The rest of November and Thanksgiving

Before all the crazy sickness, Tyler participated in our ward's Primary Program. He was pretty cute/naughty up on the stand (as most 4 year olds are). The first half he used the songs as a time to spin in circles, play peek a boo, and hip bump the kids next to him. The second half, he refused to leave his seat and participate. He did have a little speaking part which he memorized and performed excellently, if I do say so myself. I couldn't record the actual program, but here is a little video of him saying his line at home. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, he didn't say it quite like this:

We also had a good rain storm in November. Tyler had just gotten a batman umbrella at a garage sale and was so excited to use it! 

 And a random picture of Clara in her daddy's sweatshirt, just for fun.

 This year, we hosted Thanksgiving at our house and my mom, my sisters Melissa and Katelyn, and Katelyn's husband and baby all came. It was such a fun week!

 My mom got Madi and Clara matching outfits, so naturally, we had to take pictures.

 A couple cute pictures taken by Aunt Melissa

 Tyler looooooved his cousin Madi! 

 The spread - and a lovely photobomb by Kyle

 Feasting! So fancy with our paper plates and red solo cups!

Before everyone left, Mark and Kyle went to get our Christmas tree at the request of Tyler and Aunt Melissa. We finally caved and bought a prelit, artificial tree. But, holy cow! Tons easier! And this tree can have white OR multicolored lights. So high tech.

 And some cute kids in front of the tree

Tyler's Lame 4th Birthday

November ended up being a pretty big bust too. We fought various colds through out the month, but were determined to be healthy for Tyler's birthday. We had planned his first friend party the Saturday before and it was going to be a superhero party! Unfortunately, although we were relatively healthy that Saturday, all his friends were not (seriously, no one could come). That's ok, we thought, we'll have fun as a family on Tyler's actual birthday and reschedule the friend party. So we rescheduled for the next Saturday and got ready for Tyler's actual birthday. Unfortunately (again!), Clara came down with a high fever and cough the day of Tyler's birthday. She would not let me leave her side all day, although she did pluck up enough that night to sing to Tyler and eat some dessert. So even Tyler's actual birthday ended up about as lame as you can imagine. Being a 4 year old, he was fine as long as he got some presents - which I hastily threw into a bag - and a dessert, which, luckily, was easy since he doesn't even like cake and he just wanted refrigerated Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls. I didn't even get many pictures. *sigh* it was just one of those days. Tyler's bad luck didn't stop there, nor Clara's for that matter. Clara's "flu" did not go away; and after 5 days of fever and coughing I took a very sick little girl to the urgent care. After a chest x-ray, she was diagnosed with pneumonia and put on pretty strong antibiotics. So Tyler's friend party was cancelled yet again. Thankfully, the antibiotics worked and within 24 hours Clara was a much happier girl and I was a much happier and less stressed mommy! Hopefully, Tyler's party will happen soon!  

One of Tyler's favorite presents was this Jake and the Neverland Pirates punching bag. 

A compilation of videos I managed to take on his birthday

Pumpkins and Halloween

We loved the pumpkin patch/apple orchard we went to last year so much, we decided to go again! I was so excited to get to pick a box full of apples and find our pumpkin. I might have been more excited than the kids! After Tyler's last soccer game, we loaded up our car and drove the hour to the farm to meet up with our friends. Unfortunately, our trip ended up slightly different than I anticipated. 

Off we go to find our perfect pumpkin

The pumpkins that were there, were the saddest, ugliest pumpkins I had ever seen! We'd heard that the pumpkin patch in Apple Valley had had a rough year pumpkin wise, but I didn't know it had affected all pumpkin patches. We managed to find a wee bitty pumpkin that was ok. Next I walked to the stand to pay for our box to go pick apples. We had missed the last apples by a week. Apparently, their apples had come in earlier this year and therefore ended earlier. I was kinda bummed! So basically we left with a dinky pumpkin and no apples! Luckily, the day wasn't a complete bust. After our dismal findings at the farm, we ventured down the road to another farm that sold fresh apple cider and homemade spice donuts! YUM! Plus, we had a great time with our friends, so all in all it was a good day!

Harlee and Clara - future BFFs

Tyler and his best friends (and his teeny pumpkin)

The toddler friends

The next couple weeks passed by fairly quickly. We did a few Halloween crafts.

And Grandma Andreasen made a fun Halloween countdown for the kids. She gave them the book "The 13 Nights of Halloween" and each night they were able to open a little gift. They loved it! 

