We have been too blessed by the warm weather lately.  October has been great.  I am sure that cold winter is around the corner, though.  It seems to me that the longer time marches on, summer seems to last later into the year, and winter lasts longer into the spring.  I guess I will have to look back and appreciate a week in the 70's in the spring, when it is still snowing.
     The kids have been extremely involved with stuff this week.  I took Mo and Chlo grocery shopping early in the week because Jams and Sags had one of their friends get into a horrible car accident, and they invited some friends over to make cookies for her.  This meant that I had to actually take kids to the store to be prepared.  They actually really enjoyed the outing.  I purchased them a Halloween bucket, and they drug those things around all week.  Moroni's was a fluorescent green with black spiders and the word EEK on it.  He got all excited, and called the spiders "puppies."  He is really confused about this puppy stuff.  Chlo also informed me that she would like to be a "flower ghost" for Halloween.  I am not sure how to make her into a flower ghost, and Jerusha desires to be "Mama" from the latest horror film.  Rooshkie is my picky kid when it comes to her costumes too.  Mama has hair that blows in the wind, glowing blue eyes that are crooked, and she is built like a crazy mop...yeah, good luck with that one.  Mama also does crazy acrobatics and eats bugs.  Thank goodness that I can probably stick everyone else in something simple. 
     Oak had a good time this week pretending that he was deer hunting with my glue gun.  He even stuck .bb's down the "barrel" and was afraid to pull the trigger.  He was sure that if he shot at the mounted deer on the wall with his loaded "gun" that it would fall off, and his Dad would be mad.  I just hope that I will be able to get the .bb's out of the glue gun.  Mo took the same glue gun and pretended it was a phone for a long while. 
     Speaking of Moroni, we have entered undesirable "dumping" territory with him and I expect it is going to be one long and messy ordeal with him.  He took my box of "Frankenberry" and dumped it on the living room floor in and amongst his large legos.  He then proceeded to pick every marshmallow out of the bunch so that he could eat them.  We were left with a pile of blocks and a bunch of undesirable marshmallow-less red ghosts.  Needless to say, that he dumped a bag of chips twice that day too.  I got after him about it, but at his age, discipline is pretty complicated.  He just doesn't get it.  I instructed the kids not to let him have anything he can dump.  This has worked to a small degree.  We have still had a few dumping mishaps, but nothing too bad.
     Moroni also got really upset the other day, and Chloee was trying desperately to make him happy.  She went in and got him a lid off of a bin, and expected this to lift his spirits.  Well, it didn't work, but hey, she is trying to be thoughtful, and that is what makes me happy.
     Oak is also going through an odd phase of moving the couches around when he desires to be impressive.  I am kind of sick of it though, because sometimes things get messy behind the couches.  It isn't cool to reveal Chlo's family of toothbrushes to the neighbors when they come to visit.  There is usually wrappers, and other various crayons, and papers too.  I think he just wants to prove that he is a man with muscles.
     The school did their International Day on Fridee.  International day, is a day that they want the kids to learn about their ancestors.  They are supposed to find out about some of the people from their family tree, and dress up like the people from that country, and bring some food samples from that country if possible.  Well, Sager for some reason, had to have a cake shaped like a fort that day, and it was Jazzerz day to bring sharing and treats for her class.  Not to mention that Ryan had stayed up late and  had just helped Jams complete her  roller coaster the day before.  Anyhow, it was about more school stuff than I could take.  Luckily Oak was way against participating in international day, so I didn't have to dress him up, I just kept him home.  Jamie didn't want to dress up and I felt like kissing her for this.  She is always low maintenance.  Of course Jerusha was the one who wanted to go all out for international day.  She wanted me to run her to town, and purchase her a genuine costume from Spain.  Spain???? As far as I know, we have no ancestors from Spain.  This didn't stop her from wanting to dress up like a Spanish Maiden.  I told her no.  She would have to come up with a costume from our existing dress up box.  She stayed up really late creating herself a Native American costume.  She claimed that she was related thanks to her Uncle Jesse.  OK.  Anyhow, we braided her hair, put war paint on her, and she had glued brown looking fringe onto a pair of her boots.  Jazzerz dressed up like a pioneer, and Sags dressed up like a lady from England.  We rolled out fondant to cover Sags cake, and her fort turned out pretty snazzy too.  Jazz just took a box of fish crackers, and a fossil to share with her class.  It all turned out ok.  In fact, everyone loved Saggers fort cake, and they found my fondant delish too.  Thankfully, Jamie was able to cover it smoothly, and Sage used nutella to give it the muddy look that she desired.  We make a pretty good team.  The band, orchestra, and choir also performed for the studentbody that day.  Sags was not looking forward to this, because she claims that the band sounds like a "herd of honking geese with asthma."  I have faith that the band will improve, but Sage is a little disgruntled over that situation.
     After school on Friday, I told the kids that I would take them to the Cedar Livestock and Heritage Festival for their fun day.  I told everyone to put on their best Western wear, and meet me in the car.  I helped Mo, and everyone came out looking pretty good except for Chlo.  She came to the car in her owl pajamas.  I must give her credit, that her owl pajamas had a top and bottom that matched, but I just wasn't willing to take her to the fest dressed like an owl going to bed.  Thankfully her big sister Jams came to the rescue and went and dressed her up. 
