Halloween Dress Rehearsal

Earlier this month we went to the Disney Store for their Halloween Dress Rehearsal. I really love the Disney store, and this experience made me love them even more!
Our Ladybug:

Rapunzel:

They made treat bags:

Got prizes and a treat (fruit crisps):

Then a costume parade:

It was so much fun and I'm so glad we went. The staff is so friendly and the girls felt so special.

This last weekend was our church Halloween activity. It was also lots of fun.

I made eyeball cake pops and displayed them like so:

It was a challenge to make them, but I'm glad I did!

One of the missionaries makes balloon animals and even though she refuses to talk to him, Whitney was thrilled for her purple horse!

I'm so excited that Halloween is tomorrow. Our plans are still tbd but rest assured that I will be posting pics soon of what we decide to do! I hope you all have a fabulous and very sweet holiday!

Conference

So every 6 months our church broadcasts a conference. More info here. Sometimes 8 hours over two days of older men talking can be hard for little ones to watch. My kids are getting older and I decided to try to get them as excited as possible for conference this time. I got lots of different activities and ideas (mostly from pinterest) to try, to see what would work best for my kiddos. I wanted to share them with you guys in case you need some ideas.

I wanted to try to keep it as church themed as possible so they could tell a difference in what we were doing. Wal-mart had all their school supplies on clearance so they each got a tote and folder to organize their goodies. They also got little princess books (not church related, but they were excited to have something new) I also got out our Noah's ark little people set. I know it's a stretch but it's the most gospel oriented toys we have. It was really good to have the toys in an isolated area and they couldn't be distracted by other toys in their room. They stayed in the living room the whole time They also got a little bucket to hold treats, bubbles, coloring pages, and new crayons. That was good for Whitney, but didn't interest Lindsey too much:

On each of these bags I put a picture of a topic like temples or missionaries. If they heard that word they could get one piece of whatever was in the bag and keep it in their buckets if they didn't want to eat it right then. I think this would be something better for older kids. The only time Whitney recognized it first was when Lindsey was sleeping.:

By far the best thing I did was the bubbles. Notice the music note? They were only allowed to play with them during music breaks. This is a big deal because we don't usually have bubbles around here, and they for sure never get to do it by themselves. I put a sheet down with all the bubbles, treats, etc I knew there would be some messes and I didn't want to stress. As soon as the music would start they'd jump up and grab the bubbles and when it was over, they'd quickly put them away.

In April Whitney memorized the Quorum of the 12 Apostles and first presidency and has kept up and still remembers them. I took these picture/fact sheets out of a book that we have and attached each apostle to a different treat/activity. This was a big hit. Whitney was so excited to see and identify who would be speaking and then would find their picture to see what it was attached to.
Here's puzzles (pictures I mounted and cut up from the Friend), not too exciting for my kids:

Before you think I'm a terrible mom and feeding my kids all junk for two days, I did include some healthy choices but I had to use our fake kitchen food so the real stuff could stay refrigerated. :-)

We have a tradition of pancakes or french toast for the morning session:

Last conference we had to watch the whole thing on our computer screen since we don't get it on tv here. Well, I got a cord to connect our computer to the tv and it was a very good decision to get!

In between sessions on Saturday we went to the beach to get our wiggles out:

It was such a great conference and I hope that the girls will continue to get excited for conference like I do. I know I felt very spiritually fed and I'm so grateful that we can hear advice from the Lord's servants so often! Do you have any fun conference traditions or good advice to keep the kids focused/entertained?

Pumpkin Patch

2 weeks ago we went to Bate Nuts Farm to their pumpkin patch. Luckily I have an awesome Visiting Teacher from church who not only told me about it, but picked us up and let us come with her and her nephew and a couple of her friends. Of course the girls had a blast, they have farm in their blood. :-) They had lots of fun activities including a petting zoo, hayride and lots of fun shops to walk through. It kind of reminded me of Gardner Village back home.

Here they are patiently waiting for their turn at the pony rides:

I thought Lindsey might be a little afraid when she got right up to the pony, but she hopped on with no trepidation whatsoever. She was happy as a clam:

Here are all the kiddos on the hayride. The girl on the right of Lindsey is 4 months older than her!

Here they are in the pumpkin patch.

