Merilee's in town!

We loved having Merilee in town for 10 days before she headed up to Salt Lake for her work conference! I can't believe how fast it went. We can't get enough of our Grandma time!

Saturday, we went to my Summit work party at the owner's home nearby. The kids LOVED jumping off the cliffs at their pool. Gavin was jumping off the highest one, totally unafraid (unlike Jaylen who never ended up going off it, but was so amazed that Gavin was!). They loved sitting by the fire to warm up. I love St.George weather!

We played some games, ate some food and enjoyed catching up.

Grandma brought some fun books to read. The boys love reading books with Grandma!

I found all these selfies that Gavin took on my phone at some point. Love his little silly face.

We went on walks most the days and chatted after I would get back from training. The weather was great to get out in and it definitely perks my spirits up to be outside and active too!

Merilee and I volunteered in Gavin's preschool for his Halloween party. It was so cute to see all the kids excited and dressed up. We helped them make pumpkins at the teacher table.

Our neighborhood did their Wanda Witch party differently this year. We were in teams but only given 1 clue to make it to the party. It ended up being in a newly built barn in Little Valley- perfect location for the party! We went as Wayne and Garth from Wayne's World. The highlight for me was driving through the neighborhood, with music blaring from the movie that Aaron had burnt on a CD. I love my fun, silly husband. We watched the movies the night before to brush up on our Wayne's World knowledge. Such funny and ridiculous movies!

Meanwhile, Merilee was AWESOME to watch the boys! At the party, people kept asking me if I was nervous to be away from my newborn. I honestly hadn't even had the thought, because I know they are in great hands with Merilee and I trust her more than I trust myself probably! Ha!  She sent this cute picture:

These 2 about killed me. Holly and Jon Baugh. They are so prim and proper and they came dressed up TOTALLY opposite of their real selves. She is due in 2 weeks, and totally pulled off the white trash, pregnant look. HA!

Playing games with our teams and karaoke

GAME ON!

Saturday was Jaylen's last flag football game. He kept looking over, making sure Grandma was watching him. He's so cute out there. They won, I think, all of their games this season! He loved playing and he had amazing coaches. So glad Merilee could see his last game!

My sister Jenn sent me this adorable Kansas City shirt! I had to represent after the Royals won the World Series!! YAY!

Saturday, Halloween, was Merilee's birthday! After the football game we went to get pedicures and grab cubcakes at the Sweet Tooth Fairy. It was fun to relax and get our feet a much needed scrub. Those Asian ladies love Aaron. Every time they've mentioned giving him "a special" when we've done pedicures in different states. The lady asked him if he played professional basketball and he said, "Um, no... but I do play at the rec center." Haha. Oh that Aaron. Cracks me up!

So glad we got to spend time with Merilee on her birthday. Love you Merilee!

We went to the park to let the boys play and chat. It was a beautiful day! We grabbed something to eat at Bucca De Beppo and headed home to get ready to trick or treat.

Playing at the river by the park

This little cutie was so cute in his "First Halloween" outfit that my friend and client, Alisha gave us! 3 weeks old!

My sister Jenn sent this adorable tiger costume for him. It worked perfect! He was SO sweet and cute in it!

Our ninja, skeleton and tiger ready to get a homemade Lori Cluff donut and to go trick or treating!

This is the home of one of Jaylen's class mates that lives nearby. They have a huge block party for Halloween every year. I love the Halloween traditions around here!

Miles' nibbling on Grandma's cheek

We came back from trick or treating and sang to Merilee for her birthday. Such a full, fun day!

Sunday we decided to bless Miles' since Merilee was in town. It was such a special day. Miles' got his first bath with his brothers. The boys loved it and were so cute with him.

Jared and Jenny's family came, my cousin Lindsey Lefler and her family came, Aaron's YM leader's family came (who recently moved to St. George from Florida). Aaron gave a beautiful blessing for Miles'. So sweet to hear the blessings and think about Miles' life ahead. I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude for Heavenly Father for the family I have. Bearing my testimony and looking out at my brother's family, my mother in law holding our sweet baby and sitting besides our other two boys, and seeing our loving ward family, I felt such a sense of love and gratitude for all the love and support I have. I married into such a wonderful family, and am so lucky to have sibling support here. I'm a lucky woman for sure.

Jared and Jenny's family came over for dinner after the block of meetings. Milllie LOVES babies. She kept wanting to hold Miles'. So sweet.