     The "sheep fest" is always a good time.  We purchased everyone a dutch oven cinnamon roll, and there was a dental center giving balloons away.  This proved to be a great blessing.  They had actually attached a bracelet to the balloon which anchored the balloon, and the kids could wear them on their wrist.  If they came off, they didn't float to the ceiling because the bracelet keep it on the ground.  Well, Oak and Chlo kept taking off to run and skid around amongst the vendors.  It was easy to spot them because of the balloons.  Oak had a blue one, and Chlo's was yellow.  We would just look around for the blue, and yellow balloon that was zipping to and fro, and there they would be!  It worked out great.  Mo hauled his balloon everywhere for the rest of the week until it popped.  Literally everywhere.  We took it truck shopping on Saturday, and boot shopping, and he slept with his balloon.  When it popped, he shrugged it off and got all excited about a "horsie."
     On Saturday, Ryan took Jams and Mo to work.  Mo got all tuckered out from his help, and slept for quite awhile.  He was so excited that he got to go to work with Dad.  Jams ended up painting a garage floor.  She seemed to enjoy it.
     We took the kids to the Livestock and Heritage festival's live band and dance on Saturday night.  The girls were way disgruntled because there were no boys their age to swing with.  Ryan purchased them an old fashioned soda and we went home.  Ryan and I have to teach the Panguitch stake the swing dance this week and we were hoping to get some good practice in.  We did get a little of that done.
     I learned today that I need to teach the kids about the law of the fast.  I had been asked to fill in for a Relief Society teacher and needed to plan the lesson.  Ryan volunteered to make the kids omlettes for breakfast so that I could prepare.  Well, he spent most of the morning making all of the kids an omlette.  The only complaint that I heard was that he put too many onions on them.  Ryan explained that he was just doing unto others as he would have others do to him, and he desired many onions on his omlette.  Oak kind of slept in, but several of the kids had left half of their omlettes.  When he woke up, Ryan instructed him to finish one of them.  Normally Oak is fine with this kind of a situation, but I could tell this morning that a cold, half-eaten omlette was not appealing to him.  He finally decided that rather than eat the leftovers, he would fast.  Chlo had eaten two eggs, but claimed that she was fasting too.  She fasted for about ten minutes and then announced that she needed a "yogut"  Oak lasted a few hours and then claimed that he could not survive any longer without a cup of chocolate milk.  In fact, as I type this, Chlo came and told me that she had resumed her fast, and wanted me to cook her an egg.  Yep, we need a lesson on the fast.
    Moroni had some pants that were a little too big today.  I was pretty busy fretting over my lesson, and I couldn't locate a belt.  When we got to shrsh I noticed that Ryan had used a zip-tie to hold up his pants.  I love that man of mine, and his fixes.  The zip-tie worked great.  My lesson went ok, and the home teachers came over.  Oak got rastling with one of the home teachers and actually gave him a bloody nose.  I cannot say that this made me smile.  We definitely need to keep working on our people skills.

     We had such a nice week off.  It was way nice to just buckle down and do house work instead of running kids all over the place.  
     We had a horrible accident last Sunday evening.  Arden and Jared were coming home from Orderville and wrecked above Hurricane.  Yep, those horrible scary cliffs above Hurricane.  We were so grateful that they were being protected because things could have ended horribly.  Arden escaped with some feet trouble and a broken leg.  Jared is worse with some back injuries and road rash, but considering where they wrecked they are way lucky. 
     We had a nice week.  The kids were able to catch up on some sleep, and they were a lot of help.  We didn't get as much done as I wanted, but we did get a lot done.  We got most of the wood stacked for the winter, and we picked up all of the beef that the girls raised over the summer.  My freezer is now stocked with really good meat, and for this I am so grateful.  I also came to appreciate Ryan because I ended up having to defrost and clean out the freezer.  He usually does this, but he worked way too many hours to deal with it.  It was a ton of work, but I am glad it is done.  
     Jerusha started some trend, where she was acting like some noble lady at dinner and lunch times.  She would speak in a proper English accent and sip and simper accordingly.  Mo, who usually ends up on the table acting like Animal from the Muppets, she held in great disdain.  He did not care either way.  One day she was trying to have a lofty and dignified conversation with Jazzerz who just happened to be drinking her milk through a funnel.  I did not believe that Jazzerz behavior fit into the proper behavior that Jerusha was trying to portray.  Poor Rooshkie, we are definitely not the royal type.
