Sleepy Hollow and Halloween

Emily was excited to sign up for the new Musical Theater class this year and was thrilled when she got cast as the heroin, Katrina VanTassel in "The Headless Horseman".  She wowed everyone acting like the prettiest, most desired girl in town.

She had a solo singing about Brom Bones, her love interest, and playing hard to get.

She had such a blast with the whole class and we were all super impressed with what a high quality show they pulled off without any after school practices.

She didn't love the orange dress but she definitely stood out in it.

They performed three nights and the Wilfords and Grandma and Grandpa caught the last show.  It was fun to hear them all laughing at the silly characters and the well timed jokes, pauses, and effects.

The show was appropriately performed the week of Halloween.

Lily's friend made this perfect sign for Lily so they could match for Halloween.  Emily decided last minute to be a crazy cat lady so she could wear PJs to school.  I told her no real cats.

Halloween day we met Lily's friend for lunch, where Chick-fil-a kindly gave the girls free food for dressing up as their mascot.

They rode the Scheels ferris wheel and took some weird pics before coming home and getting the gang together for some trick or treating.

Iowa Weekend

Friday before the sun was even considering shinning it's light we were headed to the airport on our way to Iowa to visit the Bernards and watch another BYU football game.

Greg met us in Des Moines with the rental car (he was coming from another work trip) and we stoped at Windsor for window plant tour.  The girls loved learning about windows and the Dr. Pepper they got afterwards for our drive to Ames.

Phoebe and the girls jumped right into fun with just dance, aerial silks, and playing with Louie.

Grandma and Grandpa Dame arrived later that evening with Rachel and we all enjoyed chatting before bed.

The next morning we took Louie out on a walk in a lovely forested area.  The Bernards were happy to let Louie run Emily up and down the trails.

Then we got our layers on and headed to the game.

The Iowa State fans were so kind, several of them stopping us on our walk and wishing us a great stay in Ames.  One group of tailgaters even let the girls have some donuts.

Phoebe represented for the Iowa State fans around us and they would high five her whenever their team was doing well - which was most of the first quarter.  But after halftime we dominated and the Cougars ended on top.

Emily and Rachel ran to edge of the field and snapped some pictures with Bear Bachmeier..

Then we walked back to our car but Grandma, Grandpa, Laura and Anson weren't back yet (their seats weren't by ours) so the girls played in the backyard of a home that Aaron owns but doesn't live in right now (we used the driveway for free parking).

They smashed several mushrooms of this size or larger.

And this outdoor tree house was begging for a photo shoot.

Sunday morning we went to church, played some games and played with the animals before heading to the airport.

Another fun weekend with cousins thanks to BYU being in the Big 12!

What the squirrel tail?

I woke up from my nap and found this on the floor...yes, it is a squirrel tail minus the squirrel.

Emily, at the suggestion of Spencer (thank you 🤦Spencer), put the tail in a mature of salt and Boraz to preserve it.

So now we have a preserved squirrel tail.  Those cats continue to surprise and terrify me.

Easton's are back in Yellowstone

Thursday after school the girls and I headed to Rexburg.  We had a bit of a late start and didn't arrive till about 9:30pm.  I made the choice not to pick Greg up at the airport but to have him Uber to the hotel.  That left the girls about 30 minutes to see Kate's place and chat with her roomies.

At which point I got a phone call...Andrew separated his shoulder playing soccer and it was hurting way more than usual when that happens (this is time 4 or 5).  Natali was at the game so she took him to the urgent care -except it seems to have been the ER (not looking forward to those bills).

He got some drugs, a sling, and an order for an MRI and PT.  Good thing he was planning to take it easy this weekend  driving around Yellowstone looking for animals and watching conference.

The next morning Kate met us for breakfast and it was decided that Lily would stay behind with her and hitch a ride with the BYU Provo kids on their way through Rexburg.  Kate chose to skip the Yellowstone stuff and just hang with her friends (I think she likes college).

The Provo kids left after Friday classes and got to Gardiner a little bit before Greg, Emily and I.

Meanwhile, Emily Greg and I entered the park for free (thank you government shut down 🤦) and enjoyed a nice grizzly spotting,

a lovely hike,

and a second grizzly (this photo was taken from my phone, that is how close it was).

The other kids made Emily jealous by spotting this great grey owl.

We also saw this black bear as we exited Lamar Valley and met up with the other kids in time for the BYU game.

We left at 6 am the next morning and found the same black bear,

lots of elk, and a far off grizzly.

We were back in time for the kids to sleep through most of the first session of conference (6 am wake up not so good for watching conference).  They did stay up long enough to learn that a new prophet wouldn't be sustained at that meeting since Pres. Nelson had only passed away a week previous to the conference.

Between sessions the kids went out to mammoth and hiked around and found a black bear and cubs, I stayed home to nap and bathe.

After the second session we headed out to explore and found a hike we had never been on to a beautiful waterfall.

On the way in for the night we lucked out seeing a pack of wolves running across the hills near Gardiner, it was through a scope or binoculars for all of us but there were more than 10 wolves so still really cool.  And sometime in all the crazy we wished Mack and Nani a happy birthday!

The next morning's am drive and been slow until we lucked out in the Lamar Valley seeing a fluffy coyote.

And just when we were going to turn the car around and head back the car in front of us stopped for bison.  While waiting we looked around and Andrew spotted this lovely red fox as well as a bull moose off in the distance.  

It was fun to watch the fox running, stalking and just hanging out.  It was a great morning.

More sleep kids during the Sunday morning session though.

After the morning session the Provo kids hit the road.  The rest of us were scheduled to stay another night but in Lily and I were ready to head home and Greg and Emily decided that would be okay but Greg wanted to go the long way through Grand Teton.  So we pack up quick and hit the road managing to drive for 3 or 4 hours in a blizzard made for not such great views but some beautiful landscapes when the sky cleared.

The Provo kids hit snow as well and stopped to show Miguel some of the geysers.

We eventually pulled out of the bad weather, crossed the continental divide and enjoyed the beauty of Grand Tetons.  We even managed to spot one cute little black bear shaking a tree.  It was a long ride home.  The girls climbed in bed at 11:30 and I left them skip first period for which they were grateful.  It was a lovely weekend filled with family, animals, and conference, although I'm not so sure that should be a repeat combo.