Happy moldy Halloween

We carved our pumpkins a week and a half ago for family night. This has never been a problem in the past, but I guess we have never had an October in the past that was full of 60-70 degree temps. Lesson: When the weather is warm don't carve your pumpkins too early or this is what they will look like on Halloween.


At least it's pretty SPOOKY!

Applesauce?

We got a ton of apples for free from a neighbor and I am going to make and can applesauce tomorrow. I have already dried apple slices, and made fruit leather. So does anyone have any good homemade applesauce recipes?

Some of the reasons we love living in Idaho

Saw these pictures today in the paper. We love it here.
These and other great ones can be found on idahostatesman.com under the outdoors section.

Halloween FUN!

This weekend has felt like Halloween already! We got to go to Kelli (one of my mission companions) and Chad's house for an adults only Halloween party last night and it was super fun. I stole the pictures off of her blog since I was too busy rocking out to Rock Band all night to take any pictures!



As you can see Mark and I went 80's butt rock this year. Seriously, any opportunity to go 80's I am all for. And has anyone noticed that the 80's is TOTALLY coming back! It was so easy to find stuff for a costume, the mall was FULL of legwarmers! I say BRING IT ON, I love BIG hair because mine is just big naturally!
Tonight was the Trunk or Treat at our ward. Rex was Spiderman and Sam was the elephant that Rex was 2 years ago. They had a great time and loved getting all the candy. I am going to love stealing it while they are in bed! ;) It was so beautiful and not very cold tonight, which was so nice for the kids. All in all a great time!
Our neighbors and friends the Bell's went 80's butt rock as well so we had to get some pictures. They looked awesome! Can't wait for next weekend.

So Madonna like!



The 80's crew

Rex and Isaac, best buds.

Mandy and I, aren't we hot!

The Bell Family, don't they look AWESOME!

Sam, the cute elephant

Preschool pictures

Rex had pictures last week at Preschool and they turned out pretty cute! He loves all the kids in his class but he has two that he talks about constantly, Irie and Gavin. Every time I take him to Preschool he asks if Irie or Gavin are going to be there. I didn't know who Irie was so I asked him to point her out to me the other day. He went over to her and she turned and looked at him with the biggest smile on her face and they just smiled at each other for a minute and then started playing. It was so cute! He really loves Preschool.

He looks so big!

His class. Irie is the little girl in the middle with pink shoes on. Gavin is the boy on the left with the Boise State jersey. Miss Cindy is his teacher.

Family pictures!

My good friend Kim decided to practice her talent on my family and I am so glad she did! Tuesday we went up to the Train Depot in Boise and took some family pics. We had a great time and Kim did a great job. She got me the CD of pictures tonight and I played a bit with them on iPhoto and posted my favorite on this site. Click here to see them all. Here is a preview of a few.

Everyone needs to watch this!

Mark and I watched 20/20 last night and it was awesome. I am so irritated this election season because I really don't love either candidate and it seems like they just spew the same ol crap to get people on their side. Our economy is a mess and I don't trust either side, or ANYONE in Washington for that matter, to be able to fix it. I have always liked John Stossels reports on 20/20 and last night was the best. He always seems to show both sides of an issue with little bias. It is called the Politically Incorrect side to Politics. You should all check it out, definitely a must see why we all make this very important decision. It is broken up into 6 parts on Youtube. Here are the links.
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3
Link 4
Link 5
Link 6

Attention bargain shoppers!

Ok, so the key to smart couponing is to get the paper. I was only going to get the Sunday paper but the Idaho Statesman is having a special right now where you can get the whole week for $2 a week, the same price as getting just Sundays and holidays. I was looking through the paper yesterday and saw Albertson's ad, and they have meat on sale this week for $1.88 a lb! That is a killer deal, any meat under $2 a lb is a good deal. So I went over there today after I picked Rex up from Preschool. The chicken breasts are at the butcher block and are great quality, I got over 5 lbs. for $9.91. That is 4 meals for my family! I also got 2 pork roast for just over $3 each and two huge things of pork chops that had immediate $3 off coupons from the meat manager on them. I got all of this meat for $27!!! What a steal! I can't even come close to that price at Costco! So head over to Albertson's this week before it is too late!

