Unprompted

Rob and I were paying and turned around to this.  She's got quite a sense of humor. Precocious.  I used to hate precocious children.  Then I had one.  First we abhor, then we tolerate, then we embrace.

Sacramento

A couple of weeks ago we took a quick day trip to Sacramento where we went to the zoo, Old Sac, and Ikea.  It was nice to get out and see a new place.  A note about Old Sac.  It looks and feels a lot like the Old Market in Omaha.  It makes sense because both were the terminuses of the transcontinental railroad.  Intersting. Lots to do, so we will have to go back.

How to Raise Little Nerds

Recently, for RS enrichment night we had what was called RSUniversity and there were "mini-classes" on organization, family traditions, and nutrition.  Each was extremely over the top and Pinterest worthy and made me giggle inside with the level of ridiculousness. Not really my cup of tea.  One lady who taught made the suggestion of creating a family motto and then basing all your family activities on that quote.  Awesome, right?  Pin that mormon housewives!  So our family has decided to adopt the motto, "Nerds will dominate the world."  Or, "nerds rule".  Okay we haven't narrowed it down, but we definitely want to go with the nerd theme for sure.  It really feels right.

To that end: we recently discovered that TED talks are available on Netflix.  And we introduced them to our kids.  And we have been watching them like crazy lately.  And we love them.  So so so much food for thought.  And so much inspiration to come up with an idea worth sharing.  Here are a couple of our favorites so far:

Pumpkin Patch

A few weeks ago our dentist office paid for their patients to go to a pumpkin patch.  So we went.  (sidenote, I am so annoyed by all the bells and whistles at orthodontist/dentist offices.  Why not just charge less instead of giving away xbox's, wii's, bikes, etc.  lame).  Anyway, we went.  It was fun.  It was no Cox Farms, Valla's or Cornbelly's but it hit the spot.  The kids had fun and we got some cool pumpkins and gourds. 

 On the one way home this one cloud was glowing.  This photo doesn't do it justice.  Although many things in Reno are sort of meh and subpar I have to say Reno has the most amazing skies.  Seriously.  Breathtaking almost most of the time.  I don't know how it pulls it off, but it does.  It does have at least one thing to recommend it.

Happy Halloween

I am behind on blogging but I am going to skip ahead and blog about Halloween before it is Christmas.  So anyway, sadly, Rob was working in Elko so he missed the festivities.  Our friends invited us to eat and trick-or-treat with them.  She made this awesome punch.

 Lucy hit the jackpot because her friend did her hair and make-up and it turned out awesome.

 We ate monster eyeballs.

 Clara wanted to be Pocahontas, but in the morning when the costume was put together she was really upset because she didn't look anything like Disney's Pocahontas.  So, she switched to Tiger Lily which soothed her ruffled feathers.  But then at school she kept getting asked if she was Pocahontas.  So by evening she had changed back to Plan A.

 Tucker was a creeper mad scientist.  Not sure how I feel about that wig.  Kind of gross.

 Anders was the Bieber.  We got him a wig but it was too itchy for him.  He was kind of disappointed because he just looked like a kid in skinny jeans.  But it's the thought that counts?

 Lucy and friends getting ready:

 The boys and their good buddy:

 Lucy was Effie Trinket from Hunger Games....she looked awesome:

The cute girlies:

 The whole crew:

We went trick-or-treating the neighborhood over by the church which was a lot of fun because we knew so many people and bumped into so many friends while we were out.  All in all, minus Rob's absence, it was a pretty great Halloween!

Tournament Champions

A few weeks ago Anders' team participated in a tournament.  We hadn't intended to spend our whole day watching soccer games, but they kept winning.  So we kept staying.  And then they won the whole darn thing!  It was pretty cool.  He's had a great season.