     We had a crazy weekend filled with too many events.  One of Ryan's cousins had a daughter get married, and we felt like we needed to be at that.  We love and enjoy seeing the Bundy relatives any time that we can.  Well, we decided to attend a Friday night open house.  The problem began that day because Wams had, of course waited until the last minute to build a roller coaster.  An assignment that she has been whining about for quite some time.  Anyhow, without Ryan's assistance, Jams and I were having struggles indeed.  We did finally figure it out in my rinky dink sort of way.  The roller coaster assignment took us most of the day to figure out.  This pushed us as being late in getting ready for the reception.  At one point I realized that every person in the family were waiting on me to do something for them.  Ryan had not eaten all day, and I was heating up dinner for him, Wams had requested some assistance with the back of her hair, Sags was having issues with her dress, Rooshkie wanted me to curl her hair, Jazz needed her hair done, Oak could not find his boots, Chlo refused to get ready at all, and Mo needed his Sunday attire put on him.  I kinda felt like screaming.  Eventually all of the things got done.  I am so glad that I am needed, and we did make it.   I loved the open house.  It was decorated beautifully, they had some moist cupcakes, and some delicious lemonade.  Seriously, the lemonade was crisp, sweet, tangy and refreshing.  Not like the battery acid tasting stuff.  I really just loved that lemonade.  Anyhow, on the way home, Oak went a little nuts.  He had some obsession about making the girls squirm by sticking their heads into his arm pits.  He was yelling things like "pits for dinner!"  ha ha ha.  Really, we had all had enough of Oak's armpits  by the time we got home.  Traveling with the kids is kind of like a torturing session.  So glad to make it home after that lengthy trip to New Castle.
     On Saturday we had a Bundy funeral.  Ethan Bundy died, and he was such a great guy.  We love that family and wanted to be there to show our support.  We roused the kids out of bed, and once again made them dress up in their Sunday best.  The funeral was good, but my kids just couldn't seem to sit still.  I finally found them a safe place to dink around, and I just checked on them periodically.  There was this eight year old boy who was wandering the halls who seemed pretty obsessed with the fact that my kids were playing in the primary room.  He kept going in to "check" on my kids too.  I thought this was kind of funny because Jerusha is 10 and very capable of keeping things under control.  According to my kids he kept coming in there wanting to fight with someone.  He came and reported to me once that the kids were being "hyperactivity"  I went in there and checked and they were doing just fine.  Finally his dad came and collected him.  It made for some good laughs though.  We stopped by and let the kids eat at Golden Corral again.  Once again they pretty much cleaned the joint out of cotton candy.  We got to enjoy Ryan's dad and he gave us some delicious melons.  They have been great.  We had to bring fruit to the baby blessing, and everyone raved about the melons.  I was grateful for them because fruit is kind of expensive this time of year.  Family is such a blessing.
     After the funeral, we had to go to Hatch because Barry and Mindi were blessing baby Madeline first thing Sunday morning.  It was also the opening of the deer hunt, and in spite of the fact that I had no deer tag, I wanted to sneak around the trees a little bit.  Ryan informed me that he had to stop in Kanab to purchase some tires, and we set off.  Oak and Chlo were fighting in the back, and Chlo and Jerusha were being way giggle-goofy.  Finally everyone fell asleep, and I was able to drive in peace.  It was nice. 
     We got to Kanab, and Ryan gave me directions to a welding yard.  He had purchased some tires off of an old box truck, that was about to be scrapped.  Needless to say, that Sage was less than thrilled about waking up in the middle of a welding yard.  Ryan took his tools, and began removing tires.  He instructed us to find some blocks to set the truck onto.  Chlo, Oak, and Mo were still in their church clothing, and I needed them to stay clean for church and the blessing the next day.  Well, this just wasn't happening.  Chlo, and Mo began rolling around in some rusty old pipes, and they found a pile of black dirt to play in.  I went and found some logs to set the truck up on.  The problem was, the blocks were kind of narrow.  Ryan, said that they would work fine, because they were going to scrap the truck right away.  The problem arose when he had removed all six tires, Oak climbed up into the cab and began jerking the steering wheel back and forth.  The whole truck was rocking, and I just knew it was going to fall off.  I screamed at Oak to exit the truck immediately.  He went back to rolling around in oily, and rusty pipes with Chlo and Mo.  Needless to say that I had to wersh all of their clothing as soon as we got to my mom's.
     I explained to my mom that I wanted to meet them deer hunting, so I instructed her to take the phone so I could text her.  Needless to say that when we arrived at her house, when we tried to call, her phone rang and buzzed loudly on the counter top.  I never really did get my deer hunting fill.
     The baby blessing was nice.  She looked so pretty in her elegant white dress.  She was definitely the little star of the day.  I think that Mo sensed that the world was not revolving around him because he really started to act up at that point.  He grabbed my necklace, and pulled until it broke.  He would squirm and arch, and scream.  I would grab Sager's I-pod and this would keep him occupied for about a minute, he then would go to the story book about a plastic purse, and then he would go back to the broken necklace.  I-pod, book, necklace.  Necklace book I-pod, twist and screech.  Finally Ryan took him out.  This was nice until Sage and wazz began pounding at each other.  They claimed that it felt good, but it was way distracting.  Loud pounds were heard from our bench the rest of the meeting.  Jams also stepped on my toe in her spiked heels.  It was extremely painful.  I almost shrieked too.
     They served a breakfast at the Senior Citizen's Center.  It was really good.  The center had an interesting machine that vibrated everyone that stepped on it.  The kids spent the whole time on this machine. Mo found a haunted house statue that moaned around, and the kids vibrating would make their noise with Mo's haunted house.  It was pretty funny.  They also had a leg massager that pinched at your legs.  All of these machines got a lot of use.
