Halloween 2013

Halloween around here is generally pretty low key. No school dress-ups or parades or carnivals to worry about and the girls just choose something out of the dress-up collection to use for their Halloween costume. We probably wouldn't win any costume contests, but the girls haven't complained, so we'll just keep it simple!  

Carly was a Cat. The ears are homemade and the tail is one of my belts!

Ellie was an Enchantress this year (I think she was last year too). Here she is with one of her new best friends that lives the next block over. (I love Ellie's face in this picture)

Aubree was a fairy princess. Her costume consists of a very badly stained pink princess dress, torn wings, and a very red shirt. She was happy as could be with this costume and extremely proud of this full bag of candy!

We had a dinner at our neighbor's house, then Aaron took the girls trick-or-treating while I handed out candy. I think we got close to 400 trick-or-treaters this year!

The next day the girls had the traditional Halloween candy sorting and trading. I love seeing them do the same things I did (and probably every kid does).

A Bunch of Bookworms

The other day the girls and I decided to go through all of our picture books and try to weed out the ones that are falling apart or that we don't really like. 

But man alive, it sure is hard to get rid of books in this house full of book worms. Almost every book was someone's favorite or held some importance. In the end we did get rid of a couple dozen. Here are some of the books we kept that brought back some memories:

I read this book so many times to Carly. Even though I'm not a huge fan of the illustrations, I love the message and the memory.

We really like the Mercer Mayer books.

This book was given to me by my Aunt Janet in 1989. Also, I love the fables in it.

Ellie was reading this book to me last year

 and when she got to this page she paused to look around at the picture, and then she said, "Hey, I could use some of that stuff!" Ha ha! It's especially funny to us because one of Ellie's nicknames is Hector the Collector - she is always finding little "treasures". She would LOVE to explore a junk yard!

This is a book from my parent's house that I grew up looking at.

Anne of Green Gables. Really, no explanation is needed here, but I just love this book (the original as well as this one), and the movie. Chicken soup for the soul!

(One time Carly and Ellie were watching Anne of Green Gables together and I overheard this conversation:
Ellie: "Gilbert is so handsome Carly."
Carly: "I know. I love Gilbert."
Ellie: "Me too."
Carly (realizing the significance of what she had just said): "I can't believe I love Gilbert!"


This is the first "chapter book" I remember reading. (Not this exact copy though) And this is one of the first books Ellie read on her own.

Super cute - especially considering our love of big dogs.

Trudy Harris was one of my Young Women's leaders and she gave me a couple of her books at my baby shower for Carly. I read this book to her sooooo much! (Another one she gave us that we totally wore out from reading it SO much was "Pattern Fish".)

 It's been well loved!

A book I remember reading in elementary school - this is the exact copy. It's a very touching story. And I love Eleanor Estes books - especially the Moffat books.

When we first got this book I was a little annoyed with it. I didn't like the illustrations or the way it used certain rhyming words. But, Aubree loved to have me read it to her and she even memorized it - so cute! So, now I love this book too.

I've always loved Shel Silversteins writings and this book particularly. We gave it to Grandpa Leon for Christmas one year and he got emotional as he read it - pretty sweet.

Jenny Nielsen gave us this book when we lived in Moscow because it reminded her of Carly. It's about a super short little girl who is taught confidence by her grandma. Definitely one of my favorites!

This is a book that Aaron's parents gave to his brother Troy when he was little and being bullied at school.

I love the cute poems in this book. (It's where we got the nickname Hector the Collector for Ellie)

 And it's even more special because it was given to me as a gift from my oldest sister.

Here's a picture of Carly walking home from school today. She was finishing up book 6 in The Sisters Grimm. I guess it's pretty good...

Stephanie's Surprise Visit

We didn't tell the girls that we were having a special visitor come. So, when Steph walked into the family room Thursday morning the girls were sincerely surprised. Carly was speechless and just stared for a few seconds before they all ran over and tackled her. 

Our first day together I let Carly and Ellie stay home from school and we took Steph to Mystic to see the drawbridge, get apple cider donuts at Clyde's, and visit Mistick Village.

The next day we took her to Watch Hill after school (and drove by Taylor Swift's house).

Saturday was apple picking with our Branch

Sister Avery and Sister Blair

Then we headed over to Harkness State Park (most of the pictures below were taken at Harkness and none of them include Steph. :( Steph and I did take pictures together, but they are mostly on her iPhone.)

 There were beautiful gardens and two old mansions

 and the park has a beach!

This is Aubree's camera smile:

and her real smile (and yes, this picture makes me want to eat her up!):

 We found this cool barn door at the park. I wish we would have been more coordinated in our outfits and actually done our hair.

Carly took this awesome picture of one of the beautiful views at Harkness State Park.

Aubree was always giving Baby Kate kisses and kept reminding Stephanie of how big her belly was. (Baby Kate is due in December)

 It was fun to bring Stephanie to our branch meeting house on Sunday.
On Tuesday I got my first migraine (because of my neck being out) - complete with blurred vision and vomiting. So, that day was pretty much spoiled since I was stuck in bed most of the day. But thankfully Steph took over and played with Aubree, cleaned my house, and picked Carly and Ellie up from school. What a sweet sister!

The last two days of Stephanie's visit, she and I went to Newport, RI. We did a Servants Life Tour at one of the Newport mansions (we wish we would have done just one of the regular house tours, but oh well), went out to eat, and rented two redbox movies. The next morning we got massages and walked around East Greewich, then off to the airport.

We sure loved having Stephanie here with us!