Sam and his friend

I babysat Landon for my friend Kim today and I must say it was a nice, relaxing morning. Landon is a few months younger than Sam and I was a little nervous about having two young'uns to take care of, but they pretty much entertained themselves all morning. Landon was great and melted my heart a few times. When he is around his mom, he only has eyes for her and won't let anyone else have much to do with him but since she was gone, he was so sweet and cute to me. I got lots of smiley faces and needs for loves. The boys loved watching what the other was doing and copying it, playing in the pantry, stealing each others binky's and trying to walk around the house in my heels. I had to grab a couple of pictures because they were just too cute! Thanks Kim for letting me watch him!
Bosum binky buddies

Sam modeling moms heels (Cute aren't they, Mervyn's store closing sale!)

Landon attempting to wear the heels

Sam showing him how it is done

Sam stealing Landons binky

Giving it back upside down

awwww, how sweet

Who knew the pantry could be so much fun?

It's finished!

I finished my table finally (well mostly). I love how it turned out, the color on the top is perfect! I am still waiting for some extra money to buy the fabric because it isn't cheap and I haven't finished the drawers in the table yet, but we can eat on it now.

better picture of the coloring on the top

And this is what we are having for dinner tonight, authentic Idaho potatoes from a farm in Rupert! We got a 100 lb bag for $15 and they are all HUGE like this! I love Idaho!

Just call me the coupon lady...

I have decided that in order to help pay off our never ending medical bills, instead of getting a part time job, I would start trying to cut our budget by saving money at the grocery store. There is a whole world out their of coupon clipping and saving money. It's an art and some women are so good at it, they can get a cart full of groceries for $37! It will take time to learn it all, but I started with planning a months worth of meals, made a detailed shopping list and stuck with it. I didn't do too bad for the first time, I saved $25 on about $200 worth of groceries and necessities. YAY! I like saving money! Hopefully I will get better than that and be able to save us a lot more money this year.

Just because he is cute

I have been working on the table a lot in the garage lately. This is how Sam keeps entertained when Rex is in Preschool and mommy is busy.



He's just so cute, I wanna kiss those cheeks!

Handbag

Thanks Kami, for this link on your blog. Check this out everyone, you can get a free handbag!
www.handbagplanet.com

Conference weekend

We had an enjoyable but busy Conference weekend. I used to look so forward to listening to our leaders and I still do. In fact this year I was extra excited with all that is going on with the economy, etc. to feel some inspiration. What was I thinking??? I haven't been able to really listen to Conference since Rex was born. Sure I get snippets here and there, but I miss being able to really listen and ponder what was being said. That just doesn't seem possible with 2 little ones running around screaming during most of it. Thank goodness for the Ensign. I will be spiritually uplifted next month I guess.
On a positive note, I decided to spend Saturday canning while I tried to listen to Conference. I got a huge bag of plums from my mom's tree last weekend and although Rex loves to eat them, he wasn't going to eat a whole bag before they went bad. (unless I wanted him to spend the week on the toilet!) And I planted a jalapeno plant this year that went crazy! I probably got close to 100 jalapenos on one little plant. So I had 60 of those in my house. What do you do with 60 jalapenos? It only takes 2-3 to make a batch of salsa! So I made and canned plum raspberry jam and jalapeno jelly. I had never tried jalapeno jelly but I heard it was good on top of cream cheese and a cracker. I tried some Saturday night and let me tell you, it was YUMMY!!! So if anyone wants some jalapeno jelly, I have about 10 cans of it.



On a more somber note, Mark and I definitely got the parents of the year award this weekend. Often, after the kids go to bed we have the Amadors or the Bells or both over for games. We also go to their house. It's right next door and across the street so we will lock up the house, bring the monitor and check in regularly. Well Friday night we went across the street to the Bells home. The house was locked and we had the monitor but I still sat at the table where I had a view of our house out their front window because Rex recently learned how to open the garage door. Most nights he doesn't wake up, but Friday night he did. So I glance outside and notice my neighbors pull up to their house. I glance again a minute later and see them walking to our house with Rex in their arms!! Apparently he woke up and couldn't find us so he opened the garage door (probably to go to the Amadors) right as the neighbors pulled up. Obviously I would have seen him outside but I still felt like crap, especially since the neighbors found him first. Thank goodness they understood and won't be calling CPS on us. Needless to say we won't be having game night anywhere but our house I think. I just can't handle the guilt of "mommy, remember last night when it was dark and you left me?" Yea, thanks buddy.

I LOVE my MAC!

I took some pictures of Rex outside today because it was a nice, warm but overcast day. They turned out pretty good just on their own, but I fooled around with editing them in iPhoto (a MAC program that I also LOVE) and they look pretty stinking good! I am not good at taking originals, but at least I can edit. Thank you MAC!

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

a couple more