     We then went to Grandma's and she made cookies, and Krispy Kreme donuts.  The girls had a ball dipping donuts.  Huxty and I went walking because of all of the sweets Grandma was making, and she had some trouble with Chlo who had stapled her dress and accidentally knocked a shelf over.  Chlo was sad about these troubles too.  It was definitely time to get home and get her busy again.
     My Dad got us an additional load of wood this week which was very nice of him.  Ryan has been extremely busy and this will definitely get us through the winter.  We all went out to load it in the trailer with the tires we had picked up in Kanab.  Mo somehow wanted to make himself useful too.  He wandered around munching on a donut for awhile until he came across the hitch on the truck.  He then began to hook the donut onto the hitch.  This was the extent of Mo's assistance. 
     We are back home now, and the night with Mo was less than ideal.  He woke up at 2am for several hours.  I thought I had just gotten him to sleep when he rose up, and enthusiastically began discussing cows.  Needless to say that I was not wanting to hang out with him any longer.  He finally did go back to sleep around 4am.  I will try to discuss cows with him during daylight hours.  Hopefully this will get it out of his mind and he will rest easier tonight.

    
        

     This week was a total blur.  I don't even hardly remember what happened because it just came and went too fast.  Many days are this way.  I cannot seem to get a handle on anything.
     I pulled Sage out of school early on Friday to babysit so that I could attend the temple.  I am ashamed to say that I have not attended in a few months.  I had such an amazing time in there on Friday.  I am totally recommitted to attending more often. It puts such a perspective on everything.  After I finished in there, I met up with Ryan who had been working in Washington.  We travelled home together the back way because he had to look at a project in Diamond Valley.  It was great to just have some time to talk without all of the musical chairs and squealing coming out of the back seats.  Mo has been a literal nightmare on car trips.
     We went on a couple of wood hauling projects yesterday and we got a load of wood for some ward members, and we went back and got a load for ourselves.  I can honestly say that when I heard about the ward wood haul, I was a little bit crabby about it.  They wanted to meet at like 6:30am.  I am not a sleeping slob...I usually get up most weekdays at 4am, but Saturdays I would like to sleep until 7:30 if possible.  Anyhow, Ryan had the trailer and the chainsaws and so that pretty much sealed the fact that we had to be there.  We kind of have an unspoken rule, that Saturdays and Sundays are family time no matter what.  If Ryan has to work, we all go with him if we can.  If the Elders Quorum is having a wood haul...we are all going together.  We roused the kids up, and I instructed them to wear multiple layers of clothing.  Chlo was really against this whole idea.  We are talking about a gal who would prefer wearing a swimming suit at all times if possible.  I began putting layers on her and she was having a total fit.  Not okay in her book to be wearing two pairs of everything.  I dressed her in spite of her protests and sent her in to eat some breakfast.  She came back all upset because there was no one to eat with.  She absolutely refused to eat at the table alone.  I finally sent Jazzerz to sit at the table with her so that she would be willing to eat something.  Chlo is quite the gal that is for sure. 
     We went out in the hills, and Ryan whipped out the chainsaws and started sawing things up...Chlo and Mo even hauled a few sticks.  Jams and Sags are awesome wood haulers.  We have been on enough wood hauls that they pitch right in.  We actually had a great time.  We had a few of the Elders with us, and I must say that even though they were California city guys, Ryan taught them how to cut wood like pros.  I am not sure that they appreciated getting soggy Cheetos chucked at them on the ride home, but they were pretty good sports.  Luckily, we had the Elder's Quorum President with us on the car trip.  He is a comedian and entertained Mo the entire time.  It was great.
     We came home, dropped the extra men off, and picked up another trailer,(of course this entailed Ryan having to change a tire) and we went out to get another load.  I must admit that I am way too picky about the wood that I want to burn.  I like Cedar, I am willing to gather Oak, but thumbs down to Aspen.  Cedar is my favorite because it burns hot and long, and it makes cozy popping sounds as it burns.  I turn my snout up at some of the piles that we pass.  It's ok because Ryan found me some red cedar to burn...yippee.  Anyhow, the second wood haul, the younger kids were less than enthusiastic about hauling more wood.  They got some kind of an interesting game going that had an ax and an oven. The oven was a weird old log, and the ax was a stick. I am not really sure the gist of the game, but they were quite entertained playing amongst a pile of dead trees.  Needless to say that Jams, Sags, and I did most of the work.  I can honestly say that I thoroughly enjoy working with my girls.  They are fun and funny.  I laughed and laughed with them as we hauled and stacked wood.  Moroni wasn't too much of a pleasure though.  Part of the time, he expected to be hauled in my arms along with the wood.  Yep, he is pretty spoiled.  Chlo sat in the van most of the time because she kept removing her shoes.  She would jump over seats over and over.  Chlo is actually really good help when the kids are all at school, but she definitely lets the older kids handle the work load if she can.
     Between wood hauls, Oak was out riding his bike and found a nice, brown caterpillar.  He loved that little guy.  Anyhow, he put the worm in a bowl and held the bowl in his mouth, and gave the caterpillar rides.  I noticed that he had found a smashed tomater for the caterpillar too.  It didn't really want anything to do with the smashed tomater, but it was the thought that counts.
