October- Part I

Happy Creeeeepy Halloween everybody! What a fun time of year! I am writing with a bit of a stomach ache because I totally pigged out on my kids' candy. They are safely tucked in bed, and I have picked out my favorites from their sacks! I always go for the snickers, strawberry laffy taffy, and peanut m&m's. I know that Tyler dives for the almond joys and lemonheads. I'm not stealing their candy. It's just better that we take some while they are peacefully sleeping, so there is no pain involved. And think of all the cavities I am preventing. The sacrifices I make for my children. So, tell me, which sweets do you go for??

When's the last time you've been to a haunted house? A family friend of ours told us how she just went with some of her school friends and was talking about the guy with the chainsaw chasing her... Ah, I so remember how scared I would get. It's been since I first got married that I've been to a haunted house, but I still got so scared. I hate being chased. I was never good at tag. When someone is running after me, and I feel they are getting too close, I drop to the fetal position. Even when I play tag or flag football with my kids, I scream like crazy and it's not just because I'm having fun- I just hate being chased!! Just ask Tyler. He discovered this soon after we met and loved to chase me. I should not be sharing this, as he will read this and the chasing will begin once again. So since I don't have haunted houses to creep me out anymore, Harrison thought he'd share some creepy diapers with me today. Let's just say that he will not be having chili again until he is potty trained! Talk about freaky!

Oh, and funny, typical Logan (aka "spiderman") story: While trick or treating he was on the porch with several other kids waiting for the person to come to the door. I was standing at the end of the driveway with the other parents. While the kids are still waiting, I see a little batman bawling and running to his dad who was standing next to me. "What's the matter?" his dad asks. "Spiderman told me that his muscles are bigger than mine," was his tortured cry. I hurried and looked up to the porch hoping there was another spiderman who could have said such a naughty thing. But alas, I had to come to terms that the muscly boy was mine. Luckily, spiderman has a good heart, and apologized, and reluctantly admitted that they both have strong muscles.
Here are a few pics from October. I have been trying for over an hour to upload some more pics from Halloween, but I keep getting errors. So here are some for starters. More to come soon I hope:

This year since we only bought 1 pumpkin to carve, we had to make sure we had the best design. So Tyler had everyone draw on on a paper first, and then we voted on which drawing to carve from. And the winner is......

Mr. Friendly, designed by Tyler, carved by yours truly.

Mons must-have tradition while carving pumpkins: Carameled apples.

Kids are always willing to do their chores, especially when they get to jump in the mess!

This boy lives for the outdoors. This is where he is the happiest. I'm nervous for winter when it's too cold to go outside. Maybe I'll just bundle him up good in a snowsuit and watch him through the windows. I don't know, seriously this is stressing me out though.

Movin to the Country gonna eat a lot of peaches.

Yesterday we took the children to a friends farm to let them experience farm life. We visited a cattle farm, went to the fair grounds and rode horses, all the kids road on a big tractor, and we all took turns harvesting corn with a big combine. Here are some pictures of the days activities.



Cat's are like rabbits on a farm and will quickly get out of control. While visiting the cattle farm Logan spent most of his time finding little kittens. He really fell in love with the runt of the litter. He named his new friend Oreo. Logan wasn't pleased when I told him that Oreo had very little chance of surviving the winter. Needless to say he wanted to bring Oreo home with us. However Oreo is still living on the farm.

Movin to the Country gonna eat a lot of peaches part II

Living in the Midwest (the Hearland of America) and traveling across states I see a lot of farm land. I often times have thought about the process farmers go through to get the crop in the ground and then harvesting every year about this time. I must admit I have been curious when it comes to these large machines and how it seperates the seed from the rest of the plant. The technology used to harvest is amazing. The large combine eats up the corn, and beats the corn off the cob. The corn is spit up into a hopper, and the stalks, husks, and cob are spit out the back. All of us enjoyed our time driving the combine.




