Happy Halloween

Hope everyone has a happy halloween today! I was going to post pictures of our pumpkin we carved to look like Kaci and her all dressed up for the trunk 'n treat at the church last night, but my pictures got corrupted during the transfer so they are all gone. She was very cute though. I'm pretty bummed.

Campaign Woes

Moving to Virginia during an election year could possibly be the worst idea we have ever had. YIKES! Even the kids have political opinions here. Brad and I have done our homework on the candidates. We've dedicated several family nights to "looking at the issues". What a mess that has been. My brain constantly hurts from it. We have finally reached a solid conclusion, but I am scared to death to out myself. Republican or Democrat? McCain or Obama? The answer to these questions could make you an outcast or a best friend. What do you say? Like I said, I'm scared to death to say anything. I feel a little sheepish for not helping to campaign and all, but the personal cost for outing myself is just too high. I want friends, not enemies. I just think it is CRAZY that even among LDS people there are so many different opinions. Aren't we all suppose to be working towards the same goal? How then can political opinions among the same congregation be so very different? Elections are just a couple weeks away, and I just hope all the chaos ends very soon there after. No matter who wins, I hope the country can at least try to be unified and supportive of the new administration.
Brad wants to out himself, but by outing himself he outs me, so I told him I think he should just start his own blog and leave mine alone! He also says that people will draw a conclusion from this post of who I support, good luck to ya I'll never tell!

Kaci's Baby Signs

Here's a taste of Kaci doing her baby signs. It is so much fun to read a book or go to the park and have her do the sign for a dog or whatever when she sees it. It is so enjoyable to teach her so many things already. She's so cute and she loves to communicate with us. We love love love baby signs. It'll be sad when she starts talking and won't use them anymore, she's already saying her name and trying to say other stuff, like "shoes" (if her first word is shoe I will die laughing! why in the world is she obsessed with them?)

DC Temple

We finally got to go to the DC temple! It is very large and beautiful! We woke up at 5 am to drive while Kaci could sleep and spent all day there. Brad and I switched off watching Kaci so we could both go in. It was great. Kaci loved walking around, she saw the Christus, the fountain, all the flowers, and lots and lots of people. The place was packed! So busy. Then we spent the night at Uncle Bruce's and woke up at 5am again to make it back for church at 9am. We have been so tired, but it was well worth it. It's so much fun to go to a different temple, because they are all so different in structure even though you do the same stuff. I'm glad we get to go to such beautiful places to draw closer to God.

Great Minds Think Alike

My sister-in-law Brianne made a house out of a box for her kids the same week I made a car out of a box for Kaci. She likes to open her little door and just sit in it. I went a little crazy with making it, Kaci helped me paint it. It took a long time to do it, but it has been worth it. She plays in it a lot. We love free fun!

Fall FUN!

I have ALWAYS wanted to make my own caramel apples, and this year I did it! It was lots of fun. A friend from church happened to visit us that night and joined in the fun. Then we delivered some to friends in our apartment complex. The caramel was super sticky, but delicious, how could that much sugar not be? On a side note, if you notice in the background our cabinets actually have food in them! Wahoo! We finally got all our money from Bankoh and JMU, so we went crazy with buying lots of food and stuff we've been needing like toilet paper!

The handsome young guy in the picture is SINGLE by the way..... Brad wants to clarify that I am not referring to him as he is OBVIOUSLY taken!

This is Brad after a couple of bites, did I mention we not only covered our apples in caramel, but chocolate chips, marshmallows, and chopped pecans too? mmmm, so yummy!

We also did a little window painting, inspired by the master of window painting herself, Lynda. It's a bit on the beginner side, but we were very proud of ourselves. It's not as easy as it may look, drawing things backwards and filling it in and all. Brad did the pumpkin and I did the bats and cat. Very festive, don't you think?

Fall Picture

The parks are lots of fun with all the leaves now. These pictures were taken at Sampson Park where we play hockey. Kaci likes to play in the leaves, so long as we don't throw them at her. Brad took some great pictures of her. I'm sure there are plenty more pictures of Autumn colors to come!

Beautiful Weekend

It's been getting cold and we've been bundled up, but then on Thursday all the sudden the sun came back out and it was in the 70's again! Wahoo! Kaci and I spent all day outside at the park. It stayed nice all weekend, so we took advantage. Friday night we all went to the park and Brad and I played basket-ball hockey on rollerblades. We used Kaci's big bouncey ball as our puck when she stole our puck. We had so much fun trying to shoot baskets on blades with our hockey sticks. I laughed so hard I had an asthma attack!

Then on Saturday we ventured up to Shenandoah National Forest (famous skyline drive) to hike. We went to the 83 foot South River Falls. Kaci liked touching all the trees, finding rocks under the fallen leaves, seeing the waterfall, and playing in the stream. We had a great time. It was fun to hike through the forest here, especially with all the leaves starting to change colors.

hiking, hiking hiking


Kaci pointing to the waterfall (sorry the picture is so dark, you can hardly see the falls in it)
This is what she is pointing at!