     Well, it is official.  My baby is in the nursery and he absolutely hates it.  HATES IT! While Jazz, Oak and Chlo were in the nursery, Ryan and I were nursery leaders and so we didn't have a problem getting them to transition.  Anyhow, Moroni screamed and whaled and shrieked.  Ryan finally just stayed in there with him. Ryan is awesome in the nursery.  I just hope that Mo gets used to it before too long.  I had the task of helping Chloee give a talk in primary.  She did great because we kept it nice and short.  We got laughing later because we recalled a day when Jazz had been assigned to give a talk.  She was a little Sun beamer.  Anyhow, I was in the nursery at the time with Oak.  Ryan went in to primary to help Jazzerz with her speech.  When it came time for her to get up, there was a sheepish pause because no one was there to help her.  Yep, Ryan was snoring on one of the chairs in the back.  Luckily, Wams was in there to wake him up, but poor Jazz.  I know she felt awkward there for a moment.  We had a nice Sunday.  Except for Chlo's stuffed cow that was thrown around some in sacrament meeting, we did pretty good.
     The kids have a week off from school, and I have huge cleaning plans.  I know the kids need some fun time too, but I want to get things organized.  We shall see how this goes.

     The first picture shows Chloee sleeping soundly on the computer desk...the second is of Oak giving his caterpillar a ride.  The next few are of the kids playing while we haul wood, and the one of Ryan is of his home-made tailgate.  Our trailer didn't have a tailgate, and so he built one...that is just how my man is.  Mo is looking quite tired in the last few shots, and he was.  A good week all in all.
    

     Wow, I love the fall! It has been so great to see the change of the leaves lately. I love this time of year. I am still homesick though. I need to get to Hatch soon. I might need to bump around in the guts of Hatch mtn for awhile. Perhaps I could sneak around scoping out the deer. Something, that is for sure.
     Last week flew by, just like any other. It got really cold there for a few days, and it was hard on Ryan and his concrete pouring program. I made some hot beef soup one evening so that everyone could warm up, especially Ryan who had been working in the chill autumn air (he hates fall and winter.) I had it in my head, that everyone, including Mo had enjoyed their soup. Little did I know that Mo had stuffed all of his meat into the milk jug while no one was looking. I noticed him on the table as I was clearing up, but didn't give it a whole lot of thought until Ryan poured chunks of meat on his peaches and cream the next morning. Ryan just shrugged it off, scooped out the meat, and enjoyed his peaches and cream. However, no one else could finish theirs. Boo to your idea to add meat to the milk Mo! I hope this isn't an activity that you plan on repeating.
     Ryan insisted that I cook beef tongue this week. It didn't go well at all. Carol mentioned that I needed to pressure cook it for a long time. Well, there must have been something wrong with my pressure cooker because it ran out of water way too soon, and scorched the heck out of the tongue. Yucky.  My whole house smelled like burnt tongue for days.  Needless to say, that it was not a hit at all. I am with him on cooking and saving the beef heart, I consider the tongue and the liver coyote bait. They are having coyote troubles at the ranch again this year. Coyotes love melon...who knew?  The problem is, the melons aren't quite ripe (well, a lot of them aren't)  and the coyotes will claw and scratch through melon after melon until they find a sweet one.  They are ruining tons of melons.  Who wants a melon with bite marks and claws up the side?  I noticed that Arden had killed one today because he had posted it on facebook.  Wams enjoyed running coyote traps for them last year...we might have to send her down.
     We had a surprise visit from Dave this week, and my kids just love him. It was fun visiting with him.  Mo loved playing with his dog Rosie.   Thankfully, Rosie is used to being around little kids and she seemed indifferent to his antics.
       Cliven wanted us to come to the ranch for the weekend which meant that we had to drag the trailer down for the winter. We had cleaned it out good, and Ryan's employees fixed the water leaks in it. I love, love, love the ranch this time of year. I love the clean and fresh smell of the river, and the melon smells coming out of the bins. Plus, it was Conference and that is something that always gets me way happy. I love conference weekend. It always makes me want to do better, and be nicer. Love it. Anyhow, the trailer is great, but we are pretty squished at night time in it. There are literally kids sprawled out everywhere at night. The ranch always wears everyone out too. It reminds me that I have life pretty easy. As I walked down the ditch bank, I noticed that Arden and Clance had tied up all of the dogs. The first one had his ear sliced open and sagging, and the second one was missing part of his paw. Life on the ranch is work, and tough work. There is so much to be done, and never enough time and resources to get finished. I hope that we help out to some small degree, but I know that we get to enjoy the good parts of it, and leave Cliven and Carol with all of the struggles. Life is tough no matter where you go, but we always go home with a few battle wounds. Jazz got scraped up good when her Dad backed over a melon cart, and Mo got stung by a wasp on the face. His little face is still puffy today. Anyhow, the Bundy's are tough, and that is why. I am grateful that my husband was raised there. Anyhow, back to sleeping arrangements. Mo ended up in our bed, which is pretty small compared to what we are used to. I kept having dreams of being choked, or not getting enough air. I woke up with Mo's legs sprawled across my neck. Not a pleasant arrangement. I might have Ryan strap him to the roof next time.