The corn is then loaded into a truck which takes it to large storage bins. The seed is dumped from the truck into an auger sitting on the ground. The auger then forces the corn up the pipe leading to the top of storage bins. Average yield this year was about 175 bushels per acre.

Harrisons contribution to the day's activities...








Both Logan and Mariah had a lot of fun riding sam (that is the name of the horse)

Halloween

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Sentimental Moment...

Here's a sweet Logan story to share. The other day I was home with all the kids, and we were just having one of those great afternoons. Everyone was getting along and playing so nicely. I had noticed that Logan was especially kind to his sister and just on his best behavior. As we were walking outside to go play I just thanked him for being so good. Logan said, "I know, I just feel so good inside right now. It's like Jesus pinned a gold star on my heart and I'm wearing it like a badge." It was one of those moments that makes it all worth it!

Pumpkin Patch

I took the older kids out yesterday for 2 reasons. #1- give Tyler some quiet time to rest while Harrison napped, #2- It was 74 degrees yesterday!! Beautiful day to go to the pumpkin patch. So I took Logan and Mariah and we had a great time. I know Harrison would probably have liked it too, but it was nice to have a break for my back, and more especially to spend some quality time with the older kids.

I thought that if you've seen one bounce toy you've seen them all. Well, not so. I was very amused by this giant caterpillar. I was watching the kids as they went inside it, and couldn't see where on earth they came out. There were no other openings. I figured the kids would go to the end and have to turn around and come back out the same way. Very inefficient, I thought. Then I learned, even caterpillars have to poop!....

Mariah-poo

Logan-poo. Isn't that hilarious? The girl had to literally open the cheeks for the kids to squeeze out. I was amused!The kids were so cute with their precious pumpkin. I could only afford 1, and they handled it well. They both took turns pulling it on the wagon, and they even bathed it together.

This is what I saw when I got in the car. Safety rules!

Looks like Tyler and Harrison had some good quality time together as well. Harrison actually loves to watch football with dad. Everytime players get tackled, he grunts and says, "ooh".

How Corn-y.

We don't have sand boxes in Iowa, we have corn boxes. Kids don't build sand castles, they build corn castles.

Primary Program...

Today at church the children had their primary program. When the time came for each kid to deliver their message some would wave, smile, blow kisses to their parents, others would get scared or would become shy presenting in front of a large crowd. I remember as a 2nd grader running for class President and had to present in front of the school. I had worked hard and had memorized my speech that I would present to the class. I would start my speech with a brief skit/show. I was wearing a big sombrero hat and would start by taking my hat off laying it down, and while dancing around it, I would sing some Mexican hat dance song. I took my hat off saw the large crowd and my mind went blank. I remember dancing around the hat mumbling something that didn't make sense. I was so embarrassed. We didn't have any melt downs like this, and each kid participating in the primary program did a tremendous job.

We took a picture of Logan and Mariah after Church, and added a video of Logan singing his primary part at home.

Tyler's first surgery

Wow what a day! Tyler called me yesterday morning at lunch time asking me to go get him some pepto because he had a horrible stomach ache. He came home that evening doubled-over in pain. The pepto didn't help, and the pain got worse. It started moving to the right side of his abdomen. (do you know the diagnosis yet?)- We called our great friend and neighbor Sandy to come over and stay with the kids so I could take Tyler to the ER. We left about 6:30. We finally got in about 8:00. Long story short, he was diagnosed with appendicitis. Bishop Hancock and another brother from our ward came and gave him a priesthood blessing. We were both very comforted by this and felt the assurance that things would be okay. I had been feeling really anxious and worried as well that we are so far from family support, but after their visit I felt so peaceful and knew that we would have the support of our ward family. And indeed we did. Our great friend and Bishop stayed with us through the surgery and helped us get Tyler home safely. I am so thankful for all those that have reached out to us and made our burdens lighter - from prayers to phone calls, meals and help with childcare.

Tyler was sent home about 1 am this morning to recover at home, and I have taken over the nursing responsibilities. He had a pretty rough night. Very uncomfortable and in pain. He slept some today but has still been uncomfortable. We were able to get a higher dosage and are hoping for a better nights rest. He is looking forward to being pain free and getting back to normal life. Thanks to modern medicine and pain killers, that should be soon.

