<Happy October>

Hello! You know I'm going to quit apologizing for it taking me a while to blog. Think of it as an unexpected suprise. I could blog everyday, but then you would get bored and you'd take it for granted. This way, when I do a new blog post, you can include it in your "best of" for the day. ;)
Here's what we've been up to this month...Train park! Alicia and I have been meaning to meet at the train park, but due to her being pregnant, it being 186.7 degrees outside, me being gone all the time, and just life, we haven't gotten there. After we got back from Utah, I went up and watched her girls for a little bit, then we took the kids to the train park. It was a really neat park, and was virtually free (it cost $2 to ride the train). It will be even more fun when the kids are a little older and can really enjoy the play ground area, because it's HUGE! Eli and I rode the train (Hailey didn't want to ride it until after the train departed... :) ) And it was really neat! The park is extremely big, and would be really fun with a big group. Eli loved the train ride and pointed to everything he saw...
Arizona Museum for Youth
Alicia and I also got together (the same week, woah!) and took the kids to the Youth Museum. It was great! They had an entire section dedicated to 4 and unders, and was basically a big indoor play place for them. There were lots of different rooms, one had a kitchen, one was a living room like place, this one that Eli is in was a "story" room with stuffed animals, books, and other neat things...including this tent that he really thought was fun to climb into.There was also this big tree-like thing that you could run up and then slide down. Eli loved running up it, but wasn't really sure about the slide. So I helped him down, and then he would just lay at the end of the slide until I helped him up. Hailey kept yelling at the top of the slide "get out of the way, get out of the way!" :) She was being so cautious and didn't want to slide into Eli!
Picture time! My friend let me borrow her rockin' camera overnight and I had fun playing with it...here's what turned out...


Mmm Sunflower Cupcakes... So I saw these cupcakes in a magazine and I wanted to try them out. They were a lot of fun to make... Unfortnately I completely neglected my child while making them and I found him...

...eating his Dad's crunch berry cereal. Oh so healthy. Boyd has shared his cereal with Eli before, but how did he know: 1. Where they were and how to get them... 2. WHAT they were... and 3. That he liked them..well the next morning, I figured out the answer to the first question.....ah ha! So in my pantry, I have a bin at the bottom which has rice and sugar in it. I guess the bin was sticking out just enough for him to plant his little foot on...somehow CLIMB UP it (it's about 18 inches tall) and then hold on tight and grab the crunch berries down...again...there are TONS of things in my pantry, how did he know to get those? Boyd has never given them to him out of the bag, so I'm sure he didn't know what was in the bag... maybe he did and he's smarter than I give him credit for...oh boy...

Eli had his first birthday party invitation! It was so much fun! We went to this indoor play place called Amazing Jakes. Eli rode a few rides including the carousel (as evident by this pic--which rocks, thanks Aubry), a train, and the teacups. My son has no fear. He just about jumped out of the train, and kept bouncing up and down. He figured out how to spin the teacups and thought that was pretty neat, and thoroughly enjoyed the carousel ride (although his fingers and knuckles were white from gripping the bar so tight, so I guess he's cautious, that's good.) Both Eli and I have been making lots of friends lately, and it is the BEST. All my friends live out of state, the closest friend I have here is my sister-in-law, Alicia, but she lives up in Scottsdale so we don't get to see each other as much as we'd like. So it's SO NICE to have a group of girls (I guess we're considered 'women'...weird) that I hang out with. They all have kids about Eli's age, and most are in my ward. It is absolute bliss. I am loving every minute I spend with these 'ladies' (that's a happy medium). Friendships truly are a gift and I'm so grateful to have them!One more week left in October (wow that's crazy! Especailly since it's still in the 90s here! Yikes!) And then on to November...the year is almost over! I'll be posting Halloween pics soon (yeah right Sarah...)