Category: Family

Today is Falyn’s first Thanksgiving! We are going over to Dan’s parents house for dinner. Today we have been having a nice relaxing time around the house, not doing much of anything. We hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving.

Here’s a Thanksgiving poem that Talia wrote when she was 8 years old:

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is Pilgrims
that sailed at sea.

Thanksgiving is Indians
who are thankful like me.

Thanksgiving is food
that’s yummy.

Thanksgiving is turkey
that fits in my tummy.

Thanksgiving is family.
Thanksgiving is friends.

Thanksgiving is something
that never ends.

We all very much enjoyed our Halloween. Here’s what everyone dressed-up as:
Falyn – Ladybug, Riley – Red Power-Ranger, Jared – Superman, Aidan – Bionicle, Kayli – Arabian Princess, Talia – Hermione. Dan took the older kids trick-or-treating while I stayed home with Falyn. He went with a group of all the other neighborhood kids and their dads. Everyone that came to our door thought Falyn was the most adorable ladybug they had ever seen. Just look at this picture and tell me that that isn’t true.

Dan came home with Jared and Riley after being out about a half hour. They were both tired out and ready to dig into their candy. As you can see, they wasted no time in dumping it out and digging in!

Dan went back out to find the group and came back later with Aidan. As you can see, he got way too much candy.

After dropping off Aidan, Dan went back to find the girls. While he was gone, the boys had fun handing out candy and by 7:45, I decided it was time for them to go to bed. They weren’t too happy about it, but I finally got them in bed aroudn 8:00. Dan finally came home with the girls around 8:45. The amount of candy they came home with was ridiculous. We dumped it on the table and it took up almost the entire thing! I had them go through and pick out what they wanted to keep. The rest we put in bags for them to take to school tomorrow to be donated to a local children’s hospital. We gave close to 5 pounds of candy away! For them, it’s not so much about eating the candy, it’s the thrill of seeing how much they can get. They liked that they were able to give so much of it to sick kids in the hospital.

Tonight we did our annual pumpkin carving. Talia, Kayli and Aidan carved their pumpkins all by themselves. This was the first year Aidan carved his with no help. He did a great job! He designed the face and cut it out with no help at all. Talia made a bat on hers and Kayli did a scary face with spiders on the side. The twins had help from Daddy in making a “happy face” (Jared) and a “scary face” (Riley). They all had a great time. Afterwards I roasted the seeds from the pumpkins. We have enough to enjoy for several days. Lots more pictures on flickr. If you are’t on my contacts list and want to see them, send me an email.

This weekend was the annual parish festival. This years theme was “Under the Big Top”. We went on Friday afternoon and again on Saturday night. Dan and Talia went back on Sunday night to work at the hamburger booth. The kids had so much fun there! They loved all the rides and the games. The boys’ favorite thing there was what they called “the maze”. It was a house of mirrors that they would go into and play around in for the longest time. The girls’ favorite ride was the Tilt-A-Whirl.

Yesterday we went to the San Diego Wild Animal Park. We went with our friends Chris and Carrie, and Carrie’s dad. We had a really great time, except for the heat. At one point, the temp. sensor on the stroller read 105 degrees! When we got there, we went on the train ride. We say lots of different animals on the ride. Then we went over to watch the bird show, seeing the gibbons on the way. The bird show was lots of fun to watch with birds flying right over you head. We then had lunch. After lunch we saw the gorillas, flamingos and meerkats. We then let the kids play on the jungle gym while I nursed Falyn. After that we headed over to watch the elephant show. By that time it was 4 pm and the kids were getting really tired, so we left.

Last night we had a BBQ at the beach. We met Dan’s parents there. We got there around 5 and the kids did a bit of swimming in the ocean before it got cold. We then build a fire in the firepit and roasted hot dogs. Later we roasted marshmellows. It was very windy, but we still had a good time. We didn’t leave till after 9! More pics are on flickr.

We spent the afternoon at the county fair. We visited the petting zoo, toured the Orange Country Building, checked out the photography and art display, and rode on a few rides. Falyn was so good! She was in the stroller the entire time we were there and never cried once. She slept for part of the time and then just hung out and looked at everything. Everyone was so tired by the time we left. Partly due to the heat. It was around 98 degrees when we got there. It had cooled off to around 91 by the time we left. (Did I mention that the stroller has a digital thermometer and clock?) We usually go to a lot of the other stuff at the fair, but everyone was just too hot and tired this year. The rest of the pictures are on flickr.

We spent the morning at the park. The kids wanted to have snack there, so we brough along their snacks. They had fun playing in sand and on the play equipment. While we were there we saw a squirrel. The kids enjoyed watching it run all over the park. I brought my camera along and took a bunch of pictures, which are in my flickr account.

Falyn celebrated her first 4th of July today. The day started with a bike parade that all the kids in the neighborhood participated in. They decorated their bikes and rode around the block. Then we got ready for a BBQ. Samantha did face painting for all the kids.

After the BBQ, we went to the mall to watch fireworks. Falyn was fascinated by the fireworks and not at all scared. She stared at them the entire time. We then went back home and did fireworks with the neighbors.

The kids had a lot of fun with the sparklers and watching the fireworks we set off. The kids didn’t get in bed till almost 10:30. They sure had a fun day though!