     We got word, while we were down there, that the Casablanca had some cows get on the golf course. Unfortunately this happens quite frequently. Ryan took Arden, Jams, and Sags and I to go and deal with the problem. We also took one of his better cow dogs with us. It was kinda comical to be driving around the golf course in Cliven's Dodge while everyone else toodled around in their golf carts. Ryan and Arden could see by some fresh tracks, that we were looking for a large bull. Arden mentioned that it was probably "big dummy." I found this extremely amusing and wanted to hear all about "Big Dummy." Apparently Big Dummy is a big, black bull who prefers the golf course. Although, the ranch has a lot of mean bulls, Big Dummy is pretty docile. According to Arden, he hides out in the brush when he is being trailed, and no matter who, or what chases him out, he ends up back on the golf course. Arden claims that they even picked him up once, drove him all the way out to Lake Mead, and then left him. Well, it wasn't very long before he was back on the golf course. I don't think that Big Dummy is very dumb at all. He is actually quite smart. I laughed and laughed about big dummy. Anyhow, Arden, the dog, and the girls wandered through the brush seeking out Big Dummy but he was never found. Ryan and I stood ready to chase him out of the gate, but he must have been hiding too good. I guess Arden will have to find Big Dummy another day. I must admit that I wanted to find him all big and dumb and hiding in the brush. Too bad.  I can only imagine that the golfers don't appreciate Big Dummy grazing on the greens and bushes.  It definitely isn't something that they expect to see. 
     We ended up visiting Grandma Great (Grapes) for awhile. I was trying to keep Mo away from all of her breakable trinkets. I sat on her porch and watched him run around her yard as I listened to conference. I must admit that I saw that he had gotten into her outdoor spigot that happened to be dripping. He seemed really happy to be playing with the dripping water, and so I just let lazily let him play. I found out all too soon that he had found a mud bog under the spigot. This mud had an odd balloon/rubber glove smell to it. Everywhere we took Mo the rest of the day was unpleasant. He smelled of balloons, and this was after we cleaned him up at Grandma's. He reeked of balloons and had a weird eye thanks to his hornet sting. It was good to get him home and clean him up. The rest of the kids had a ball playing on the hay baler, and chasing chickens. Oak mentioned that he had a chat with the chickens and let them know that we eat their eggs. He mentioned that this upset the chickens so much that they ran off looking for their eggs. Jerusha caught a pet frog that she played with for awhile, and they all (Jazz, Rooshkie, and Oak) eagerly stood by the fence waiting for melon customers. Stetsy shared her latest hair techniques, and we went to a gun show. We had some trouble with Chlo, who kept getting her feelings hurt over dumb stuff, but the kids enjoyed getting out and playing hard. A great weekend, had by all.

     Well, it is official.  Moroni won today.  I keep thinking that I am up for the challenge that he provides, but today he is way more than I can handle.  I will try to admit defeat gracefully and move on.  It has been quite the week.
     Jerusha decided to open a snack bar for after school hours.  This is a cute idea and all, but I found ritz crackers in every nook and cranny imaginable.  In the corner, under the table, in the bookoo fudge.  In a rage I shut down the snack bar.  Jerusha begged and begged and I finally consented to let her reopen it if she cleans up some of the outrageous messes.  I am not seeing much improvement.  Jams and Sags want the opportunity to run the snack bar too, and so they changed it to the Bundy snack bar.  Anyhow, anytime Ryan and I run anywhere she has a list of supplies that she needs filled in order to run the snack bar.  It is getting to be a little out of control.  At least they aren't begging me for snacks though.  One of the items on her menu is a banana blast.  This has a banana, caramel, and whipping cream.  Jazzerz somehow got whipped cream all over her shoe, and then tracked that cream all over the house.  I have found smashed bananas in my carpet, and yogurt on the windowsill.  Maybe I need to make sure that the snack bar does not have the "to go" option.  Anyhow, hopefully Rooshkie is gaining some cooking skills in the process.  Otherwise I vote thumbs down to the snack bar. 
     It froze this week and started to cool off, which is nice.  I love the fall weather and the changing of the leaves.  I was going to take the kids out to see the colors this week, but it got too blasted cold on Fridee to do much of anything.  Ryan decided on Saturday to get the bikes up and going though.  That turned out to be a ton of work for him, but we had a great time riding down from the waterfall into Cedar City.  It was so much fun.  I loved it.  The leaves are changing, and we all were able to ride, thanks to Ryan's fix-it skills.  I figured I wasn't going to be able to go because of Mo and Chlo.  He found and fixed up a clunky bike trailer that I had purchased at a yard sale about five years ago.  He fixed it onto the back of his bike.  Moroni and Chlo were fixed up with pillows, blankets and marshmallows.  They loved the ride.  Ryan and I also decided to go out on the town too.  In the meantime at home Mo was getting very upset at getting ditched.  He got over it though.
