This is Halloween!

Delicious chili made - check. (Sean has a very tasty chili recipe that he actually won a ward chili cook-off for last year)

Pumpkins carved - check. (Sean did a "barfing" pumpkin and the "dog" from Ghostbusters, and I did a silhouette of a witch in front of her cauldron)




School Halloween parties - check. (3 parties to stop at this year)


Everyone in costume for a church party - check. (Even Sean and I dressed up this year: the Grim Reaper and Cinderella...quite the couple...HE HE HE)




Trunk-or-Treating and fun carnival games at the Ward Halloween Party - check.


Lots of candy being scarfed down - check.

THIS IS HALLOWEEN!

Our first "Company"

Last week we were so lucky to have Aunt Lindsay come to stay with us for a few days. She drove up with Great Grandma Dick (Sean's Grandma) who stayed at Tom and Carolyn's house. We loved having her here and also enjoyed our visits with Grandma as well. One of the days they were here we took a fun field trip to the Albuquerque Bio Park. We went to the aquarium and then walked around the Botanic Gardens. Nathan LOVED all the sea life. He kept saying "feesh, mo feesh" (translation: "fish, more fish"). There was a big puffer fish in the big tank that just hung out right by the glass. It looked like it was a friendly thing, just happy for all the attention.


There was a fun Children's Fantasy garden with a huge castle and dragon and a maze and huge insect statues. The kids LOVED it. They were getting it ready to light up for the holidays. We'll definitely have go back to see it then. We walked around for a good couple of hours and there were still lots of gardens that we didn't even see. There was a special insect display where Megan held a giant cockroach right in her hand (like it was any other kind of "pet" - YIKES).

Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta

We moved right as the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta was going on. It is the world's premier hot air balloon event. We got up ridiculously early on Saturday, Oct 9th and headed to Balloon Fiesta park. There was definitely traffic, but we figured that we planned it just about perfect (not too early, so we didn't have to stand around in the frigid air for too long, but just in time to get a little snack and find a place to stand to watch the balloons take off). It was pretty awesome! You stand right there on the field with all of the balloons that are taking off all around you. We saw fun-shaped balloons (Darth Vader, SpongeBob, a GIANT cow, the Wells Fargo Wagon and lots more). There were about 500 balloons that took off that morning. Well worth the wee early hours.

We are now New Mexicans

I guess I am past due for an update. We made the big move. We sent our moving truck away on Wednesday, September 29 and then we left Visalia on Thursday. We drove most of the way, and then finished up the trip on Friday. We stopped in Albuquerque to run a couple of errands and get the keys to our house, and they we headed up to Edgewood. We finally got to walk through the inside of our house (we signed the contract without ever actually going inside - (we saw LOTS of pictures))...and we like it more and more everyday. We were hoping the moving truck would make it on Friday (if they didn't we knew we would have to wait through the entire weekend). It didn't. It didn't get here until Tuesday, which means that we slept on floors for 6 nights (2 in Visalia and 4 here in Edgewood). It wasn't too bad, but we were sure happy to get cozy in our own beds when they arrived. We spent several hours that first weekend at our new church building watching General Conference. We have really loved it here so far: super welcoming neighbors (we are the only house on the street with kids...and yet all the neighbors have made comments about how they like to hear those voices), a great ward with lots and lots of families, good school and teachers, a fun little preschool program that we miraculously got Megan into (which is amazingly CHEAP too), beautiful weather, etc. Every time I look out our windows I feel like I am in a cabin in the woods - I don't think that will ever get old. It's also fun to be so close to Sean's aunt and uncle (Tom and Carolyn and little Rachel). We have gotten together with them a couple of times, which has been nice.

At one point I walked outside and could hear the kids talking, but I couldn't see them anywhere. Then I noticed that the voices were coming from inside the truck. They had climbed way up to the top back and were reading books on the LoveSac.