Friday, October 31, 2014

October

We're getting ready for ski season - we all got season passes!!  These pics of Bradley crack me up because if they were a bit more fuzzy he'd pass for Bigfoot with the way he's walking.
Over UEA, Matt and Bradley went to Colorado for an Eagles hockey tournament.  The rest of us stayed home and 
1) went to an apple orchard... 


 
 
 

2) Made some of those apples into yummy caramel apple delights... 3) Picked pumpkins and ran through the hay maze at the pumpkin patch... 4) Played at Get Air again... and 5) went out to eat for every dinner and played so hard that this little one fell asleep early.  Aren't sleeping kids the cutest?!
  
 

 
 
 
 

While at the tournament in Colorado, Bradley's team didn't place, but they had a fabulous time.  They walked from their hotel to the rink via a nature trail and they had a lot of fun seeing rabbits everywhere.  Owen wanted some closeup pictures so Bradley used his creeping, army crawl skills to snap these photos.  I also added some misc. hockey related photos.





This month we also did a few small home improvements.  Honestly, I think the smallest improvements can give the biggest impact to the way your space works.  We added some wall systems to our garage and now we can hang all our skis and more tools up.  We also added three shelves, removed the closet rod, and added hooks in our coat closet.  This space works so much more efficiently now!!!  We've got boots on the floor, a laundry basket with our ski pants on the bottom shelf, a circular basket on the middle shelf to hold thermals, and the ski coats and helmets hang around all three edges of the closet.  The top two shelves hold misc stuff we don't use often.  In our pantry we added a shelf closer to the ceiling.  You need a stool to reach, but it's perfect for paper towels and things we rarely use.  It is amazing how much more room I seem to have now with just those small fixes!!

Our second year at the Oakridge Halloween Party.  It was just like last year and didn't disappoint!
Painting pumpkins, decorating sugar cookies, and feeling slimy, gross, Halloween guts.
This fun creature keeper came again with another fun, fabulous show:

 
 
 
 
 

The Nord Family Halloween party - Rancho Style!!   
This year was a "Cow-Boo" celebration!
Matt had to work late so he joined us later.  Will is Darth Maul, Lauren's HP again, I'm a hunter and Logan and Bradley are my mounted trophy deer, and Owen is a toilet.  He was dead set on being a toilet this year so we tried our best to make his costume.  He got a TON of comments while he was trick-or-treating, and one neighbor even gives out awards for who he thinks has the best costume of the night so Owen got a special treat from that house!!
Brad's friend Spence Packer* set up this teepee and told a spooky tale of Old Ephriam.  The little kids loved it... intense enough to qualify for Halloween but not scary enough that the littles would get nightmares.  *Sidenote about Spence - He is the kind friend that made Maggie's dog coffin for us this summer.  Another fun tidbit of info is that he also happens to be Elder Packer's son.  The amazing party tent and decorations.  Sue and Brad went all out - it was fabulous!  The incredible couple who planned and hosted this event.  We sure love Nana and Papa!Happy Halloween!!