So grateful to have Merilee here for 10 days. We are so lucky to have her. She geniunely loves, cares and is interested in our boys. I'm so grateful to have her love and support and be able to look to her for advice and a pattern of how to raise these crazy fun boys. She was so helpful with helping me test the waters of heading back to train some clients, doing dishes, and everything else happening around the house and that week at the boys' school. She read so many books with my kids, played with them and snuggled them. Jaylen was lucky to get some new church clothes and winter clothes for school. We're so grateful when she comes out to visit us!

Post Miles birth in October

Wow, what a month! So many changes and good things happening.

Gavin has been cute about foot rubs lately.

 I took the boys down to the river at the soccer park when Aaron was working a full day and it was just what we all needed. I soaked in some sun and read a book while Miles slept and the boys got to splash and play around in the river. Thank goodness for excellent weather in October!

Miles didn't complain about his first bath!

Kelson's mom called and told me Kelson's Make a Wish was being granted and she wanted Jaylen to come over to be his special friend. It was adorable to see Kelson's excitement. His wish was to go camping with his family (such a sweet kid!) so they gave him his own camping trailer with all kinds of special things inside like his own cooler, waffle iron, Mario quilt, etc. Kelson has been a great friend for Jaylen and has been such an inspiration to us. It was great to see him all excited for his wish.

I started going out on walks on Monday after we got home from the hospital on Saturday. It's been great to get out in the sunshine and explore around. Miles is always calm on our walks. He's such a GOOD baby!

I pulled out a bag of old shirts I have and am going to use some of my down time to make another quilt. I'm excited to get it done since I've had the shirts for a long time, just waiting to have time to do it.

Jaylen's 2nd grade photo

Snuggles with these two are priceless!

These guys love Mario time together

All my heart...

The traveling walking circus

Miles' feet are so tiny!

Gavin is a fun scooter buddy. I love to see him enjoying being outside exploring with me!

 Jaylen's school sent home a paper about an extra project that the kid's could voluntarily do called Reflections. There are different categories to submit to and the theme was "Let your imagination fly." Jaylen kept talking about wanting to do a video "Film" submission. The project has to be entirely done by the student, not the parents. I told him I'd be happy to help him get the things together to make it happen, but he would need to do the story line and do the video with his own brains. I was so proud to see him come up with his own book for the story line and then put together what he wanted.

We laughed and laughed at the finished product. It was pretty Uncle Ricoish, but he was so proud of his efforts. He got everything together to submit and off it went. I got an email later in the week saying he was receiving an award at the assembly and to come. Oh, we were surprised and couldn't stop laughing. Jaylen was totally surprised at the assembly and so excited. They played a clip from it for the school and the kids loved his video. Out of over a 100 submissions, he was one of the winners from the Film category! He got a bunch of coupons and rewards. So proud of our Jaylen and his curious brain. His video moves on to district competition!

Jaylen is the sweetest to his little brother!

My nieces sending me "hippo" pictures. Love them!

Oh this made me laugh. So true of my Minecraft crazy kids.

Eating a rainbow

We went to the Spooky Town Fair the night before Merilee came in. The boys were pretty excited to get their costumes on for the first time.

 The Sullivan soccer park a mile from our home had a grand opening! They finally finished the soccer fields, playground, splash park, tennis courts and trail. It was so great to be able to walk down there! Its going to be a great addition to this area! The boys loved playing at the playground, bounce houses and playing with cousins and friends.

Maggie doing a stand on Aaron

 Adorable nieces. Addie came up and gave Maggie a creepy hug that caused quite the laughs. Millie LOVES babies. She is always asking to hold him. It's adorable. She's so sweet with him.

We got the St George Running guide for the year and as I was looking through, SURPRISE!, I'm in it. I can't wait to get back into some races this year!

Cute Lily has been coming over to play with Jaylen after school lately. She says, "He's sooooo cute" every chance she can get when she's over here. She loves to hold him.

I shed some tears over this shirt. I'm excited to have it in my quilt but it was hard to cut it out. I bought this shirt to go with my dad to a KU game in St. Louis when he was sick with leukemia. It was also the shirt I was wearing when I held my Dad's hand while he passed away. So many sweet, hard memories with this shirt.

It was fun to watch Aaron play ball on his league team. It's especially fun to see Cam (number 30) playing with him since they played together for SVU years ago!