I hope everyone is enjoying this Halloween day. I swear the day is always longer on Halloween! And I am sure it is for all the kiddies that want to be trick-or-treating!

Everyone at my office dressed up for Halloween today and we had a little party this morning with pumpkin bread and apple cider. Lots of fun! I am dressed as Carol Anne from Poltergeist...wish I could look more like Kimmy did when she was little...now that was the ultimate Carol Anne! As a dare my boss, Linda, said she would buy me lunch if I went to Panera to pick it up. I said yes without really thinking about it then realized that I was in pajamas, slippers and a blonde wig! All the rich Del Mar/Solana Beach folk were looking at me funny but oh well I don't really mind. It is Halloween people, come on! And I got free lunch out of it :)

Tonight after work I am headed over to Michelle's house to celebrate Halloween with her family. They are going crazy decorating their house as "The Curse of the Mummy" this year with a giant pyramid and everything! It will be fun to see all the little trick-or-treaters in costume. Michelle is dressing up as Tangina...the little old woman from Poltergeist that says "This house is clean". I will put up pictures after. Should be really fun.

Love the costumes guys! All my friends are very impressed...when I was showing the pictures to my friend Grant yesterday he said, "I don't care if I'm not Mormon I am going to have get togethers like that with my family when I have kids!" It was funny. You guys are an inspiration!

I hope everyone is having a fun day and eating lots of candy!! :) Love you all!

Marnie

It is a wet, overcast day here in Bavaria. Still beautiful though, I guess I got used to the overcast skies once again during my year in Washington. The weather really is so similar thus far. More deciduous-I'm not spell checking that-trees though. So we have some absolutely gorgeous colors. I love the weather, but it doesn't really motivate me to be super-energetic, I should be cleaning and doing laundry while the girls are asleep but I couldn't resist the blog.

You all look so cute in your Halloween pics. I love Isaac's costume and I'm so impressed with all the grown-ups costumes. You guys are amazing. I wore a black t-shirt with a shiny silver bat on it to our branch Halloween party. I will wear it again tomorrow for Halloween. It says "Batty" on it and Mike thinks that's appropriate. That's about as dressed up as I got. This year was easy, Jane still wanted to be a pioneer and Sadie wanted to be a Barbie princess. Done and done. Ellyn was Snow White, also done. We spent the weekend munching down on all the girls Trunk or Treat candy. Good thing they're going out tomorrow night, all the good stuff is gone.

Well we are finally finished with soccer. We just weren't quite into it this year, too much to do and see. Jane would have two games a day on Saturday, one at 10 and the other at 1 or 2. We went to some of them, but we missed some too. I told her coach that we would send her to practices but that we had just gotten back together as a family and there were things we wanted to go and do while the weather was still good. I feel like I've written this all before, so please forgive me if you are reading it yet again.

So Saturday Mike and I had to drive out to Nurnberg (this is spelled several different ways here, depending on where you're from (U.S., Germany, etc..), mine might possibly be a combo of two or more spellings) for the adult session of stake conference. Our friends watched the girls and we'll watch theirs next weekend (I need to find a good babysitter)while they get to do something fun like go out to dinner. After the meeting one of the counselors asked to meet with us. I assumed it was to give Mike his assignment for High Council, which it was, but it was also to call me to be the first counselor in the Stake Primary. Pretty much you can just count on our family being translated any day. We are that righteous. So that was kind of a surprise but we are both really excited about being able to visit other wards and branches and not just stay in our insulated little 90% american branch. Both the women that I work with are German, the other counselor just got off her mission to Washington D.C. in February and she's absolutely darling. I think Mike and I are both a bit apprehensive, but we'll be blessed right? As for the translation, we'll make sure we request a visit CONUS first.

