesn't stick to the cut edge of the apples! Only the skin. The good note, is that they did taste good!)

They were suppose to look like this: 

Needless to say we have changed the menu! You will have to come and see what it is!

 More wedding! Tanner has earned a few dollars painting and working on other projects for me.

Tanner putting pictures in all the frames for the tables

 Wedding shopping

Grabbing lunch at Capprioti's  while we were out shopping for boys wedding outfits...

Mitchell trying on clothes at the Rack.

John send this pic to Ashley and told her he was wearing it at the wedding... haha. That didn't go over very well! 

 Blessings in my life!

I broke down and asked for help! Why is that so hard to do??? Ashley and I have spent hours and hours making the centerpieces for the reception. They are so cute, but very time consuming. I had about 30 left to do and John made me ask for help. My friends came to the rescue and helped me get them all done! It was amazing! We had fun chatting all day! Some stayed for an hour and some stayed for 6! Some even came back later in the day! Keri had us over for dinner because she knew I hadn't even thought about it that day! Thank You to all of you!!!

Kim, Sherry, Rene'e and Sonya

Brenda and Kaleen

Pam and Caroline

Jamie

Kathy and Lynette

Nickee and Sonya

Sherry, Scotty and Nickee

 I might get in trouble for posting pics of these already... oh well. Act surprised when you walk in the reception.

 Chef Tanner

 Tanner had a book report due this month and he made fortune cookies to go along with it. They really good!!! and he got an A+ on his assignment! 

Crazy boy!

We watched several you tube videos to get them down!

hot hot!

He wrote little messages from the book inside of them!

 The best thing that happened this month is this little arrival!!!!!

I have waited years to get my hands on this! First I waited a few years for Verizon to offer it because I didn't want to switch to AT&T. A few months before the Verizon iPhone announcement, John got me Droid. I liked my little droid, but I didn't feel complete with it. I wanted all of my Apple products to sync. So, I had to wait another year and a half for an upgrade to get it. I ordered this the day it was announced!

I must say I love it!! I love the feel of it, I love how smooth it works, I love that it syncs with my iMac and my iPad. I am so happy! 

Happy Halloween!

I know you are thinking that these boys are too old to go trick or treating... oh well. They went and they had a good time. They went to the ward trunk or treat and then went out in the neighborhood. 

Tanner, Tyler and Jonah

Tanner and his loot

Tyler and his candy. He sorts his just like I always did!

Jonah sorted his by chocolate and sugar.

I am sure I have missed a few October things. John and I both got new callings. I am helping with the ward Christmas party and Webelo's and teaching primary. So much for the break the Bishop said I was going to get. haha. John got called to be on the stake high council. He will do great. He is excited to be over missionary work.

Ashley came home a few times to help with wedding plans. She also went through the temple. I will do a separate post on that.

The wedding is in 7 days! I hope we are ready!

Will miss her...

We gave a little piece of our family away on Tuesday. We gave our turtle, "mom" to the Dye's pond. She was growing so fast and I couldn't keep her tank clean for more than about a week. It's a real pain to clean and I am sure she was going crazy in her little 20 gallon tank. I must say, I miss her! I miss watching her get excited when I fed her, I miss hearing the constant sound of her water filter (it sounded like a waterfall) and I miss talking to her as I do the dishes. Ashley thinks we gave her away because I hated her, thats NOT true. (You can read more of her feelings on her blog here.) I love our little turtle! I just knew she needed a bigger home.

We asked our friend Kathy if she had ever considered getting turtles for her pond and she said she had just been looking into getting one! Yahoo! So we took her over and "mom" was so happy. She just swam around and floated like she was in heaven! We can visit her anytime we want. She has fish to play with and Kathy said she might even get her a friend!

Look how little she was when Ashley got her! She was so cute!

Can you see how dirty her tank got??

Mitchell letting her go...

She was playing with the fish! Hopefully she won't eat them!

