babyville.

A couple of weeks ago I babysat my friend Kimber's baby Abe and my friend Tamara stopped by with Benjamin. When Bentley woke up from his nap he was so excited to see babies. He insisted that I hold one baby and he hold the other. He got Abe's blanket and pacifier and was so cute with them. I asked him if he wanted a baby. Last time I asked he immediately told be "No!" but this time he didn't answer. It's gonna be awhile.

halloween.

My parents came up for Halloween because I had to work at our community opening social and Matt had to go to school. So they brought the boys to the opening social and took care of them while I sat on a ginormous bounce house and monitered the gazillion kids waiting in line for their turn. I will definitely be signing up to work at a different station next year. Bentley and Gaige had so much fun with Grams and Grandad that they took a very long nap. When they woke up we dressed them in their costumes. I got Bentley to wear his costume by telling him that people wouldn't give him candy unless he wore his whole costume. When we went to the ward party last weekend he refused to wear it and went as the UPS man instead. Gaige wore the pirate costume to the ward party and was the UPS man on Halloween.

We met up with the Floods, Jensens, Crisslers, and Hoovers to trick or treat in our neighborhood. The boys had so much fun and were pretty good about taking one piece of candy. By the time we got home Gaige had eaten 3 lollipops, one with the wrapper on it. I guess we know his favorite candy!

After trick or treating we came back to our place and had scones and hot apple cider. I have never made scones, but remembered my friend Carrie Nuttall's mom used to make them on Halloween in Georgia and I loved them. So I am starting my own tradition of Halloween scones. We ate them with whipped cream, honey, honey butter, and cinnamon and sugar (not all together). Thanks mom for frying them all! Here is the recipe:


Sconecutter White Bread Scones (Randy Barton)

Ingredients:

2 packages (2 tablespoons) active dry yeast

1/2 cup lukewarm water

1/4 cup sugar

1 tablespoon salt

2 cups warm water or warm milk

1/4 cup shortening, butter, or margarine

7 cups all purpose flour


Dissolve yeast completely in 1/2 cup lukewarm water; stir in sugar and salt. Add warm water or
milk; stir until frothy and smooth. Add shortening or butter and 7 cups of the flour to make a moderately stiff dough which is each to handle.Place dough on lightly floured surface; knead until smooth and elastic, five to six minutes (or in kitchen aid with dough hook). Place dough in lightly greased bowl. Cover and let rise in warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 1/2 hours. Punch down dough. Place on lightly floured surface and roll out to 1/2 inch thickness. Allow to rest five minutes. Cut with pizza cutter into desired shapes.Fry dough in deep, hot vegetable shortening (350 degrees) one minute on each side. Serve hot with honey butter, butter and honey, or jam.

Bentley - 2 years 7 months

height: 35 1/2 inches

weight: 26.9 pounds

Bentley loves to go to school. He often sings the "Who Came to Class Today?" song on the couch and names Bentley, Brother, Mommy, and Daddy. He also loves to sing the ABCs, but likes the Super Why version much better than the original ABC song. And he loves Super Why. He always says "Super Bentley, super Brother, super Daddy, super Mommy, super Grams to the rescue!", "the power to read!" He talks a lot, especially to Gaige. One night he didn't want to go to bed so he layed next to the door and screamed. After a couple of minutes he got up and got in bed and we could hear him telling Gaige "Mommy and Daddy won't open the door..." He gives "big" hugs and kisses and loves to help. He says "Bentley help mommy." He really likes to help cook dinner and carry stuff.

He also loves to walk Brother into nursery. The first day Gaige went to nursery they walked in holding hands, Bentley turned around and said "Bye Daddy" and they ran off to play. Usually Bentley cries for 10 seconds, but now he takes care of Gaige. The nursery leaders told me that Bentley would stand behind Gaige with his arms around him and would kiss the back of his head several times and rub his shoulders. If only he was always that nice to Gaige!