     Shrsh was disasterous today.  I mentioned that Mo won.  He was terrible, and I am not sure that there is going to be a light at the end of the shrsh tunnel anytime soon.  He figured that everyone had come to the building to witness Mo on parade.  I cannot reason with him that this is simply not the case.  He began running back and forth and back and forth up front (we were on the front row, which is never good)  He then began branching out with his antics farther and farther.  He ventured over to a pretty gal and begged for cereal that she had brought to shrsh for her baby, he popped up and down, up and down from behind the bench at the family behind us.  I took him out a bunch of times, but he would scream to go back in.  I could usually get him to be good for a minute looking at baby animals in a book, but then he would remember that he had a show to put on.  He got so bold as to venture onto the stand.  It was fast and testimony day, and so I felt sheepish going up there after him.  Being that I was thinking about bearing my testimony anyway, I made the mistake of picking him up, and trying to bear my testimony.  He twisted and turned and screeeeeeeched loudly.  Finally one of the counselors in the bishopric took him, but he twisted away from him too and began doing a show right by the podium.  At this point, no one was listening to what I was saying, but watching Mo and his show.  Oak was laughing so hard he was practically bawling.  I finally just left with him, and looked at pictures of Jesus in the hall.  We are in for it every Sunday, but he will grow out of it.  It just might be awhile.  Ryan attempted to take him to the Nursery, but he bawled so hard over this that he almost threw up.  He then fell asleep for awhile, only to wake up, and go back to the bishopric member.  He demanded that the baby animals book be read by him.  He did help Mo out in this, but Mo insisted that every animal in the book was a puppy.  The pigs, the goats, everything.  Puppy.  He knows horses and cows too, but he was being stubborn.
     We got home from church and Chlo made up her mind to be a spooky ghost.  She attempted to be spooky in a flowery pillowcase.  She couldn't see anything and just kind of bobbed back and forth.  Mo finally just went up and hugged her.  This wasn't what Chlo had in mind.  She wanted to spook and to scare.  I finally told her that a flowery pillowcase just wasn't scary.  Poor Chlo.
     We went on another bike ride on Sunday afternoon.  It was so fresh and wonderful.  Mo and Chlo love riding in their trailer and the kids were just loving it. The would throw an arm up and yell and it was definitely worth the trouble to fix up the bikes.  I am so glad that Ryan can fix stuff.  He is a great dad. Ryan and I also went home teaching.  It was a good weekend spent together. 
     I went walking with my friends later, and Moroni threw a fit about this.  Ryan was glad though because he finally gave up and settled down in his arms.  He slept there for quite awhile, and he usually won't go down for Ryan. I can see that Mo is going to be a Daddy's boy.  He loves tractors, and horses, and he begs and bawls to go with Dad most days.  It will be nice when Ryan can take him too.
     Well, we shall see what transpires with the snack bar this week.  I am hoping that we can keep it open with fewer messes.  Jerusha even put out a tip jar, but I noticed that no one was tipping her. 
Poor Rooshkie.

     I am loving the fall chill in the air this morning.  This is my favorite time of the year, and it is because our favorite family outings usually happened in October with the deer hunt.  When I was really young my mom would make cinnamon rolls, and caramel apples, and little ghost sugar cookies, with chocolate chip eyes.  Most of these treats were taken deer hunting.  I feel bad that we did not draw out on any tags this year.  I love to get over to Hatch, and breathe in the cold, wet leaves smell.  It is way invigorating and so I will have to go over there for a visit anyway.  Perhaps Deeb and I can cook venison and dip fries in fry sauce.  That just might do it for me. 
     We had an extremely eventful weekend.  I loved hanging out with family, and watching the kids play with their cousins.  Last week was extremely busy too.  Now that the kids are back in school, we have way too many activities going on.  That, and Jams and Sags (and Jerusha too) thinking that they need to be social all the time keep my very busy.  We started out the week kind of rough because Mo refused to get out of the car on Monday afternoon.  I had just picked the kids up from the bus stop, and I had hit the case lot sale the Saturdee before, but had yet to remove some of the items.  Anyhow, Mo wanted to play in the car, and I needed to direct traffic inside, and so I asked Oak to keep an eye on Mo as he asserted his independence.  I kept the car door open, and I kept the front door open to monitor what was going on with Mo.  Anyhow, five minutes went by.   I went outside, and Oak was still "watching" at the car door.  Moroni had broke into my jumbo sack of flour and had moved a bunch of it into different piles that he was bouncing in.  It had spread all over the van.  I asked Oak why he didn't inform me of these messy happenings and he just shrugged and said that Mo was having a great time.  I guess Oak figured that Moroni knows best what to do with a sack of flour....not so I am afraid.
     The next morning we had the privelage of trying to drop off the water trailer again.  This time Ryan left me a jack and just told me to drop it wherever and use the jack.  The tire was still bad with tread flip flapping all the way down the road.  Lovely.  I also laughed silently because the girls were all piled onto one seat that Mo had somehow missed with his flour antics.  Anyhow, inspite of the tread finally giving way and flopping up onto the roof of the car, and scaring us half to death, the floor jack was way easier to use.  It is good that Ryan can come up with ways to help me succeed in these clunky situations.  I was way happy that I was able to make that work. 
