I thought it would be nice to post some of what we’ve been doing for the past couple months. This post won’t have a cohesive flow; it will just be pictures with explanation. Enjoy!

Our pear tree became ripe enough for the kids to start enjoying pears in late August. Here they all are with their yummy pears! My kids are rarely all in one place together unless they are eating, so I have lots of pictures of them at the table or up to the kitchen counter or with snacks or stuff. I just love seeing them all together! They’re so great!

Also in August, Josh got surgery for a hernia. The surgery went great and he has healed very well. But I have a funny anecdote about surgery day I wanted to share. When I arrived, Josh was still very slowly waking up. We were in the recovery “room” for over an hour before he felt like he was ready to go. The nurse walked us out to the curb and waited with Josh in his wheelchair while I went to get the car and bring it to the doors. When I returned with the car, I saw the nurse chatting away to Josh … who looked literally dead. It was such a funny sight to see her just talking merrily as Josh hung limp and pale in his wheelchair. 😆 (Am I creepy for thinking it was amusing?) Anyway, he had passed out, so we went back to the recovery room for a while until he was truly ready to go and then everything was totally smooth after that. So don’t be worried about Josh. But it was memorable for me.

Then the kids went back to school. Since Helen is now a big first grader who goes to school all day, it is just Bianca and me at home.🤯 The first week the kids were back in school, we took Bianca’s baby doll (Ella is her most recent name, I believe) on a walk every day. Bianca is a sweet little mommy and made sure that if she wasn’t able to attend to all of Ella’s needs, I did it for her. I wanted so bad for somebody to ask me what I had been doing since the kids went back to school. I would reply “Oh, just babysitting my granddaughter.”

But finally, after Labor Day, it was Bianca’s time to go back to school as well! She loves going to Miss Karie’s preschool and all the fun crafts she gets to bring home. Here she is in her horse mask from the week they learned about farm animals. 🥰

Fay started junior high this year and is working so hard at all her classes! One afternoon, I walked into the house from picking up the elementary school kids to find Fay like this. Something about her school work spread around her, her focus on her laptop, and the soda she had saved from lunch just made me feel like she’s so so big and grown-up. Thank goodness she’s still Fay!

With the new school year came the return to after school activities. Carter is doing soccer again, Helen and Bianca are trying ballet this year, and Fay is giving tumbling a go. Portia decided she didn’t want to dance again this year, but instead give tennis a try. She is SO CUTE playing tennis and I think she is making good progress. But it’s hard to know if she likes it or not. She really wishes she had a friend to do it with her. If your daughter is Portia’s age and wants to try tennis, let me know and let’s sign them up together!

So, Josh is the funnest dad ever (I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned to you all how great Josh is. 😉) and one day when he mowed the lawn he mowed part of it into a maze. The kids got literally hours of fun out of that maze over multiple days. They were excited to show it off to their friends when they came over, and they were devastated when it got mowed away. But Josh assured them he would make another maze some day, maybe with the entire yard next time!

One Saturday, Fay and Portia decided to dress all matching. Even down to their black socks with pink toes and heels! Then they decided to do as much stuff in sync as possible. They would whisper to each other what they planned to say and then count to three to say the same thing at the same time. It was so cute! And then Helen and Bianca wanted to do the same. Helen even did hers and Bianca’s hair the same! I just adore my girls!

And my boy!

Fay really wanted to bob for apples in celebration of the beginning of fall. We all went out and had a grand time bobbing, but Carter’s bob was the best! He put on his swimming goggles and just plunged his entire head into the pot of water. He bit so fiercely at the apple, apparently, that each time he thought he had the apple, a bite would come off into his mouth instead of bringing the entire apple. He probably got 5 bites of apple before he finally successfully extracted the apple itself. We all had so much fun watching the battle and Carter’s ultimate triumph!

And speaking of the beginning of fall, we had a fall kickoff party on the autumnal equinox this year! We decorated the whole main floor as autumny as we could and ate soup and pumpkin pie and pumpkin tres leches (provided by Mary)! We were grateful for Camry (Cameron and Mary) and Morgan who came to celebrate with us.

We’ve been really enjoying the spoils of our garden the past two months. A huge thanks goes out to Hyrum and Becky who provided almost all the plants for our garden this year! We got so many glorious zucchini, tomatoes and cucumbers! The only plants they didn’t give us were our pumpkin plants. But those have also done so well! I planted two plants–one orange Jack-O-Lantern pumpkins and one smaller white pumpkins–and each plant produced 5 beautiful pumpkins! I had been watching very closely and was sure we were going to get 9 pumpkins altogether. But then, one day, Carter found a whole jack-o-lantern size pumpkin hiding in the weeds at the very back of the garden behind the corn. (The weeds are, indeed, that big.) It was still green when he found it, but now it is ripe and beautiful and harvested and sitting on our front porch!

I have no recollection as to why this occurred, but a few weeks ago the kids all unanimously decided we needed to have a ball. Everybody got fancy for the occasion (I think Carter put a bow-tie on with his soccer uniform) and danced around the house for a good half hour. Everybody loved it! Except maybe Charlotte (the dog). 😂 Maybe one of our kids will grow up and follow in their father’s ballroom dance footsteps!

I’m grateful for the opportunity this post has given me to look back and see how beautiful our crazy little life is. I tend to let myself get bogged down in the surviving of each day and lose sight of this sacred season of growing up that my family is in. But there really is so much simple joy to be had in every day; and each joyful moment is a gift directly from my own loving Heavenly Father.