Besides that, let's see. I don't think I mentioned on this family blog that we've been puppy sitting a yorkie. Very good thing for us to do. We for sure don't want a dog right now. UNLESS- it was potty trained, a year old, didn't shed (which yorkies don't), yorkie,FREE, and could help Jane with her math. To pay almost a thousand dollars for one of these jewels and then have to deal with potty training and behavior issues is just more than we can bear right now. The dog is darling, BUT not at all potty trained and so he must spend most of his time in his crate where he yelps pathetically and annoyingly I might add. I've crate trained how many dogs now and this one seems the most clueless. He also poops about 10 times a day as opposed to Bailey or Max that pooped once, maybe twice. If this is usual with Yorkies I can't keep up with the scooping, plus it's so tiny it's hard to see on the lawn, with leaves, twigs, weeds, and such. No doubt the girls will be able to find it with a shoe or hand one of these days. Plus of course the whole travel issue. It is easier to travel with pets here, especially the little ones.

I think I have babbled for a sufficient amount of time. I need to go wake up Ellyn. Tracey, we have her on a very specific bed time routine as well and it is working beautifully. Daylight savings did throw her off this morning, but I somehow woke up at 4:30 and couldn't go back to sleep so it didn't bother me too much. I don't know what I will have to say for tomorrow.

Oh, one more thing. Christmas, Anne and Kim, I need to know if you girls want something specific, if you want me to pick out something here, or what. Barb, it's too late for you. I already have yours and Kenn's present and I'm so excited about it. Adina, anything specific for Taylor? Also, Anne as I was reading your blog I realized that I never got back to you guys about the family sponsor thing, do you want another $20.00? Did you get enough covered? We would be happy to send it out, it just came up in the middle of the craziness around here and it slipped my mind.

Well I love you all, wish we could have been there for the Halloween festivities. Wish me luck, I'm trying to build up enough energy to carve pumpkins with the girls after school (no procrastinating there). I love you all. Love, Brooke

It looks like everyone had a great pre-Halloween weekend, we did as well. It started with Hayden’s Halloween school party on Friday (he only goes Wed, Thur and Fri.) Then we had our ward party on Friday night and we attended the Lakewood stake party on Saturday night with the Debaltzo's! Tons of fun and more candy that we could ever eat, and he hasn’t even trick-or-treated yet!! Yikes!! I told Hayden he could pick anything he wanted to be for Halloween and he changed his mind daily for a few weeks and finally settled on being robot. I thought “sure, I can make a robot costume pretty easily and save ourselves like $40.” Hahahah… I won’t think that again. He looked at pictures online and decided that he wanted a silver body and rectangle head... well that's what he got. Anyway, after way too much work and stress it all came together in the end and Hayden loved it. It only cost $10 so that’s not bad. As for Danica, we borrowed some costumes for her. She was a cheetah the first night and a ladybug the second night. Very cute and very easy!! Tom and I were duds and did nothing. After looking at the Vancouver pics we are feeling pretty badly about our lack of participation!

Merry Christmas to us! Our treadmill arrived on Friday! I ran a couple of miles on it on Saturday to test it and it felt great. It was a comfortable running surface and it has a TV built in to keep me from getting tired of looking at the wall. It’s awesome and I can’t wait until tomorrow when I can use it again.

We had Stake Conference today and President Packer was here. People were so excited to see him that they arrived for the meeting really early. We decided that we better try to be early so we arrived at 9:20, the meeting started at 10:00 in Kirtland. Little did we realize that arriving at 9:20 was about the same as arriving at 10:20 to a normal conference. We could barely find a seat in one of the overflow rooms in the relief society room. Apparently people arrived as early as 7:30 and the chapel was packed by 8:30….fortunately, we still got to enjoy the conference via the television feed into our room. (Although "enjoy" is a very relative term considering we were struggling to keep the kids busy and quiet for nearly three hours in a little tiny room, totally packed with people...enjoy....hmmmm....maybe the wrong word....) But, President Packer was fun to listen to. I don't think he had anything formal prepared, he just kind of talked. At one point he decided he wanted to know the words to the song "Scripture Power" because an early speaker had talked about it. He asked if anyone would come sing it for him...someone in the choir volunteered our ward primary chorister and she came running up from the back and sang it on the spot. All the kids stood up and sang it with her, Hayden loved it. Luckily our chorister is a brave and amazing woman. As you all know after my horrible karoke performance, I would have died on the spot if it had been me.