We also had a few fun things planned for the week of Halloween: a pumpkin carving dessert night with friends, the ward Halloween party, and of course Halloween. Unfortunately, that didn't go as planned either. The day our friends were supposed to come over Tyler came down with a horrible flu. So instead of parties and get togethers we sat at home and watched a lot of TV. Halloween day arrived and Tyler was feeling a lot better so we decided to hurry and carve our pumpkins.

Ew Mom! This is nasty!

Halloween isn't Halloween until you carve Ironman's face into your pumpkin.

Luckily, we were able to go out trick-or-treating Halloween night! 

Ironman and Spider girl!

Our Last Trip To Disneyland (for a while)

During Mark's fall break we visited Disneyland for the last time. *sniff* Our passes ran out this month and we wanted one last Disney adventure before we said "adieu" to the happiest place on earth for a while. A few days before our scheduled departure, we measured Tyler and found that since our last trip in January he had grown the required 2 inches to make it onto the Radiator Springs Racer ride and Splash Mountain. SCORE! Then weather.com told us we were going to be at Disneyland during a freak storm. Hmm, oh well, shorter lines! 

We woke up early to get there before the Cars ride fastpasses ran out and good thing! By the time we got there, around 9 (it opened at 8), our fastpasses weren't until 4:30-5:30 pm! About 15 min later it was already at 6:30-7:30 and the park closes at 8. So we made it just in time!

 After the passes were acquired we went about our day going on all the rides that struck Tyler and Clara's fancy: Soarin' Over California, Astro orbiter, Buzz Lightyear, Peter Pan, watching the Jedi fight thing, Autotopia, Splash Mountain, Winnie the Pooh, Pirates of the Caribbean, The Little Mermaid, Toy Story Mania, and of course Radiator Springs Racer! Can you believe we got through all of that in one day? And we were out of there by 5 pm. Freak storms are pretty handy when it comes to Disneyland.

 In all reality the storm wasn't that bad. There were moments of pretty bad rain (like WHILE we were on Autotopia and got soaked!) 

 But for the most part as long as we had jacket and hoods on we were fine. Worth it to get to go on all the rides we wanted.

We didn't get to see many characters this time around, except Tiana. Clara was asleep, which really is sad since she has randomly picked Tiana as one of her favorites. But Tyler got his picture with her and he was so giggly and shy. It was so funny to see him get all googley eyed over a pretty girl. 

 Another funny Tyler moment was on Splash Mountain. I sat behind Tyler and held on to him during the ride and I was curious how he liked it. As we were walking out there were several people gathered around the picture monitors laughing at a picture. As I got closer they all turned and started saying, "Hey! There's the kid!" I looked at the picture and Tyler's face was hilarious! Eyes wide open, mouth grimaced, sorta like this:

Oh my gosh it was so funny! Unfortunately, Mark had my phone so I couldn't take a picture of it! But it was great!

Lest you think he was traumatized for life, he very soon looked like this. Aww serenity!

 And finally, the crowning event of the whole day - Radiator Springs Racers! Thanks to the parent switch pass Tyler got to go twice and he loved it both times! He was very emphatic that THIS ride was his favorite. The rest of the day was nothing compared to this moment. And I agree, this ride was great!

It was a great last trip to Disneyland!

Soccer and the Air Show

After our adventure with peewee t-ball, we couldn't just forget about peewee soccer. And now as a veteran parent of both I can say peewee soccer is much more fun! The skill level is about the same, Tyler's competitive level saw an increase, luckily the unrelenting heat decreased, but the pace and the excitement by far exceeds that of t-ball. I would say Tyler also enjoyed it better. We were able to be on the same team as our friends again and fortunately had a much better coach. Plus, they looked cute in those shin guards! All in all, I would say a good way to spend six Saturday mornings of our life. 

 Tyler loved making "scores" as he called them. Actually he loved it so much that he got pretty upset when he didn't or when someone else did. One time he even hit a kid.... on his team....for scoring the goal instead of him. Oops! Mark pulled him out of the game for a while after that mishap and luckily it was an isolated incident. He also didn't seem to care which goal the ball went in to. He generally just went for whichever was goal was closest, which somehow always seemed to be wrong goal. The coach teased that we needed his name in neon letters over the right goal. And one opposing team joked that he was their MVP. Fortunately, peewee soccer doesn't keep score.

 Tyler with his coach at the end of the season team party. He ended up being a pretty good little soccer player/runner minus the whole scoring for the other team thing. 

My dad was able to visit us and watch one of Tyler's soccer games. Tyler was so excited to show Papa how he could "make lots of scores." Later that day we attended the Apple Valley Air Show. To be honest I was expecting a bit more and was kind of let down, but in the eyes of Tyler you can't beat seeing airplanes up close and even climbing inside some airplanes. Not to mention, he got a shaved ice afterward. BONUS!