Sara's Baptism

My brother's wife, Sara, was baptized on Saturday. She has a very strong testimony and is eager to be the best member of the church she can be. She is what missionaries describe as "golden". I was shocked when she called me last month and said she had been praying to know what to do in her life and her prayers were answered as she listened at a Fast and Testimony meeting when they came to visit in September. Since then, she and Jakob have met with the missionaries and attended church as much as possible. Jakob was able to baptize Sara because during this process, he chose to be active in the church once again. It is WONDERFUL to have every member of my family (including spouses) be members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with strong testimonies.
These are my wonderful siblings (in age order), Kristi, Me, Jakob, and Morgan.

Sara is the sweetest/smiliest person I know and she will be a blessing in the church as well as be blessed by her decision to be baptized.

Jakob and Sara are eagerly looking forward to going to the temple and being sealed together next year.

My mom and dad with Sara and Jakob. Sara's parents and sister were there to support her too. The program was very spiritual and is a special moment in my family's life.

Halloween

This was what Cara wore to the Library's story time Halloween party. We watched Elmo's Halloween movie and they got treat bags. Obviously Cara went as a witch.
One of our few Halloween activities was making these cookie spiders. We didn't have a lot of time in the month to focus on Halloween because of our 9 day Disneyland vacation through Fall Break.

We also went to Elk City's Midnight Madness to trick-or-teat along Main Street. Some of the shops had really good sales that I could not resist.

Merilee wore her hair like this to the Fall Carnival. The girls both wanted to be witches this year so I let them pick the colors of their capes and after I made them, Merilee said hers looked more like a vampire cape. So she went as a vampire instead. We just used what we had to make the costumes this year.

Holland wore his skeleton jammies that Grandma got him when my younger sister graduated as a Radiology tech (hence the "bones").

and pumpkin slippers from last year. I did buy his green pumpkin and Cara's witch hat, but that's it!

We went to Merilee's school's Fall carnival and we were some of the only people dressed up. I was embarrassed because I wore a Cinderella costume and had some heavy make up on and did not see any other adults in costume. Last year, tons of people dressed up and Justin won the adult costume contest. It was too crowded and I asked the girls if we could leave and they were eager to get our of the chaos too.

We decorated one pumpkin this year with a decorating kit Grandma gave us. It was a Frankenstein pumpkin. Merilee is showing his head/hair.

The kids were able to push them into the pumpkin as long as I held them in place so they didn't slip or bend.

One morning I woke up trying to think of something "Halloweeny" for breakfast. So, I made my wheat pancake recipe (in the blender) and threw in a couple handfuls of baby carrots. It turned the batter orange and then while they were cooking, I added black and orange sprinkles. I also gave Cara and Holland candy corn to build a pumpkin face.

This picture was taken right before we went trick-or-treating on Halloween.