     I need to mention that Chlo has grown up tons these past few weeks.  She is now such a mature little helper.  I thought we were going to be in trouble the first few weeks of school because she was being such a sneaky mess maker.  I realized that Oak had been tattling on her non-stop for a very good purpose.  After a few horribly messy days I began calling on her to help me with specific tasks.  She helps with laundry, dishes, cleaning.  Chlo is so much help now, and I don't know what I would do without her.  We still find a few odd messes here and there, now and then, but nothing like it was.  For example, I found a few rocks that had been frosted with hazelnut spread.  This is to be expected I guess.  One morning she got up demanding that I warm up some spaghettios for her breakfast.  The thoughts of that made me gag a little bit.  I suggested a piece of toast instead, and she went off bawling and complaining that she didn't want a roast.  Yep, our communication needs improvement at times.
     Our steers went into the butcher, and Jerusha was a little bit relieved that Ryan didn't have time to butcher them.  She had kind of gotten fond of Leo, in spite of the fact that he would drag her around by the lead rope about as much as she would lead him.  I think we all would have been happy to shoot Diablo though.  He was a real jerk.
     Jams and Sags went to a friend's birthday party in Zerkleville and ended up in a big chalk fight.  When they got home, they were a blue and red chalk mess.  Jamie still looks like she has been strangled with the red chalk all over her neck.  We have scrubbed and scrubbed and it just will not come off.  I love that my kids are creative about having fun, but hey, I have no idea how these things get started.
     On Saturdee we had the Roy Bundy Reunion.  I must admit that when we first started attending this reunion I was kind of crabby about it.  A whole different set of Bundy's attend that one.  Bundy's that of course were not as familiar.  It is held on the Roy Bundy property in Enterprise, and it is a lot filled with Cedar trees and dead weeds.  I must admit now, that I am glad Ryan always insisted that we attend.  I have gotten to know these Bundy's way better, and this year, because of the rain, the property looked like a green meadow.  Instead of doing an auction, the past few years have been spent telling stories about Roy and Doretta.  They had it tough, but they held to their faith.  Roy had rheumatoid arthritis, and his kids had to carry him around for about fifteen years of their childhood.  I know the Bundy spirit, and drive to work.  I know that this must have been completely devastating to Roy.  After that long, he cut up some tires, and put them on his knees.  He then began walking on his knees, using some homemade crutches.  He gardened and ranched on his knees.  They talked about his service in the temple.  He painted a set of tires white so that he could do temple service. She had twelve kids, and did a lot of the work too.  It is impressive how some people don't let hardships hold them back.  The Bundy's are an awesome family.  I love this reunion now, and look forward to it every year.
     On Saturday evening Katie had made plans to baptize her eight year old, and bless their new baby.  We went down the road to a little pond.  By this time we were experiencing blow-your-head-off wind.  The water was way choppy, but I will never forget Daniel's baptism.  He and his Dad looked awesome in that pond, dressed in their whites.  The baby was given a nice blessing, and then it was off to rescue Mo from the local dogs that he kept terrorizing.  The wind was bad, but it didn't hinder the spirit at all.  It was a great evening.
     Yesterday Christopher Allen had his missionary farewell.  We really like Christopher.  He came to the Bundy reunion this year, and he was a great help to me with the kids.  He held a bawling Chlo, and Mo.  He and Sags also had a great melon fight.  I determined that we were not going to miss his farewell.  Oak is getting old enough that I wanted him to be there.  Anyways, Mo was just awful.  The attendance was huge.  I finally took Mo in the back.  Jazzerz joined us, and he wanted to jump on whatever chair that Jazz happened to be sitting on.  She couldn't sit anywhere without him squawking about it.  He then began rearranging chairs.  This was loud and noisy work.  He pushed chairs clear across the gym, and I let it go on for a minute because I really wanted to listen.  They had Christopher leaving, and another missionary returning.  I finally gave up and joined several others in the hall.  By that time Blake Holmstead had given up on his one year old, and several others had too.  Who can hear with Mo rearranging chairs in the back?  I personally cannot.
     We had a Dave Bundy get-together after the farewell meeting.  It was fun.  Chlo wanted to sit up on the stage.  She refused to get down, but kept demanding pieces of watermelon.  I kept obliging with the hope that she would not be so cranky on the ride home if she ate something.  By this time a bunch of other kids had joined her on her stage-perch and they kept demanding melon too.  I was running back and forth to meet their melon orders.  Ella, Alice, Paxton Houston, and Maddie Schaefermeyer were all involved.  During my wanderings back and forth, I came across Ammon and Lisa's youngest daughter.  She had removed her diaper and was mooning different groups of people.  I thought it was hilarious, she is only two.  Anyhow, when Lisa noticed what was going on, she had Halle hurry her out to get another diaper.  Good times were had by all.  It was good to see everyone again.
     The ride home got testy with all of the kids fighting over really dumb stuff.  At one point Ryan had to pull over because some of the kids needed a bathroom break.  Chlo came back from the bushes with some "hotdogs."  This made me nervous because I thought that they had perhaps found an old raggy package of hotdogs and I am sure Mo would have just helped himself.  Yuck.  But no, her ''hotdogs" ended up being those swampy cattail bushes.  Chlo swirled and twirled them into a seed mess all over the car.  See what one little decision by a kid can do?  Those hot dogs aren't cool at all anymore.  They are simply a vacuuming job for mom now.  I already filled the car warsh vacuum with flour this week....come on Chlo!  Gimme a break.