pumpkin carving

Saturday before Halloween, we were pumpkin carving.

mary's birthday

The last week of October we celebrated Mary's seventh birthday. 

I went in to her class with Zingers. This is Mary and her teacher.

Caitlin had a field trip to the pumpkin patch.

I was grateful that Anne and Eric were visiting from Colorado.  It was wonderful to spend time with them and especially fun to have them here for Mary's birthday.

Mary requested dumplings so I did my best to remember Miss Lu's recipe.

I love you Mary.

cornbellies 2011

The kids and I get excited every October about going to the Cornbellies corn maze at Thanksgiving Point. 

 This may have been our most enjoyable year at Cornbellies.  The big kids were all old enough to pair off with a younger sibling and have fun without the stress of keeping track of everyone.  Grandma Martha and I watched the youngest four.  I was relieved when they were satisfied with this maze.  The older kids mastered the bigger one.

And the cage maze.

 I love going on the hayride just before dark.

Sophie on the hayride.  You can see her injury from the ice cream store incident.

october break

The middle of October the kids have a few days of vacation from school.  We had a couple of peaceful, sleep-in mornings with pancakes and pajamas, and television. I was grateful the kids were content with not that much planned. I had just started into the boxes and was really trying to save money.  Thursday we walked over to the mall where they were having a free animal demonstration.  It was a beautiful day.

Our neighbors, including Caitlin's best friend, came with us. 

After the animal show, we stopped at Ike's ice cream and let the little kids, and not so little kids rid the carousel.

Bethany loves Pandas.

William loves elephants.

No bubble gum ice cream that day. My only complaint.

This was right before Sophie got tired of waiting for her cone and dove out of her stroller into a face plant.  She got a bloody nose and black eye and wouldn't even be consoled by her ice cream, so we went home for nap time.

I was grateful that the kids spent a lot of their vacation time entertaining themselves and their friends with our moving boxes.   The nieghbors agreed that boxes are the best toys ever.

boxes

October 2011 was boxes.  Here I am under the boxes.  Figuratively, as you can see from the camera angle.  The disaster rises above the sofa line.  October there were a blur of birthdays, holidays, school vacations, and such as I sorted through boxes, and got out of bed again, and moved myself through days of hoping to get it all sorted out and put away to move on to something else. I noticed the days were passing and the holidays and birthdays. I believe that I was there trying to be a part of it all, but also always tending to the back of my mind the single mom realties financial and otherwise that make you go to bed each night grateful that you made it another day closer to another day.

The  ten thousand year old cookies Olivia found when we unwrapped our kitchen goods. "What? There were cookies?" Ben asked.  Made in China. Sat in storage for a year. Yum.

Friday, October 14, was a big day for me, I had been imagining and anticipating for some time.  Rob and I didn't go to our BYU graduation day, 14 some years ago, because I had a feeling Sam would be born that day, and he was.  I didn't really feel like that was graduation day for me anyway because after how many years at BYU, I still had one evil awful class to finish independent study.

Back to present day, it was my UCMT graduation, and my first time since high school to walk up and get some type of graduation certificate.  What was most precious about the experience was looking out to see the children, even William standing on his chair,applauding for mom.  Afterwards Grandma Martha treated us all to Golden Coral, my kids' paradise. They deserved it. I should have treated Grandma Martha, but was too poor at the moment. I had a wonderful support system through my massage therapy program and I am so grateful for them.

This was Grant. "I found the chocolate fountain, Mom."

This was a happy day. The following Sunday.  We went to Paul Ream nature park with our bags of old bread.  Grandma Martha came with us.  I was able to convince everyone that they were all coming. like it or not.  And they liked it.

I was happy to see Kyle and Bethany spend a long time together watching the ducks. They are both creature lovers.

Olivia took pictures of the leaves for her entry in the school art exhibit.

Dinner and one of the blessings of unpacking.  Sam made this incredible sandwich with the Panini maker he got from Grandma for his thirteenth birthday.  It was a happy reunion.