Danica is a little bit sick today. Hayden has a cold and cough and it seems that she has gotten it. She doesn’t have much of a runny nose or cough but her voice is really hoarse. It’s so sad to hear her try to cry or talk, it barely comes out! It’s really so cute and so sad! She is handling it fine and it just her happy cute little self. We have such problems with her waking up too early morning. Day-light savings doesn’t help! She of course woke up right at 7 (now 6am) just like every day… sigh… we just barely cured her of waking up at 5 or 6... now we get to do it again! Hopefully we can break that habit quickly this time…

One more thing: I was looking online today for something for Hayden to do to stay busy and still keep the Sabbath day holy. I found so many fun ideas for kids a bit older on this website, check it out. There is a version of Cranium that looks really fun. http://www.jennysmith.net/fhe/lds-games.php

Okay, well we are off to bed. Happy Halloween!

Hello everyone! Hello from the lonely mother here in Boise, Idaho. Peter headed off to New Orleans last Sunday to participate in Habitat for Humanity. I will let him do the duty of telling you guys all about it. He gets home tomorrow and no longer will I be the only one who talks in this house. I think that was the hardest part in that I would talk to Andrew and he would just sit there and stare at me. But I did have some fun getting him to laugh and just being with him in general. I seriously cannot imagine not being a mother. I am so blessed to be able to have Andrew in my life. Sometimes I just look at him and can't believe how much I actually love this little boy.

Andrew is growing each and every day. He hasn't really taken interest into grabbing toys yet but he tries to shove his fists in his mouth in the anticipation of sucking his thumb that every once in a while he actually accomplishes. He is no blue eyed boy. He is developing a brown/hazel color to his eyes and he still has the reddish tint to his hair. I can't wait to see you all that will be there at Christmas so you guys can see how cute he is. It scares me because all the women in the ward and just random women around town are always commenting on how cute he is and how he has beautiful eyes and just the longest eyelashes. I keep telling him he is going to be trouble and a heartbreaker when he grows up. He has been cracking me up this week...I know it sounds sick but I was playing with him and he was staring at me and I said "what are you staring at?" and he started pushing out the pouty lip and so I kept saying it until he actually broke out in a full on cry. I know I sounds liek a horrible mother, making my child cry but he is sooo cute when he does.

I am doing well. High School volleyball has been over for a couple weeks now. However, tryouts for club volleyball are on monday and we will see how that all goes. I am really hoping for a good team this year so that we can be successful. Practices start after Thanksgiving and we go until mid-May. It will be nice to actually be paid again for coaching. I had to volunteer for high school ball...which I probably won't be doing anymore until I am doen having kids...too hard and too much of a time commitment. School is good, I registered for Spring semester the other day and it sounds weird but I am so excited to be going full time again. I will be finished next December and no more school for me. I am counting down the months. Then I will be able to spend more time with Andrew just being a mom and not having to take him to the babysitter everyday.

Well I know this may be a novel but I really have nothing else to do since Andrew is asleep in his bed. I love you all and am so glad to be a part of this family.

Love,
Anne

I am better by the way :)

In case you are reading this, the movie that is being filmed near your home is called "Jolene." Here is a brief description of what it is about: A teenage orphan spends ten years traveling cross-country experiencing life, love and heartbreak. Based on E.L. Doctorow's story, "Jolene: A Life."

Directed by: Dan Ireland (hasn't done much)

It is set to release in 2007.

Sincerely,

The Crazy Family Movie Buff :)

So I am sick at home once again. I have had a nasty headcold since Sunday that I think just needs a bit more rest to go away. I tried going in to work today but my nose wouldn't have it. Lots of water and rest should do the trick. At least I am using up those sick days! :)

This last Saturday I did another 5K. It was a Light the Night against crime 5K that was for the crimestoppers program to raise money to be used as rewards for calling in criminals. I did it with Michelle and her sister Aimee. It was really fun because it was at night. It started at 7pm and it was in Balboa Park. I was hoping it would be through the park but it ended up just being along Park Blvd. Still fun. I did better this time and ran a lot more. I met the time I wanted but I still need to be a lot faster. I will just have to work my way up. The fastest guy did it is 15:30...crazy!

