Thanksgiving in Eden

I'm sure something else has happened in the last couple weeks, but somehow this next post is another trip to Arizona.  Because we are crazy like that sometimes.  But this time we went down to my grandparents' house in Eden for Thanksgiving.  A long weekend of family, limited tech access, animals, and fun.  Oh, and very VERY little sleep thanks to Ellie.  Who also decided she was done with baby food day one of this trip.  Fun stuff.  It also took us over 15 hours to drive home due to accidents, traffic, and weather.  We may not be going anywhere else for a while but I'm still so glad we made the effort!

Halloween in AZ

Jason took a couple days off work and we made a long weekend visit to my cousin in Arizona for Halloween.  And despite the fact that Ellie seems to be following in her sister's footsteps of not sleeping on vacation, we had a blast!

We drove as far as Mesquite Thursday afternoon then continued to make our way to Phoenix on Friday.  We caught up with Alicia for a couple hours that afternoon before it was time to get ready for the Sorensen Halloween party extravaganza!  Aunt Janae and Rachel spent so much time making this an awesome Haunted Mansion themed party.  I wish I'd taken more pictures because the details were incredible!

The next day we made our way to Carefree where a famous pumpkin carver (who knew there was such a thing) had bunch of his sculptures displayed.  And I just thought that I was a decent pumpkin carver!

Once we wrapped up there, we headed back to get ready for trick or treating in our family costumes.  I was Peter Pan, Jason was Mr. Smee, Leila was Tinkerbell, and Ellie was Wendy Darling.  This may be my favorite group we've done thus far.  So fun!

Sunday was just a fun, relaxing day and we let Leila play with her cousin friends so much that she wore out all 3 of them by the end of day.  That girl has so much energy, it is ridiculous!

Unfortunately all good things must come to an end and we had to drive home yesterday.  I sure wish we lived closer to the Perkins and Sorensens because we always have a great time together!

Offbeat October

October 2
Turns out otter pops make pretty good teethers!

October 3
Uncle Jared was sweet enough to paint Leila's fingernails for her.

October 4
For our traditional Conference gathering, we had all of the great-grandchildren in attendance and had to snap some pictures.  Of course getting that many littles to look in one place and smile is another challenge entirely!

Ellie with two of her cousin baby buddies.  Would you guess that she's actually the oldest of the bunch?

October 11
Leila insisted on bringing her Lucky Duck game to Grandma's so that she could play with all her friends.

October 15
These two girls sure do love their dad.  As soon as he walks in the door, he's lucky to find any alone time.

October 23
Just hanging with my smiley baby (who LOVES looking at herself on my phone camera).

October 25
The blanket fort I made for Leila.