All of us at the waterfall

Brad and Kaci during a pit stop to find rocks under the fallen leaves and play in the stream.

Kaci's Hill

Kaci likes to watch all the kids play. Our door faces the playground, so I just let her go outside while I cook or what not. She just sits out on the her hill and watches all the kids. It is so cute. She sits on the hill more than anywhere else, including her high chair at the dinner table. Occasionally she'll venture over and play. It's rare, but when she does every single kid on the playground wants to play with her. (so she usually gets overwhelmed and comes home crying, which is why she likes to just sit on her hill... still too little to play with all the big kids)

Conference Weekend

Who doesn't love Conference weekend?
I loved Bednard's talk about prayer. He said that just as God prepares spiritually to create things, we need to prepare spiritually through prayer to create our day. I committed myself to saying more earnest and sincere morning prayers. I've never been good at those ones because I have such a hard time waking up. I tend to fall back to sleep when I pray first thing, but I'm working on it!

Brad's favorite talk was Uchtdorf's on hope. He liked that one because Brad is all about having an eternal perspective.

Kaci LOVED the singing. Anytime the choir sang,it didn't matter what she was doing, she'd stop and walk right up to the computer to listen and watch. Her absolute favorite was when the children all sang on Saturday afternoon (evening for us). She thought that was absolutely wonderful!

Reading Reading Reading

We got this huge chair for FREE on craigslist for Brad to study on, but he always sits on the couch, so Kaci got it. She loves to sit on it and read her library books. She has learned how to do baby signs for a pig (points to her nose), a frog (sticks her tongue out), a duck (quacks with her hand), a monkey (scratch her armpit), a doggie (pants like a dog), a squirrel (clicks her tongue), a flower (pretends to sniff one). She loves to read books about things she can do signs for. She points to it on the page and then does the sign. It is so much fun. I'm constantly trying to teach her more signs.

International Festival

A few weeks ago, we went to the International Festival, which believe it or not, was very similar to the Food Fest at BYU-H. We had a great time. The best part was getting a FREE brand new shiney blue bike helmet for Brad.

We thought Kaci might want to get her face painted... her flower turned out fabulous!


Can you see it? It's that little yellow dot on her cheeck!


She liked her balloon and the crazy dancers and drummer much more. It was a good day!

Oh Bradley!

Kaci comes in from outside plugging her nose, telling us she's poopy.
Brad escorts her to her room to change her diaper.
Brad and Kaci emerge from said room and Kaci falls over.
Again, and again, and again.
Brad: "What's wrong Kaci, all the sudden you forgot how to walk?"
Kaci: "WAAAAA!!"
Brad keeps picking her up and she keeps falling over.
Brad: "Kerri, what's wrong with Kaci"
Kerri: "I don't know. It looks like she's limping."
Kaci: "wimper... waaa... boo-hoo"
I check out her feet looking for splinters and what not. I find nothing, Brad takes a look, he discovers little rocks and dirt between her toes. So we get a q-tip and clean between her toes, much to her protest. We set her down and she continues to fall over.
Kerri: "What's wrong Kaci?"
Kaci: "AWWWWW"
I pick her up, pin her down to further examine her feet. Brad then notices he put both her legs through one leg hole! We remove the skorts, set Kaci down, and like magic she can walk again!!

Poor Little Girl!

Martins

I finally went to the nice grocery store in town. Kaci loved it because she got to drive a car while I shopped. It was all well and good until I stopped too close to the aisle and I saw the little one doing a little shopping of her own.

I also found this amazing pumpkin there. It was at least as tall as Kaci. It was HUGE! I want it so bad... but who in their right mind would spend 40 bucks on something you just mutilate?

Neapolitan Ice Cream AT LAST!!

Brad is an ice cream connoisseur.

He spends more time in the ice cream isle than anyone I've ever met, and that is doubled if he goes with Liam. I sometimes stand there with him and listen to his debating, but I get tired of just looking at it. Brad happens not to like 2 of my favorite flavors, Neapolitan and Fudge Swirl. I suggest getting those flavors almost every single time, but we never do. I can't tell you how many times my plea for fudge swirl has been denied, I can only remember getting it once and we buy ice cream nearly every grocery trip. I've always been denied Neapolitan, I finally asked why and this was Brad's response... "ok, let's go look at it... nope, that one has the chocolate next to the strawberry. I only get it if the chocolate is next to the vanilla." WOW! Ok, he officially deserves the title of a connoisseur, don't ya think!

Part two to this story is that we have been wanting, very badly, some chocolate ice cream. Unfortunately Kaci can't have chocolate (she breaks out), so I was ALONE in the ice cream isle and I thought, "hmm, neapolitan has chocolate and vanilla... maybe I should just get it!!" Kaci covered her mouth in shock, but I proceeded and got it! VICTORIOUS AT LAST! When Brad opened the freezer and found the neapolitan he said "ok, but you have to eat the strawberry chocolate line." I responded "GLADLY!!"