Gaige - 18 1/2 months

height: 33 1/3 inches

weight: 27.5 pounds

Gaige has to do everything by himself. He doesn't want help eating, drinking, or anything else. He loves to jump, and when he gets really excited he jumps and yells "Yup!" He is getting goofier and goofier. He loves to stomp up to people all hunched over with a big smile on his face. And he loves to giggle! He gives very big hugs and loves to give kisses too. He has recently learned to push and hit, probably from being in nursery. And he loves to say "No, no, no" to Bentley while Bentley is sitting in time out. He talks a lot and thinks everything is the color blue. He hates when he doesn't get to go to school with Bentley and can't wait to go pick him up. His favorite song is "Ring around the Rosie" and his favorite book is "A Mouse About the House." They boys call the book their "Mickey Mouse Book." They fight over it like crazy and Gaige gets so crazy that we don't read the book anymore. He is so obsessed he freaks out when we won't let him read it or try to put it away.

He follows Bentley around and wants to do everything Brother does. They love to sit on each other and wrestle, usually resulting in a lot of yelping and whining. They adore each other. I found Bentley in Gaige's crib the other morning, and this morning he brought Gaige lots of toys to play with in his crib before I got up. Which brings me to the rough stuff...my boys get up at 6 am now because of the time change! This week has been very long with early risers, not so great nappers, and lots of tantrums, crying, and naughtiness. No matter when we put Bentley to sleep he strolls out of his bedroom before 6:30 am which is just too early for my old bones! I've tried everything!

pumpkin patch.

Last Thursday we went on our preschool field trip to Underwood Family Farms in Moorpark. The boys got to feed chickens, go on a tractor ride, and pick out their own little pumpkins. Bentley loved the tractor ride and Gaige loved picking out pumpkins, he wanted way more than just one.

the LA zoo.

We were supposed to go to the pumpkin patch on our preschool field trip, but with rain in the forecast we rescheduled it. After living in LA for a couple of years I have noticed that whenever there is rain in the forecast for LA it does not rain. My mom came up and spent the night so she could go with the boys and me to the pumpkin patch. Since I was sure that it wasn't going to rain we decided to go to the LA zoo. I convinced Lauren that it wouldn't rain so she brought Alex and Austin too. It poured! It poured and poured and poured! But we don't mind the rain so we had lots of fun. The kids loved the animals, especially the sleeping hippo. 13 October 2009

look out mud, here we come!

All of that rain we had here in Southern California created lots of glorious mud for my boys to get their boyhood on. We suited up with rain boots and beanies and ran out to play in all of the goopy browness. Gaige thinks it is really fun to splash his hands in the muddy water and then lick them. If I let him he would lap up the muddy puddles like a puppy. He always attempts this but gets caught. One thing I love about my boys is their love for mud. They have so much fun splashing and stomping in it. I mean just look how much fun they have. What kind of mommy would I be if I denied them the sheer pleasure of playing in the mud like little boys should? They make me laugh!

conference.

For General Conference we had breakfast with the Hoovers. Ava and the boys had lots of fun playing together. And we had lots of laughs as the boys ran around being crazy the whole time. They are definitely little show offs when we have company. They treated Ava like a princess and fed her raspberries and watermelon until she couldn't fit anymore in her mouth. Ava is the cutest little thing and we had lots of fun with Kelli and Austin too. It's just too bad that she has horrible teenage parents that don't dress her...just kidding!

more fun.

The last week of Matt's vacation the boys were a little bit sick but we still managed to do some fun things. We went to Disneyland again, but this time we went with the Floods which was tons of fun! We also visited "Mother's Beach" in Marina Del Rey with the Floods and the Jensens. And best of all we went to the Long Beach Aquarium which is Bentley's new favorite place on Earth. Both of the boys, and Matt and I, had lots of fun. We pet sharks, sting rays, sea stars, sea cucumbers, anemones, and sea urchins. We watched the sea lions and seals, saw turtles, crabs, and lots of different fish. And we fed the birds. Bentley cried when we left after being there for four hours. He wanted to see more fish and whales! He even saw a Dory fish and Daddy fish. He was so excited that he went over and grabbed some random lady's hand, took her over to the fish and told her about Dory fish and Daddy fish. He talks about them every day. He says, "Dory, and Daddy fish, and whale." All in all, the whole family loved it and it brought back some great memories for Matt and I.

DisneylandMothers' Beach




Long Beach Aquarium