The Coffin Date (straight from my journal)

Oct. 21, 2001

 Last night I went on a date with Aaron Parsen, it was so much fun! (First of all, Aaron is this guy who I have a crush on. He is an awesome guy. He is so funny and nice, and everything - he's the type of guy I'd like to bring home someday.)
   The date he had taken me on was a date that he and his buddies had been wanting to do since their sophomore year in high school. They picked us up at 3pm and took us up to "their spot" at Kelly's Canyon. This is a spot that they had always gone camping at together. So when we got there we went hiking, played football, and some other games. Then we started to make a hole in the ground where we could build a campfire. While we were digging the hole we hit a piece of wood - about 6 feet long -in the ground. I had the flashlight and I was scared to death that there was a dead body or something crazy like that in it. Even the guys were scared. The thing that made it scarier was that a few weeks ago a girl from IF was kidnapped and killed and they think she was buried somewhere. So as we were looking at this piece of wood I was thinking that we had found this girl. We lift off the piece of wood and underneath it there are bones!! I was freaking out. But then one of the guys sees some paper plates and utensils in the coffin. The guys all start laughing and we realized that they had planned it.  (The bones were from the deer that Aaron had killed the other day!) It was a great trick. After that, we built a campfire and ate a delicious dutch oven dinner.
   Then Aaron and his friend Jordan played the guitar and sang for us. (Aaron has an awesome voice!) Aaron started singing and made up a song about his buddies. He told about how they came here all the time to go camping and that one day they decided to carve their initials on a tree and they each put a + next to their names. They decided that they would each bring their future wives here some day and propose to them. It was so cute! It made me wish at that moment that Aaron was my boyfriend because it was so romantic! After the date, as Aaron was walking me back to my apartment he asked me if he could come visit me here some time! :) I hope he does. 

I've discovered that my journals are not literary works of art. I think Carly, at nine years old, has better writing style than I did in college (or even now). Oh well, I'm glad I have it recorded. :)

Before we left Kelly's our dates took us to look at "the tree" with their initials and we had this picture taken:

Aaron is third from the left (doesn't he look exactly the same?) and I am above him. 

I remember thinking that night, "I want to carve my initials in that tree"!
Well, two years later, my wish came true.
Here's that same tree twelve years after "the coffin date":

And here we are 12 years after that first date:

Journal Entry: August 14, 2001

Sorry, not the coffin date. I'm going out of order here. But, I thought this would be good to add to our dating story even though this was written before I even knew there was a person named Aaron Parson out there.

(note: the words in blue are the words straight out of my journal. the words in black are commentary from me right now.) 

I need to be the kind of person that is qualified - or like - the person I want to marry. So, I'm going to list the qualities:

• Someone who reads their scriptures regularly
- yep

• A return missionary
- and I'm pretty sure he was AWESOME!

• Gets along with their family and is respectful to their parents
-yep

• A hard worker (not lazy), focused, ambitious
- very much so!

• Mature, not worried about trivial social things and not starved for attention
- he's pretty much happy to just hang out with our family at home every day.

• Takes care of their body and keeps their body in good shape
- Wakes up at 4:30 every weekday to go to the gym

• Good sense of humor - laughs and makes me laugh
- In a house full of emotional girls this quality is immeasurable! has come in handy on more than one occasion. He has the wonderful ability to not take me too seriously, and even laugh (in a very caring and sweet way) when I'm in an irrational state of mind. Not to mention that he is just a funny guy. He makes jokes and laughs at my jokes and can laugh at himself.

• Thrifty, good with money, doesn't have to be rich to be happy
- Aaron definitely takes his responsibility to provide for our family seriously, and works hard at being successful in his career. That being said, Aaron's biggest financial dream is to own big dogs. Seriously. Now, when I talk about financial dreams I talk about trips to Europe, shopping sprees, nicer home, nicer car, the list goes on and on. Aaron just wants an Irish Wolfhound. 

• Someone who is humble, can admit when they're wrong, can say sorry and thank you easily and doesn't always have to be right
- I could write essays about Aaron's ability to apologize (even when he's not always to blame), and his overall humility. This is one of the number one things I admire in him (partly because humility is not my strong point) and has made our marriage much more peaceful. If I would have married someone with my amount of humility .... there would be a lot of fighting! 

• Smart, studies hard
- Always one of the number one students in his class. 

• Spiritual, but doesn't flaunt it, loves the church, has a strong testimony
- yep

• Honest
- yep

• Happy, enjoys life, has fun and is optimistic
- yep. Although, life is not always peaches and cream and Aaron (and I) definitely have our unhappy, unfun, and pessimistic moments. We're real. :)

• kind to everyone, makes people feel comfortable around them
- I've never met anyone who didn't like Aaron right away (unless we're talking about his previous boss, but that's a whole other story, and he doesn't count).

• someone who is willing to go out of their comfort zone
- yep. Just one example: moving to Connecticut for a job that is way bigger and better than anything he had ever done before is definitely going out of his comfort zone. (And, by the way, he's learning so much at his job here and LOVING it!)

It's been a good reminder for me to read over these qualities - for a few reasons. First off, I realize how lucky I did get in finding Aaron and getting him to marry me. I was shooting pretty high ... and I got lucky! Secondly, this is a pretty good list of qualities that I still need to be working on. Thirdly, the law of attraction (like attracts like) really is a pretty powerful thing. I wrote this journal entry one month before I met Aaron. So even though a lot of these habits and characteristics are ones that I don't naturally posses, I'm sure they were ones that I was working on in that month. So, think positive thoughts and positive things will come your way! :)