I saw the Prestige last week. Really good and entertaining. One I think that you would pretty much all like. Maybe not a little kid movie but that's up to you. I think it is PG13. All of the actors are really good (especially Hugh Jackman :) ) and the story is great.

Anyway, I am off to get some rest. Love the pictures and news from everyone. Kimmy I will let you know about Christmas.

M

I just wanted to update everybody on what is going on here in Rexburg. I went to the doctor today and I am currently at 2 cm dilated and 70% effaced and he stripped my membranes today. My next appointment is next Monday, but a week from Saturday is the due date. I have been having contractions the whole last week and have been to the hospital twice, so we will see what happens. It sounds almost exactly like Anne's labor so I don't want to get my hopes up too much. I am still working which is getting to be hard, but I know I would be bored at home and why not make some money??
Treven's job is great and we register for Winter semester in like 3 weeks. This fall seems so have gone by way too fast. We are already half way through.
BROOKE! I need some ideas for Christmas for Ellyn. Marnie, I need some from you for yourself. Adina, I will e-mail you or call you to tell you ideas for Treven. He is slowly giving me ideas.

Love you all,
Kimberly

I promise I will stop putting this off, and get more uploaded tomorrow or the next day....

Check www.heartcity.com site for info and photos of the devastating fire in Valentine, Nebraska. 113 degree heat and sparks. Melody and John Sim's home, no longer the owners, was burned to the ground. That is, they did not own it when it burned, thank goodness. However, you may see areas you remember, like the fish hatchery, etc. Take a look. Dad

That is how many visitors we have had to this site since April 2005. Wow, a lot of traffic. I tried at one time to add some advertisements to the blog so that we could get some revenue off all the visits that could be earmarked for reunion get togethers but it was a pain and I realized that 25000 really isn't that much in relation to the other sites that make a lot of money off visits, plus the fact that people would have to click on them to make it work. Basically, not worth it to buy a tootsie pop for everyone at the reunion.

Awesome news from all. Kim is about ready to pop, Tom is about ready to be a tired abused man, Tracie is about to become a lonely woman, Marnie is gallivanting around the country, Andrew is double-sucking, Mike makes me a not-so-lonely person in HP, Mom & Dad are racking up the FF miles, B&B are planning the new cottage, Grandma is breaking bones daily, it seems, and the Germany Stinchies are sending pictures. Ah, what fun!

Washougal Stinchfield's are cruising along. Can't believe it is almost November!! Practice acquisition takes place in 2 months, nerve-racking, but going really well. We are growing. These next two weeks I have a million Scoutmaster Training "opportunities". All day tomorrow. Tuesday 3 hrs. Overnighter next Fri/Sat. Can't wait until I get all this preliminary training out of the way and just settle down into a normal schedule. Soccer ends soon, so that'll help as well.

