Halloween!

Our stake had a Trunk or Treat last night. We decided to postpone bedtime and dress up!
We had a Friendly Hero as a bee, complete with Honey. We actually had a family theme: All inspired by the ultra cute costume I made for the Friendly Hero. (Yeah, be impressed--I Made IT!)

We had an entomologist, a grub, a flower and a bee!

Happy Halloween!

A Heroic Naming

We have thought long and hard for a name to reflect our newest Super Hero. It's hard enough for us to name our children, and then to come up with a Heroic name on top of a real name is nigh impossible. But without further ado, I am proud to introduce you to the Peaceful Hero!

Demonstrating his peaceful abilities to sleep through his Brother's Love. We love having you around!

Introducing a new Hero

Hello all! We are pleased to announce that the Penguin has arrived! He is also home from the Hospital and that the Math Hero and the Penguin are healthy and happy. He doesn't have a Heroic name yet, but his name is Dad's middle name.

He was born on Monday, Oct. 18, 2010 at 2:29pm. He weighed 8 lbs 3 oz, and is 20 inches long. The nurses couldn't believe that I was carrying a baby that big. They didn't know how he fit in.

The Heroic Family:
Happy at Home:

Ode to the Computer Backup

My Ode to the Automatic Computer Backup System:

You are a blessing.
You are amazing.
I love the computer backup.

I'm glad that you do this yourself-
I didn't realize the joys of having this essential backup--
until I had a toddler.
We're still not sure what he did,
But it required wiping our hard drive to fix it.
You had all of our important documents in the backup.

You are a blessing.
You are amazing.
I love the Computer Backup.

TEMPLE!!!

I've got a few ideas for different posts, but I had to share how excited we are to find out that Indianapolis is getting a temple! We have been praying for it! We will probably still make visits to Chicago to see family, but won't feel like we're rushing to get to the temple. We are really excited to watch this progress--especially since we'll be here for five more years!

We were having difficulties getting conference to stream with sound and the only part we heard of President Monson's opening remarks was his talking about the temple dedications and then right after he announced the Indianapolis Temple we lost sound again. We got it working in time for the speakers, but feel extremely blessed that we heard about our new temple.

I love conference!

Project-Check!

Yesterday I made applesauce with a friend. On my list of things to take to her house was my camera. Did my camera make it into the car? No, the Friendly Hero was busy helping me pack things in and out of the pots I needed to take. We had powder all over our carpet that had to be quickly vacuumed up--before we could leave our house.

I'm really sad that there is no picture of the "mice tracks" The Friendly Hero and his friend left as they ate apples. They left the peels all over the house.

Nor are there any pictures of all the quarts or boxes of apples. We turned eight bushels of apples into 153 quarts of applesauce. It was great fun!

I did take pictures of the applesauce that I brought home. My friend was gracious enough to help me with my 114 quarts in exchange for teaching her how to make her 39 quarts. I find it very obvious at times that I grew up on an Apple Orchard.

Applesauce waiting to be steam bathed.

Steam bath going strong.
I was very grateful we found an orchard out here that sells Red and Golden Delicious, which is what my family grew, and that the apples in Indiana ripen almost a month before they do in Utah. I was able to make the applesauce a month before I'm due and guarantee that I have enough for next year. Yes, as a family, we can eat 114 quarts in a year--easily.

A Question

I have a question for all my talented quilting friends, cousins, and family:

I am really interested in learning more about quilting, but being due in 6 weeks is stopping me from actively seeking out classes. Is there a book or a website that I can look at that is really good for a beginner, or would you just advise me to wait until the baby is a little bit older and take a few classes?

Any and all thoughts on the matter are appreciated.