Samuel's Birthday and new family pics

box baby

Caleb and Austin playing at chuck-e-cheese

Samuel earning tickets at chuck-e-cheese

Joseph's "tintin" hair-do

Attack of the tumbleweeds

sweet little Malachi

Family picture, it was really cold and windy, so the two littlest ones wouldn't smile

I love Samuel's expression in this one

I love Travis, so glad he is back home

Happy baby

What's in the box?

Here he comes

He's a "Caleb" in the box 

Samuel getting a Kindle for his birthday

Samuel got some hexbugs

Daddy and Malachi

Getting ready to blow out the candles

This was a busy week.  Monday we spent all day getting free meals for Veterans Day, it was delicious.  We all ate way too much food.  We are still working on getting another car, so Travis had the car most of the week, so I didn't go anywhere, and had to cancel an appointment and reschedule another one.  Wednesday and Thursday Travis helped some neighbors/friends move, and they couldn't fit a lot of stuff in their truck, so Travis filled up our garage will tons of stuff, it took him several days, of reorganizing to finally be able to fit the car back in, and even then it is a very narrow opening, so you can barely get out of the car, and I have to lift the baby over my head (he is in his infant car seat) to get him into the house.  I am still not getting enough sleep, and two nights ago, I even dreamed about sleeping.  Thursday night we went out to our friends house for dinner, and they live on five acres, and have goats, chickens, and bunnies.  The kids had a great time playing there.  Friday after school, we took Samuel to chuck-e-cheese to celebrate his birthday, everyone gave their tickets they earned to Samuel, so he could get one big prize.  They all had fun, and Samuel got 1000 tickets and turned them in for a big nerf gun for his prize, then we picked up free pizza on the way home, and watched "tintin" the movie.  Saturday was a very busy day.  We went to the golden corral for breakfast.  (Samuel's choice), then we picked up our bountiful basket, and spent the next several hours, taking 6 kids through 8 different houses.  Yes, we are house hunting.  I had no thoughts of moving, but all the sudden felt prompted by the spirit, that moving into a house would be good for us, so we have been looking.  Everyone loved the 7th house we looked at, and kept saying since Samuel is turning 7 it is a sign.  The house needs some work, mostly being cleaned, painting, and having the kitchen remodeled.  But, has lots of space and a huge backyard, and it is 12 minutes from where Travis works.  We made an offer on the house last night, so we'll see what happens.  As soon as we were done looking at houses, we drove home and got ready to take some family pictures.  Unfortunately, it ended up being a very cold and windy day, but managed to get a few good pictures in, but couldn't get the two littlest ones to smile, because they didn't like the wind.   Then after pictures we went to Outback Steakhouse for dinner.  We had four free kids coupons, but they only ended up letting us use one, so it was more expensive than we thought.  As we were driving home, the wind was pretty crazy, and tumbleweeds were flying everywhere.  When we pulled into our street, every house on the West side of the street was covered in tumbleweeds, it was "attack of the tumbleweeds", the next street over from ours was tons worse than ours, one house had tumbleweeds completely covering their house, they were 25 feet deep!  The kids thought it was awesome, and spent the rest of the evening with rakes, removing tumbleweeds from in front of people's houses in the dark.  Sunday we went to stake conference, and the kids were great.  We had them taking notes to earn treats, and they said it all went by so quickly, and they couldn't believe it when it was over.  Austin took 8 full pages of notes!  After we got home from church, we gave Samuel his presents.  He got a sensory swing from Grandma and Grandpa Hardy that he is excited to use, and a Kindle and some hexbug toys.  He is one lucky little boy.  We had friends over for dinner, and I forgot to take the bread out of the oven, so it burned, but everything else was delicious.  Yesterday we went and looked at the house again, and turned in our offer for it.  We also went to a Hail and Farewell, and Malachi was smiling and cooing and gooing at everyone there, he was so cute.