Seven in Eleven

Luke just turned lucky seven. He's growing up so fast. He loves first grade, playing basketball, reading, fishing, being a big brother to two little sisters, doing crafts:) and helping mom cook. He took his first hunting trip with daddy...to bad he wasn't lucky seven on that trip, maybe they would have actually filled their tag.:) But no matter how old he gets he will always be our sweet Mr. Bones.

onions

Check out these bad boys! Our onions were huge this year and we had peppers coming out our ears. I think everything grew so big this year because they had to fight the ginormous weeds that invaded our very neglected garden. We chopped up and froze most of the peppers, stored away the onions and canned the rest into spaghetti sauce. Plus we got quite a few bottles of grape juice canned the same night I went to the hospital to have Ruthy.

After cleaning up the garden we had our annual wienie roast under the walnut tree.
I never did do anything cute with the space between the garage and the house aside from stringing up some lights for Luke's pirate party....maybe next year I'll follow through on my "spruce up" plans. And maybe next year those ugly garage doors of ours will actually get painted...maybe. It feels so good to no longer be lazy, pregnant and sick. I got some MUCH need weeding done in my flower beds last week and mowed and raked to my hearts content...I have sooo missed working out in my yard. I have so missed having calluses on my hands, dirt under my nails and sore muscles from good hard work. So get ready yard, next summer you and me are gonna get down and dirty.:)

Oh Sarah!!!!!

This picture was on my cousin Brooke's facebook page today. So excited....it better be good!

Speaking Out

Provo City council voted to go ahead with the Provo Northwest Connector project. Which means a four lane $30,000,000 highway will plow right through the middle of what little remains of the city's beautiful farmland. It also would cut through our families back pasture. I know this kind of thing sadly happens all over the country, new growth crowds out old beauty. What just doesn't make sense is how completely unneeded this highway is. AND SO... my sister Sarah has decided to fight this thing anyway she can. She wrote an article for the local paper, you can read it here on her blog. If crap like this makes you mad too, please help us by speaking out and be sure to join Citizens Against Provo's Northwest Connector Highway on facebook.

Goolish Delight

So here is the "really scary" story by Ava about our Halloween costumes this year: The Vampires, Luke and Daddy, drank your blood mom and killeded you and then you were in the mermaid lagoon and me and the turtle saved you. The end.



For her first Halloween Ruth was a turtle. We crammed this little baby into...

this unstuffed giant turtle stuffed animal. It was pretty darn cute.

Luke won some vampire fangs at the school carnival and so he wanted to be a vampire this year. Jeremy and I copied him.

Ava wanted to be a mermaid and we had some fun with her hair. (For Sarah, Karen and Brittany: "Now to get Ariel's hairdo it's really simple. First twist hair up into a ponytail. Attach a shell from Virginia :) Add many many flower clips and finish with some spray on glitter and there you have it, an easy step-by-step princess hairdo.:))


Halloween donuts from Grandma Barker and hot cocoa for breakfast.

Pumpkin carving fun and guts.






Looking at their pumpkins out their bedroom window.

Our creepy crow, rat, spider infested porch




Even the dogs dressed up. Duce was his usual lion and Fred was Teen Wolf.


Eating chili out in the backyard before trick-or-treating. HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Ruthy Rue

And it begins...the nicknames from Jeremy. Our poor kids have a million different names and Ruth isn't left out. On her list so far, Ruthy, little Rue, Cheeks (I think you can see why), and Fall-to-it (???). One thing we all call her is sweetheart because she is just as sweet as they come. I couldn't have asked for a better baby. Watch her turn on me now that I typed that. Well at least for now she is sweet and chubby and we just can't get enough of her.

Tummy time



First bath

First smiles

First time sleeping in a drawer. Just kidding. My friend Rosemarie took these last two darling pictures of her.