It was really cool to see the huge pumpkins that are 100+ pounds. Since everyone around here loves everything baby, it was no surprise that the girls picked their own miniature baby pumpkins

It's the first year the girls have been able to go pick their own pumpkins not from a store, it was such a fun experience and I think it should be a new tradition! (I love traditions!)

Interesting

This year I'm going to try to start a new Halloween tradition. I'm going to make a slideshow of all our past Halloweens so the kids can see themselves younger and their costumes. Who doesn't like to look at childhood pictures of themselves, right? I know that I only have 4 Halloweens to put pictures from, but this way I can just add on every year and we can keep it going.
Well, I was looking at my blog to try to find pictures starting back when I was pregnant with Whitney for Halloween and I started reading old posts. It's almost as funny as looking at childhood pictures! It's so crazy how your outlook changes over time and the style of your posts. I was reading my 100th post and a survey post and some things that made me laugh were:
-Sometimes when hubby and I are driving we'll play a game where you have to read all the road signs out loud but you have to sing what it says.
-I hardly ever cook dinner.
-I don't think I could ever move more than an hour away from my parents.
But most interesting:
3 surprising facts...
-I'm pregnant at the same time as my oldest sister
-I have never eaten a salad
-I've never been to California
A lot of things have happened in 4 years. At that time I didn't know my other sister was also pregnant. And I actually ate my first salad in California. I guess you're never too old to try something. And never say never. :-) In a lot of ways my priorities have changed since I started my blog, but I'm glad. I'm so grateful for my girls and that I have the opportunity to stay home with them and the changes I'm making by doing it. I really love California, I'm meeting so many great people and experiencing more than I could ever imagine.

When is the last time you re-read blog posts, journal entries, or looked at pictures? Learn anything interesting?

Visitor

 ...A very red visitor. Last weekend The University of Utah football team played at UCLA. Ty's brother in law flew down from Utah and we drove the 2 hours up to LA to meet him and go to the game. It was so cool for me to see the Rose Bowl and to see the Utes in a different stadium. The girls were beyond thrilled to see Steve and extra excited because Aunt Tami had sent him with new shirts! We were a little late to the game, thanks to California traffic (that I still haven't gotten used to), but the girls did really great. Even in the intense sun, it wasn't too bad. Whitney's favorite part was definitely the cheerleaders, so she was pretty entertained the whole time.

Here are our happy girls as we were stopped on the 5 freeway for almost 45 minutes due to a bad accident:

 Throw up the U!

 The girls look so thrilled in this picture after I just said what a great job they did haha

Not quite sure what this move is called:

Never to young to brainwash be taught the right way:

I thought our seats were pretty good:

It was very nice to be seated among fellow Utes:

The rest of the weekend was spent relaxing. We took Steve to La Jolla Cove, which I think is one of the prettiest places in San Diego. (And coolest because of all the animals)

The girls really love seeing anyone from Utah. (maybe because I talk it up for weeks? :-) But they had such a fun time with him.

We were so grateful not only to go to the game, but to spend time with family and show him some of our favorite spots down here.

Tidbits

Well, it's been two months since the vacation and we are back to normal. Here's some glimpses into what we've been up to.

During Lindsey's naptime I started working with Whitney on her letters. I got a bunch of awesome school supplies on clearance at Target to help us. She has a lot of fun with it and hasn't been half bad. She even knows how to write most of her name now. More than anything, it's good to have some structured things to do together where she has all my attention alone. Now that Lindsey basically does everything that Whitney does, it's nice to have a specific project to work on individually.

Sorry it's upside down

We went miniature golfing. The girls had fun until about hole 13 then they were done. So they got to just watch us finish.

Everytime we drive past this place Whitney says it's Disneyland. She was disappointed that she couldn't go into the castle.

I'm officially a registered California voter.

I upgraded my knife set which I'm very stoked about. They just make me happy to look at them. My old ones were falling apart at the handles.

We finally had a break from all the sunshine. (yes, you read that right) My favorite season is fall, so the lack of rain and clouds is a little depressing. Last week it rained, so we celebrated by bundling up for the 65 degree weather (I know, we are babies, right?!) and headed out for a walk. Isn't she a cutie?

Things are actually going really well. I love Halloween and the girls are very excited for activities this week. I've been a bookworm lately. I may exceed my yearly reading goal, which is good since I didn't think I'd even hit it. I've started some new hobbies (posts coming later). Football season is in full swing. Life is good in these parts. How is your fall going?