I went backpacking with Isaac last weekend. We went up eagle creek about 4 miles. It is a canyon on the Oregon side of the Columbia Gorge just west of the Bridge of the Gods. The hike was precarious at times with 200 foot cliffs dropping off the right side of the 4 ft wide trail. Luckily they had cable hand rails to grab onto. Not too much traffic up there after we passed all the day hikers coming down. There is a waterfall called Punchbowl Falls, very beautiful, almost unreal. Then there was this High Bridge area where a bridge went over the "creek". It was a ravine only about 15 feet wide that was about 100 ft deep at least, with the water at the bottom. Kind of took your breath away standing over it. We then found a place to set up camp. There was no one else around. We heard some backpackers over on the trail a couple of times while we were eating dinner. I was tired but Isaac wanted to start a fire. I let him try for 20 mins before he gave up...good, I wanted to go to bed. I'll teach him how to start a fire another day. It was pitch black once the sun went down. Couldn't see your hand in front of your fact. You could hear the creek down deep in the ravine, but that was it. Glad Isaac doesn't sleep walk. While we were talking laying there in our sleeping bags, we could hear something walking around outside out tent and could hear it breathing. I said "Hello!", but no answer. It was there about 5 mins, then walked away. Who knows. The whole time though I was thinking, "You idiot!! Why did you put our food in our packs IN the tent!! Didn't you learn anything as a boy scout!" I was just waiting for a bear to help itself to some leftover dehydrated meat lasagna with a little side of Dave and Isaac, but it didn't happen. I had my hatchet right there for easy retrieval though, just in case we got a guest. Like I would have been able to do anything. I was just thinking about how Black bears are the most likely bear to be around there and how the experts say you are supposed to be aggressive and charge them...they will run away. Again, this is only for black bears, not Grizzlies. I was ready to try it. We left to go back the next morning, starting our hike in the pitch black, so that we could return for Parkers soccer game (I am the coach) at 0900. We made it just in time. Sore hips for a couple of days because I have not carried an extra 60 lbs. on my hips for a while. But they are doing better.

Already signed up for Hood to Coast next year. Any family members here in Clark County want to help as volunteers or drivers? I guarantee you will enjoy it. Let me know. I have been laying off running since the Marathon in September. My time was poor, 4hrs 40mins, but I completed it limping due to the injury I had sustained before the Hood to Coast. Letting it heal then I will be back in it. I'm not stopping Buffy! I miss it already. One of those runner things I guess.

Isaac is growing by leaps and bounds. Not only physically but in responsibility and maturity. Really weird to see. Maybe it is middle school doing it. The one thing that I am very glad of is that he still reads a lot...and I mean a lot. He'll have two large series going simultaneously and be able to keep track of it all, amazing. We try to encourage and support that at all times...except at 11pm on a weekday, which we do have to contend with occasionally. He is doing real well in soccer and is better than me at guitar. He just absorbs the guitar stuff naturally. His fingers move faster and, the kicker, he practices more than me. Most of all I love that he loves to do stuff with the family and he loves to hang out with me, I want to keep that going as long as possible.

Taylor, Parker and Morgan are doing well. All the kids are doing well at school, can't complain there. A tribute to their mother staying in the home and encouraging them, couldn't do it without her.

Lunch is over, I better get back to work. Good to see you all are doing so well. Congrats again Tom, you'll love it. I'll add some pictures from our latest escapades when I am home.

Dave

So we got word from the Navy that Tom got the GPR but we don't know where... hopefully we'll find out mid November (or sooner if Kenn can pull some strings for us!) Also just wanted to let you know that Tom graduates on May 20th. Some of the girls are counting down and informed me that is only 7 months away... That really is soon! After much deliberation and looking into all the gyms around here (which are really expensive!!) We have decided that we are buying a treadmill as our big Christmas gift this year. Going to Curves for the winter months would end up costing me nearly $500!!! And they are only open for very limited hours. The gym at Case is slightly cheaper and they have babysitting during some hours but honestly it would take me at least 2 hours to drag the kids to the gym everyday! I am finally enjoying my exercise and I don't want to lose it. They say that any investment in your health is a good one and that makes sense. I feel happier all around when I have the chance to run in the morning. So hopefully once the treadmill arrives I can do it without freezing or spending two hours dragging the kids to the gym.

Danica is still having problems sleeping...if I only had one kid it wouldn't matter so much but once I am awake for the day I can't stop until late so I can't get up at 5am!!! She started by waking up at 7, but it's gotten progressively earlier. Some days it's around 4:30 or 5 and we can't get her back to sleep! We have begun another cry it out campaign...Hayden is sleeping in our bed, from the beginning of the night and if she wakes up we are doing nothing. It wasn't that bad the last time we did it so hopefully she will relearn fairly quickly. I'll put up with 6am, I'd like 7 and would prefer 8 but I won't do 5!!!!! So this is our plan... We've got our ear plugs ready... Poor little angel. She is such a sweetheart it just breaks my heart but that is what being a parent is all about I suppose! Luckily, she only woke up a few times the first night and last night she was awesome, she slept from 8:00-7:00 with no crying!!! Woohoo!!! Hopefully she'll do that again tonight and start a new improved routine!

