Brrrrrrrrr, the COLD arrived

                                     

Getting back into school this week was painful! The mornings are cold and dark now even at 6:45, we engage the bum warmers in the van on our way to the gym. Evelyn was not feeling the need for school on Monday. Took me an hour just to coax her to complete two math problems. The boys were not thrilled I made them do actual math lessons and learn about phonics. Amelia discovered she had to finish a complicated unit on factoring that took three days instead of an hour or so. I was delighted to try my hand at quadratic equations after many, many years. We figured it all out but she still had to slug through all the practices and tests. The little girls and I made an impromptu stop at the library to finally get cards because I heard the lobby was open...the library was open! Only 30 can enter at a time but we were able to go in, browse, and check out 30 new books. Lots of fun reading this week thanks to the library. I felt behind most of the week, behind in laundry, grocery shopping, cleaning, writing and blogging the week, etc. 

We had some funny spots this week. Evelyn decided to brush her teeth using a silly apparatus that pulls lips away from the mouth...her goal was to see all her teeth! Goal reached. Evelyn and Ambree decorated our driveway with some gorgeous chalk art. Those two also set up a chair train in the school room. Josie donned Phillip's Halloween costume to our amusement. The suit is huge on Phillip so you can only imagine how swamped Josie was. Josie took Stitch (aka Mia) on a walk around the block with a rope. Everett got his much desired Sloth suit for Halloween. He was a three-toed sloth for half the week. It was super cold this week with highs in the 40s. We are not ready for winter yet in October. Guess I need to hitch up my belt and go get winter gear. 

Justin had a very, very busy work week. He was late getting home on the days he was in the office, Wednesday until after 10:30 pm. He was able to meet the deadlines of the week so had time to spare this weekend. He's working on a project to reset his Ryobi lithium batteries so the batteries will take charge after the factory settings fill up. I love his love of tinkering. He has a locksmith sets he loves to tinker around with as well. He was very nice and cleaned up the dishes twice this week. 

Thursday we decorated sugar cookies with the Palmers in an effort to help them with their Halloween party the next day. We enjoyed using royal frosting as a new medium. Amelia and the girls went early, Josie with a jar of nutella and bag of bread for lunch sandwiches. Everett loves Hyrum, he is everything Everett wants to grow up to be: a soccer star with a homemade ramp for bikes. Friday Everett made plans to make our own ramp. His first draft was 12" long by 8" wide, we had a laugh over those dimensions. After measuring his bike the plans got significantly larger. 

Friday the kids got dressed up in the Halloween costumes for the Palmer's party. Evelyn went as Mulan in her matchmaker outfit. Josie vacillated between Cinderella and Belle, Cinderella won. I had fun fixing their hair up fancy. The girls went from 5-7 for Eli and Fallon's party. The older kids went from 7-10 for Clare and Hyrum's party. Amelia worked hard on her deer costume. She had it planned out for a month at least. She made her own flowered set of antlers! Took us an hour to fix up her hair and face paint...but she loved the finished look. The boys were easy: don their comfy PJ union suits as Cactus Jack and the sloth. Josie cried off and on after we got home because I wouldn't let her go trick or treat. It's hard to understand that the real holiday is still 8 sleeps away.