Halloween (a bit late)

I do know that Halloween was 5 months ago! But as I said about 5 or 6 posts back I need to catch up on our blog, so I am posting things a bit out of order. Please bear with me. And maybe our halloween pictures during winter will cheer you up and put a smile on your face!

For Halloween this year Emma was Thing 2 and her best friend, Katelyn was Thing 1 (she is not pictured because we spent halloween in Rexburg this year with Jenni and her family). Jack was a skeleton and Charley was a transformer. We decided to go to Rexburg because for years Jake and I had wanted to go to Harriman State Park in Island Park to attend their Halloween Festival. And let me tell we were so impressed with their Halloween Festival/spook alley! (I even got a bit of a scare in the spook alley! Yes there were screams!) We had such a great time. It will definitely be a halloween tradition. The Festival always falls on the Saturday before halloween and since halloween was on Saturday this year they had it on Halloween. It was a wonderful time and believe me the kids got plenty of candy!

Charley on the hayride (about a mile long with lots of spooks on the way)

Enjoying the hayride
Again on the hayride
Jenni and Sterling on the hayride
All the kids before getting their loot! Jessica, Mike and her childeren also joined us along with Chance (Sterling's son).

Nothing like a family picture with a skeleton.


About to go on a horse race! They had lots of fun Halloween carnival games for the kids.

Jack riding the wooden horse. And then we ended the night with hot chocolate and a donut. It was an enjoyable night! Please join us next year......

My long lost brother!

This past December my brother, Jeff, came to the United States to pay us a visit! We had not seen him in 6 years! Jeff lives in South Korea with his wife, Mia. He teaches for an international school. It was a pretty big deal for him to come.....Dennis, Mike and I met him at the airport in Salt Lake City. It was so wonderful to see him. We stayed up late that night talking. He had changed so much but yet was still the same old Jeff. If that makes any sense.....

The kids were so excited to meet him and get to know him. They hit it right off. And of course Jack and Charley would not leave him alone! They wanted to be with him all the time. It was really sweet.

Jeff was able to come up to Idaho during his visit. It was fun for him to see our house and our life here. And of course the kids loved to play Wii with him! It was wonderful to see my little brother with my kids. He is so great with kids and they just loved him. They showed their classrooms at school to him....which of course was quite exciting. After a few days here in Idaho we then went down to Utah to hang out with rest of the family. We mostly just hung out, ate, talked and shopped for Christmas. We had an early Christmas with the whole family at Stacey's and of course enjoyed Stacey's cooking as always. It was a wonderful week! I miss Jeff like crazy and wish he was closer. Someday maybe we will be able to visit him in Korea.

Jeff, Mike and Dennis at the airport. Dennis thought it would be funny to take a picture with his phone of me taking a picture of them. Dennis doesn't like getting his picture taken.

Mom and Jeff at our house. I love this picture!

I think this picture of the boys with Jeff says it all! They had such a wonderful time. What joy!

Jeff with all his neices and nephews. From left to right: Emma, Cicely (Dennis), Jack, Charley, Jeff, Chole (Dennis), and Summer (Mike).

The kids loved getting to know their Uncle again. They wouldn't leave him alone! But he seemed to love it and enjoy it all! What a wonderful Uncle.....we miss you Uncle Jeff! Come back soon.......