Hayden is still loving preschool and begs me every day to have someone over for a playdate. He was in the primary program this past Sunday and acted exactly how you might expect. He made faces, lifted his shirt up, got "too tired" to stand during the songs and talked and laughed whenever he wanted. When "Follow the Prophets" came on he yelled out "This is my favorite song!" and then proceeded to humm it so it looked like he was just standing there. He was however very cute, he never left his seat (unlike many other sunbeams) and he remembered his little speaking part perfectly. Not bad for the youngest Sunbeam in the ward. We've started a new system where he has to earn his video game/computer game time by doing chores and such. Today was the first day and it went well but I am sure the novelty will wear off soon. But I'm going to stick with the program because he is getting really lazy about helping clean up and always fights doing his really simply chores. Plus he begs to play his games ALL day! So hopefully this will help both problems! We'll see...

We got our pictures taken the other day. Although she literally took over 200 pictures there isn't a single one where both Danica and Hayden are happy at the same time. But that's just life. We're learning how to photo shop them and what not but here's a preview of one of the many!

Have a great weekend! I gotta go sleep! Bye

We have had a dry spell haven't we? I know more people check it than write as I am one of the culprits. I decided that I'd turn over a new leaf and add some of my news which is not much.

We had a great weekend down in California. Dad really enjoyed his high school reunion and seeing all of his old friends...who are many! He made up a slide show of pictures from the yearbook which was a great hit. We were hoping to do a session at the Sacramento temple but when I finally got someone to answer the phone there the sessions were all filled. It is really a beautiful temple! We went and walked around it on the outside. It is one of the small ones but does not appear small from the outside due to some archways in front.

We then went down to the Edlingers on Sunday starting out with Stake Conference. That was fun since it was at the interstake center where I went to stake conferences when I was living in Berkeley. Russell Nelson was there since they were putting in a new stake presidency. We had third row seats since we had gotten there early because Pepi and Carol were in the choir. Çan you believe Pepi....he is more active as a non-member than many other active members!!! We then had a great dinner with their family. As we have told many of you, three of their kid's families live in houses next to them so Katie's family, Mike's family and Liesl's family were there...with twelve kids altogether. We thought it was chaotic with nine!!!

We then bummed around with them on Monday morning and flew back here in the evening. Life since then has been pretty uneventful. Kim gave us a scare on Tuesday with a little false labor but I am hoping she will hold off until after this weekend. John and Melody Sims are coming on Friday for the night. We already had tickets with Dave and Adina to Cirque di Soleil so we're going to all go out to dinner before it and then John and Melody will take one of the cars home and we'll go to the show. They will be staying at the house for the night Then Adina, Buffy and I will be going to Time Out for Women in Tacoma on Saturday.

I had lunch with Maylene Perkins today...to jog memories, they lived in our ward in San Diego and moved up here a year ago. We had them for dinner in February...the infamous night of the battle of the blinds...I think both Mike and David's families were here.

Speaking of Grandma, she broke her pelvis at some time in the last two weeks so her movement is really limited. She is on some pretty strong pain meds so she doesn't seem in too much pain. She had a bad night last night...very distraught and didn't sleep much so she was really weird today..shaky and very uncommunicative. Hopefully she will sleep better tonight so she can get back to her usual self...confused but fairly happy.

Love you all...Mike, I'll leave it up to you to give your news to all when it is appropriate!

Mom

Since no one else is blogging I figured I will put up some more pictures of my recent adventures...


Hiding in the corn maze

Picking apple at an orchard near Julian

Vanna White-ing the beautiful fall colors...they do exist in Southern California!!

Michelle and Me with the fall leaves