New eye wear for some.

I forgot to pass on some important news. The kids had an appointment the last couple of weeks with the eye doctor. Paige upgraded her glasses to something a little more grown up and started to try out contacts. Parker had to get glasses due to the fact he was having a very hard time seeing about everything. He couldn't see too much in school and at home he was six inches away from the TV all the time. He is very proud of his new glasses and has been very good about wearing them and taking good care of them as well. He actually was excited about getting them and was very fun to watch as he tried on several pair before he chose his favorites.

I am still getting used to the fact he is wearing glasses, but I think he is very cute and very smart looking. Just a new look for both Paige and Parker.

What's new with us.

Here is October and November's post all in one. We all were able to enjoy halloween on Saturday, Oct. 30. We went to the trunk or treat our ward hosts every yea. The kids always bring home too much candy. I always worry about Madison and the abundance of candy she gets, but we seem to manage and make it all disappear within a week or two. This year the kids were very imaginitive with their costumes. Meghan was a puppet and dismissed her strings at the last minute and went as a doll. Paige was a gypsey, Madison was Athena from Percy Jackson movie and Parker went as a Power Ranger. All was fun and now they are making plans for next year.


Before we enjoyed the Halloween trunk or treat, we as a family took a short trip up to St. George to take family pictures at the Jacob Hamlin home. The week before our youth from our ward took a trip up to St. George and visited several sites. Meghan thought the Jacob Hamblin home was the perfect setting for our family pictures this year. Here are a few of the pictures. I just can't decide which one I like the best.

Overall, we are staying busy. Everyone is doing well in school. Jim is getting the hang of his new classes, I have only FIVE classes left after this semester is over, and Meghan is still practicing her driving skills and trying to get all the hours in so she can schedule her driving test for her license. We look forward to having Grandma Coffey down for Thanksgiving and take a breather from school for the Christmas holiday. That is a short review of what we have been up to. More exciting posts to come.

FRESH STRAWBERRIES and a HUGE CANTALOPE

I went out to the garden today and found a handful of strawberries. I was so excited because the snails or some other bugs didn't get them before we did. Our strawberry patch is growing beautifully thanks to Jim for using miracle grow on them. I just LOVE growing home grown fruits and veggie because everything tastes better than the store bought ones. YUM!

After finding the strawberries, I then began looking at the rest of the garden which seems to be finished growing except this green, round squash looking thing. We have watched this plant grow all summer and the leaves looked like a cantalope, but then it got so big I just thought it was some sort of winter squash. I picked it because it looked over ripe and thought I might just look at it to see what color of squash it might be. When I cut it open my nose told me it was a cantalope and my eyes couldn't believe how big it got. We brought it in, cut it up, and chilled it for a while then we set it on the dinner table and enjoyed it. It was so big I cut a bowl up for our neighbor to share. Okay, I can truely say miracle grow does it's job.

Survival of the first day of school

We all have survived our first day of school. Jim was a bit nervous for his master's classes. Meghan has been on cloud nine because she is finally with kids from middle school (or should I say 8th grade which has been her MOST FAVORITE GRADE). Paige is just in her element of being a social bug at Lied Middle School, and Madison is just a bit nervous about forgetting her new teacher's name on the first day of school. Parker woke up early and couldn't wait to get to school. "No first day of school tears for my mom, I am the 4th child and she is excited to send me to school", thought Parker . He wasn't all too excited to take pictures to document the memorible event. He did think I would stay outside the classroom door for two and half hours so he was a bit confused when he had to walk to the playground to be picked up.

MOM!! No more pictures. That is enough!! I want to go learn. On his second day of school he proved to his teacher that counting is easy. He had a TEST to see if he could count to 10 and he went up to 72 when the teacher stopped him for another student. He wanted to see how far he could count but he does have to leave room for improvement.

Madison and Parker were so eager to go to school. I wish there was a special bottle to capture all the excitement and release the excitment back on them in January when school is getting to be just school and just part of the daily routine. We shall see how long this excitement lasts. I survived all my classes as well last week. I started a week before everyone so I had a head start of everyone. I will finish before everyone too. Now that we all are back in school, we get to all have study time and quiet time. YEA!!!!! We shall see how long that lasts.

We have one week of summer left and we have done some exciting things last week as we wrap- up the summer . I took the kids up to Mount Charleston to a hike we took with our neighbors last fall, but never found the real trail head. I was determined to find it and complete the hike for Mary Jane Falls. I almost missed the switchbacks because it is not clearly marked, but we were pointed in the correct direction from a friendly hiker close by. It was a great hike. A little harder than I expected but the kids did great. I owe my THANKS to Meghan and Chad for helping me carry Parker at times when his little legs just hurt with pain. Following are some pictures we took at the top enjoying the waterfalls. Everybody got a little wet from the falls, but Meghan decided to drench herself in the water.

At the top of the falls we climbed up into this little cave so to speak. Meghan didn't like the tight closeness of the cave but she was patient so I could get a picture with everyone.

Last week we also celebrated Madison's 9th birthday. She loved the apron I made her and was so excited to take a couple of friends over to her uncle's home to use his COOL POOL. Thanks uncle Steven for the use of the COOL POOL.

We bought a bunch of noodles to play in the pool and afterwards Madison gave each of her guests a noodle to take home as a reminder of the awesome fun they all had. We shall see how interesting this Fall is with my family. I am enrolled in my second yearof my Master's at UNLV, Jim has decided to start his Masters this fall, and all the kids even Parker will be in school. I have decided that we are an "Education Family" this fall as all of us will be in school learning new things. It should be very interesting how all of it will come together. Stay tuned!! Hopefully, Iwill be more organized to post something about our family each week.

Happy 9th Birthday Madison

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MADISON!! I sure have enjoyed the last NINE years with you. Hope you have a wonderful day with all your friends. Love you much.

Our week out of the heat.

Our week out of the heat was very, very fun this year. We started out at Bryce Canyon and camped out for one day then we traveled to Durango, Colorado where we always have a week long of work and fun.

Smores: Yes, our family loves to make smores. We made them all the time while we were at Grandma Sheila's and at Bryce Canyon. Yummy treat.

Our first stop on our week out of the heat was Bryce Canyon. We camped out and then went and explored Bryce Canyon from bottom to the top. We really enjoyed seeing the sights and spending time as a family.

This year on the little farm we were able to make an abundance of applesauce. We ended up with 26 pints of applesauce, 13 quarts of apple juice, 2 batches of apple/apricot fruit leather (fruit roll-ups the old fashion way) and 4 batches of apple/cinnamon.

Mowing the fields and the lawn was another little project we all enjoyed doing. In fact, it was so popular that we had to make sure everyone got a turn.

While we were at Grandma Sheila's we also had many little projects to do. Jim built a flowerbed for my Mom and did all the hard work of leveling the stones and getting them in place. Paige repainted an old milk cabinet from my Great Grandmother, Mama Nartha Priestwich and turned it into a cabinet to hold Mama Nartha's old china that has been in storage for twenty years.

We had a great time at the farm and the time always goes too fast. If you want to see all the photos we took on the "Week out of the heat" go to Meghan, Jim, or mine facebook pages to see the full album.