We honored our Veterans

We held a Webelos flag ceremony in the morning:

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And hiked along the Santa Cruz river where the Mormon Battalion came through in December of 1846. The Webelos are carrying big bags of garbage they collected along the trail. It was so hot!

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(Mark hiked the whole way, too):

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Next, we visited the monument for the Mormon Battalion in Downtown Tucson:

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And we listened to Mr. Tossi speak about his experiences in WWII under General Patton. This man landed in Morocco, travelled through Northern Africa and up into Sicily; he went to England and then landed on Omaha Beach during the invasion of Normandy. He fought his way through Europe and Africa in a tank. Daniel asked to have his picture taken with him:

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Costume capers

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The perennial Halloween shot on the front walk.

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Here we reveal the pumpkin artists from our last post.

The boys came home from church and found the backyard required some defensive tactics.

And now that October 31 is over we can get on to much better things.

We pulled out the Christmas music a week before Halloween. That last picture hardly looks like a Currier and Ives Christmas card painting, but the angle of the sun, the early dark nights and the smell of woodburning stoves is in the air in the evenings  makes it impossible to ignore that little Thanksgiving and Christmas spirit, even if it’s 80 something degrees outside during the day.

Boo!

Happy Halloween from…

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The Little Bunny of Doom

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Spiderius bitesyouwhenyousleepii

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The Hound of the Baskervilles

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and Cutie pumpkin surprise.

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WooooOoooooooOooooooo!

Pirate at rest

Tim the pirate

We’ve been hard at work this afternoon, painting facial hair on the a pirate in the house, finding boots, hooks, armor, the right gloves and nail polish, hats, belts, and glitter. I just found Timothy crashed on the couch, the flier for the evening’s event serendipitously placed behind his exhausted body.

The Games We Play

legos and mindstorms robot

I found the boys playing with this massive Lego creation a few minutes ago. There is a robot controlled by my laptop and lots of aliens and Mars Mission contraptions.

long leg fashions

And on the camera were these photos of the long-legged doll fashions Paige likes to sew. Aunt Care has made some of these.

long leg fashions

We know how to have fun around here.

Music Honor Society

honor society paige

honor society daniel

This is an honor that comes with accompanying music store discounts and gift cards. Shall we buy a Star Wars score? A Broadway book?

The kids work so hard on the piano. I love how our house is filled with music every day.

Prima Ballerina

ballet

This is Paige at age 5 posing with the ballerinas from the Nutcracker Ballet in 2001.

Paige danced around the house from the time she could walk. We took Paige at age 5 to the Nutcracker wearing a dress as close to a tutu as we could create. She sat quietly through the show, enchanted by the beautiful dancing. At one point she leaned over to me and said, “I love the ballet so much, I just want to go up on stage and dance with them!”

Paige didn’t like to leave my side when she was young. I worried about that a little when I decided to sign her up for ballet lessons, beginning on her 6th birthday. She still talks about that first day of ballet like it was the day her life began.

Anyone who has seen her dance knows that she has a special gift.

Ballerina Sarah

Tonight Paige learned that she has been chosen for the second year in a row to dance the lead role in Oh Holy Night. What I thought was a once in a lifetime experience for her (and for me, too) will be repeated. This time I’ll bring my tissues. I’m sure I’ll need them.