Random Pictures

So I was looking through our photos and I found these gems that never got posted.

The first one is the kids eating at a "Family Fun" event we went to back in September. It was so much fun! They had inflatable toys, games, snakes, free food, rock wall (which Kailyn attempted to scale), animals like goats to pet, horses to ride, and much more. The best part...it was all FREE (even the food). Unfortunately, I didn't get a lot of pictures cause my camera battery died. Thank you so much to Cynthia who took a picture of the girls on the horses.

Caden skipping the hot dog and going straight for the cookie. Sounds like a good idea to me.

Jordan rode a pony.

Kailyn got on her horse grabbed the reins and started kicking the horse (how you kick to get the horse to go). The lady in charge came over and gave me her card telling me they normally don't let kids ride on trails as young as her but Kailyn was a natural (not sure if she was really impressed or just trying to drum up business).

CADEN

For some reason Caden has adopted this Frisbee as his new hat. He loves to wear it.

Caden helping Daddy mow the lawn back in September.

JORDAN

We went to an open house thing awhile back and as we were leaving Jordan asked if she could have one more treat. I told she could grab one more. She came back holding 2 and told me that she wanted to take one home to Daddy who wasn't able to come cause he was working. I thought it was sweet and told her that would be fine. When we got home she handed me this and wanted me to put it on the table for Dad when he got home. When I looked at it I was a bit surprised and asked her what happened to the rest. She told me she wanted to try a little. The next morning she excitedly asked if Ken had gotten the treat she saved for him.

Jordan 'reading' a story to Caden

We often find that Jordan has fallen asleep in weird places. Here she fell asleep while sitting in her chair.


KAILYN

The second day of school (while I was taking a shower) Ken decided to take some pictures of Kailyn, just in case I had forgotten the first day. This is what Kailyn gave him. I have not idea where she came up with some of her poses.







I guess the other two wanted to get in on the fun.

Apple Picking

So I realized I never posted pictures from our apple picking. We went as a ward to MacQueen's apple orchard. Ken had to work so Russ (Ken's brother), who was visiting us to help us fix our roof, came along to help instead. I think we waited to late this year to go picking cause the trees were very picked over and the only apples had to be reached by ladders. I am so glad Russ was there to help lift the kids up. The kids had a lot of fun and we got a lot of yummy apples that we used to make crisp, apple butter, and just ate. The kids were disappointed when we went to get a donut (or as Jordan calls them bagels with frosting and sprinkles) and discovered they were all out. Donuts were a huge hit last year and they had been looking forward to them all year.

Jordan had so much fun picking the apples. She picked most of our apples for us.

Kailyn ran off with her friends for most of the time but did help us pick a few.

Caden picking apples.

Caden was so proud of every apple he successfully picked.

Caden wanted to carry the apples. He gave it a good try, but didn't go anywhere.

Our little taste testers.

New Roof

So while we our talking about our house thought I should post some pictures from our other project. As you may remember we had a leaking bathroom that had to be gutted do to black mold. After trying to tar the roof we realized that our efforts were fruitless and we just needed to reroof.

Ken's brother Russ flew out to help us on our endeavors. We soon learned that the roof had 3 layers of shingles on it!! Totally against code. After a lot of work by Ken and Russ (removing 3 layers is a lot of scrapping and a lot of nails to remove), we discovered why we are leaking. Under the 3 layers there was tar paper everywhere on the roof except the area of the roof that leaks.

After removing the tar paper we also discovered rotten wood and 2 areas on the roof invested by carpenter ants. So they got rid of the ants and replaced the boards (both support beams and actual roof).

This is one of the boards they removed. It's hard to see but the board is completely rotted.

Area 1 infested by ants and rotten. (front of house)

Area 2 infested by ants and rotten (back of the house). Which explains the other leak in our house.
New boards.

Then the fun began, laying the shingles. I actually like laying shingles, I have helped by dad do it a few times on our home growing up. After many long hours, a few blisters, and no serious injuries our roof is done. (I will have to take a picture of the finished project, it really does look nice)

Russ hard at work

Ready to lay the new shingles.

Timber!!

As many of you know we have a very large yard that had many very large trees. Unfortunately, they were all infected by the Ash Borer. It is a little bug that borers into the tree and thus cuts off the tree's supply of water and nutrients.

We had one tree fall on its own in August. It was completely rotted out. Our neighbors hired a tree service to cut down their 2 trees and wanting ours down too we told them to continue on into our yard. They ended up cutting down 14 trees. It was really amazing to watch them cut down these 50 foot plus trees. There was one massive tree by our house. It was boxed in by power lines on one side and our house on the other. I was really amazed by how they maneuvered the branches down, never touching our house or the lines...that is until they got to the very last cut. I don't know if they were tired or what, but they cut the bottom part of the trunk down and it fell unexpectedly onto the power lines. You should have seen them panic and how they worked frantically to fix the problem. They were able to get it off the lines but not before it caused some damage to the lines.

I am so sad to see the trees go. Our yard looks so bare now, although I must admit fall this year was much more enjoyable (raking up leaves from 14 massive trees is quite the undertaking).

A couple of trees turned out to be rotten in the middle. Here is a picture of one of them.

Here is a picture of one of the guys cutting down the tree. He is on the small branch on the right.

The kids loved playing on the logs. Here is Jordan.

Jordan on her thinking stump.

Caden

Our new bare yard (the trees on the left belong to our neighbors) and a picture of some of the wood left by the trees.

The logs are almost gone now. A friend of a neighbor 2 houses down from us took over half of it, our next door neighbor took a little of it, and some people from our ward are taking the rest. Our poor yard is pretty beat up between the trees falling on it, the logs laying on it, and all of the cars driving onto the grass to get the wood.

Package

Like all kids my kids love getting packages. For every holiday my parents send a package for the kids. The kids love getting these packages (I must admit I look forward to them too) and can't wait to open them and discover what fun things are found inside.

Even before opening the package they can't seem to take themselves away from the box.

Some of the goodies. Caden quickly zeroed in on the marshmallows and tried to claim them all to himself.

For Family Home Evening we cooked up the cake mix (found in the package) and then I let kids frost and decorate them. They were so excited by the selection of sprinkles (also found in the package)