Elder Sanders- Home with Honor!!

Phew! I'm finally posting about one of the most important events of the year.... my little bro Pete's came home from his mission!!! He came home on Friday, Sept. 7th. Mom and Dad were here visiting us that week, and took Mariah home with them that Wednesday. Peter came home on Friday morning. I had to wait until the next Monday to fly down with Harrison to see him, but at least Mariah was there to represent! Here are lots of pics from that week in Dallas. I'm so thankful that I had the opportunity to go. Tyler was sweet to let me go for a week and held down the fort with Logan who had to stay behind because of school. Mariah was gone for about 2 weeks since she left early with mom and dad. She was missed!!


It was so nice to see the extended Sanders family. It is so fun to get together and laugh and hang out. I was so touched at the effort everyone made to be with our family.

One reason I was dying to get to Dallas was to meet Joanna, Freddy's lady friend. I had to make sure I was there to check out her every move and try to find something wrong with her, because apparently everyone in my family fell in love with her so fast. But there's no foolin' me. My eyes were on her the whole time.......and I loved everything I saw! She is beautiful, sweet, very thoughtful- the only thing I don't like is that she makes me look bad. I gotta find her weakness. I'll just wait 'til Christmas -that's when everyone's true colors come out. :)

Mariah is a social butterfly through and through. She loved having so much family around. She was 18 months when Peter left, and she always talked about him when he was gone. One cool thing we did was we burned all of his pics from the mission on a cd and watched them on tv and listened to some of the experiences he had.

The rest of these pics are just random fun times. I stayed at John and Paula's house, and with their 2 cute girls. I had so much fun. They are the best. We stayed up late every night, and they got me completely hooked on "The Office", so we watched most of season 2 since I had never seen it. This pic is of Savannah. She has curls to die for. One night we fro'd (sp??) it out. The picture doesn't do it justice.

It was great to see Toccoa. She is a good girl, and is hilarious! She has so many funny facial expressions, and a great personality. And of course, you are gorgeous!

Coa and my cousin Bre (she and Aunt Lori flew in from Cali). I'm so impressed with Bre everytime I see her. She has an amazing countenance. She is a beautiful person, inside and out.

" Excuse me, we don't do that at Charlotte" - (inside joke, had to be there)

Yummy dinner at Abuelo's. The more I look at this picture, the more mom and Aunt Lori look like they could be sisters - she is actually my dad's little sister- maybe after you've been married for so long, you even start looking like your in laws.

This is our youngest cousin, Conner. He flew in from Utah with Uncle Todd and Aunt Kathleen. He is a fun kid to have around, as is great with all the nieces and nephews.

Of course, Grandma came too. She is always there for the special times. After going to John's softball game, we all headed to Braums. Mmmm, hot fudge brownie sundae with toasted almonds.... good thing they don't have those here.
I wanted to make sure everyone had a chance to spend time with Harrison and experience the joy I feel everyday.

As much as I love taking the kids to the Frisco mall and riding the carosaul (sp?), I am glad my mall just has a play place. I would be broke. Mariah could do this all day.

Mariah fell in love with High School Musical this visit. She danced and danced... and great now I have the song stuck in my head..... and now so do you.

This is a sad picture. Do you see Mariah's face? We were so excited to go have lunch with Toccoa at school. Mariah waited all morning. When we finally got there, she opened the door and cracked her big toe nail. It spoiled both of our appetites. The next week at home, she did the same thing to her other toe on the way to church. Now she has no toe nail on either toe. Now I've spoiled your appetite. You're welcome.

A happy moment for Harrison. These are times I cherish. I take pictures of them. I print them. I blog them. I am determined to remember that he is a good baby. He must have forgotten because he is screaming and trying to bite me as we speak. It didn't help him to see the happy picture of himself. And, honestly, I'm not sure it's helping me. Ouch! he got me bye