Just chilling in the lily pads!

Look how pretty the pond is! We will miss you little turtle!!

BPC Retreat

Last weekend (Oct. 6-8) I went a short company retreat with my little job I have. (In case you forgot, I do a little work for my friend Stacy and her company BigPictureClasses.com. ) I was thrilled that i was invited to come since I only work about 10-20 hours a month. The retreat was up in Washington in a little town called Leavenworth. I LOVE Leavenworth, it is so beautiful!. It's a little Bavarian-style village nestled up in the Cascade mountain range. It is where you go to get away from the city and you feel like you are in another country. In the fall the leaves are beautiful and you can watch the Salmon spawn up the river and in the winter you can ski and cross country ski and the summer is just gorgeous with lakes and rivers nearby. There are lots of fun shops in town to explore. I don't think I had been there since Ashley was a toddler.

I had a bit of a challenge getting there! I should have know that when I got to the airport and my flight gate changed 3 times that I was in for a long day! (and they weren't in the same terminal! I got my exercise!) I had to be leave for the airport at 4:30am because my flight left at 6:00. I was on a flight to Spokane, WA and it stopped in Reno and Boise! Crazy Southwest! We were all meeting in Spokane and then driving the 3 1/2 hours to Leavenworth together. We were all to arrive around 10am and get to Leavenworth for lunch. When I got to Boise I got a text from Wendy asking if my flight was going to make it since one of the girls from Denver had her flight cancelled. I figured something was wrong in Denver and said yes! We are leaving in 5 minutes. About the time we were suppose to land the captain gets on the intercom and says we can't land in Spokane because of thick fog! ugh! (fog in October is pretty strange! ) The flight was headed to Portland next, so that is where we landed. After talking to Kayce and Stacy, we came up with a plan. The fog was not expected to lift, so I rented a car and drove to Seattle and picked up Dani who was stuck there and then the 2 of us drove to Leavenworth and met everyone there. It was fun to get to know Dani, I had never met her, just emailed her. I left the airport at 12:30 and got to Leavenworth at about 5:45... 5 hours and 285 miles!

It killed me to drive through Bellevue and not have time to call my family there! The good news is that is was a beautiful day and I really enjoyed the drive. the leaves were changing and everything was so green! I was in heaven! The retreat was at a place called the Sleeping Lady. It was nestled in the mountains on the Icicle river. It was so pretty! I wanted to spend every minute outside! I kept asking if we could have our meeting by the river! Unfortunately we needed a computer and powerpoint. We did a lot of team building and communication activities. I learned lots!!
 

Stacy and I after an amazing meal. The food was to die for!

Wendy, Me and Stacy. It was great to be with these 2 great friends!

Sarah, Kayce and Dani.

I really wanted to jump in the river. it was so pretty!

Wendy and Stacy

Kathy and Kiley. (Kathy did all the team building and communication activities for us. She is amazing! )

Brandi and Wendy

Wendy and I enjoying the beautiful surroundings!

Kayce and Sarah

The place we stayed was amazing. They had beautiful artwork everywhere! I loved this little guy!

The food was SO GOOD! All the fruit was fresh and everything was organic and prepared so good. On the menu they would list all the local farms that all the food came from. SO cool!

The river we were on...

More art work... a Dale Chihuly piece. It was lit up at night!

Again, the food was so good! Fresh and full of spices and flavors!

The view from the restaurant.

They had these cool fish all over the river bank.

So pretty!

On Friday we spent a few hours walking around the shops in town. It was so fun! Lots of fun things. We didn't have enough time!

Wendy and Dani

The tree's were just starting to change...

I had a great time getting to know the BPC team! I work with some amazing ladies!! I wish I had more time to visit family and friends in my home state... oh well. I kept telling myself I was in Nebraska or somewhere that I knew no one! We drove home through eastern Washington and flew home from Spokane. Luckily my trip home was non eventful! I litterally drove all ove rthe state by the time I went home!