November!

A super cute growing Chunk!

A beautiful morning sunrise greeted me after a good sweaty morning workout!

Our First snowman of the season!

Laexin's school received an award for being one of Idahos most distinguished schools - only 7 out of 1800 schools received this award!

We had a great Thanksgiving in Vernal.  I always manage to forget to take pictures.  It was a fun time with all of the Hoopes clan and all of the cousins together.  The kids had a blast playing and we enjoyed lots of yummy food!

The 25th of November we put our Saratoga Springs home on the market, on the 26th we had a full price offer.  We were very worried when our renters gave us notice that they would be moving out in December instead of the spring, it's just not the best time to sell a home in the middle of winter.  But, we feel so blessed that things happened so fast for us, like it was meant to be. We are to close the 14th of January, hopefully all will continue to work out.

Kids had a dental appointment, Loa did great for her first time!

A visit with Opa & Halloween Festivities

At the end of October Opa had to come to SLC from his mission in South Africa to accompany missionary home.  We were able to make a day trip to SLC and have breakfast with him, JG & Ledjin.  If was good to see him and have a little time together. (Of course I didn't get any pictures!)

Afterwards we took the kids to the Halloween event at the Gallivan center - this kick started their 'candy collecting' about a week early :)

That afternoon we met our good friends, the wickhams, at the pumpkin walk in Logan - it was so cute!  We had a great time & enjoyed dinner together afterward, it was good to catch up!

On the monday before Halloween we painted & carved our pumpkins!

Halloween day we were able to go help at the Halloween party at Laexins school.  It was fun to be in this tiny little school house for a holiday celebration - everything is so laid back there, both LeGrand and I commented that it was the first time we had every been at a school that not only didn't care but actually 'allowed' the kids to wear masks to school.  They did a little Halloween parade through the school, it was cute. You can see that Laex took his costume very seriously, I never once told him to 'pose' but he was in full 'character' for every picture I took :)

Halloween evening we were invited to have soup with some friends then the guys took all the kids out trick-or-treating, they made a haul!  LeGrand always goes through their candy when they get home and throws away all the stuff we know we wont eat.  This year there was maybe a small handful of candy that went in the trash, everyone gave out really good treats :)

Lytzi's Special Day

On Sunday September 29th, Lytzi got blessed.  It was fun for us to have family visit for the special occasion.  My parents and G-ma, Jed & Kenz, Trev, Ramey & the kids were all here from Friday to Sunday.  On Sunday, Shylo, Duane & the kids came.

I had Lytz's dress made out of the skirt of my wedding dress, it turned out so cute!

Harvest Time!

Potato Harvest happens the 2nd & 3rd week in September. The kids get both weeks off of school and the farmers are extra busy!  This year was a unique harvest, we got to witness the lords hand in the harvest, and experience an extended 3 week harvest (yes, that means the kids were out of school for a whole 3 weeks). Towards the end of the second week of harvest it stormed here for almost 4 days, when it rains that much the harvest gets halted because the fields get too muddy to continue gathering potatoes.  Since SO many (like 3/4) of the high school students work for the farmers during harvest, that meant that sending kids back to school would put the farmers in a bind & keeping kids out of school would affect the amount of money our schools would get from the state (because their budgets depend on attendance). So, the superintendent made the decision to take a 3rd full week off of school.  It was amazing to see the weather clear during that week for just long enough for the farmers to finish the harvest, such a blessing for this community.

The first week of harvest the kids and I had fun enjoying our free fries and getting our potatoes.  We watched loads and loads of potatoes being hauled!

The second week of harvest Laex and Loa went and spent the week in vernal with Grammie and Papa - of course they had a blast!

During the final week of harvest it was just becoming too much time off school :)  I put the kids to work helping clean up the Garden!  Laex was pulling up plants and loading in the 'gator', and Loa was the designated driver to the weeds to unload the plants (if you make work fun, they don't realize it's work :)

--I had to get creative to keep them busy!  It was hard being out of school this long, it was like starting school all over!  We also got to go to Laexins school for the fall carnival!