Picking Pumpkins

We love Pumpkin Patches. The one we usually go to is on 11800 S. & 3600 W.
We love it! They even had little wheelbarrows for the kids. They love anything their size.

My three boys taking the pumpkins to go pay.

Dad teaching the boys how corn works.

I love old trucks. My boys are super cute, for real.

The happy couple-we're pretty cool sometimes.

I pretty much have the coolest kids too. What do you expect when two cool people make kids?

Gotta love all the old tractors.

Happy Fall!

My three favorite times of the year:
Christmas
4th of Julyish
FALL!!

I Have No Title for This Post

I love when my boys all read together. There is something so sweet about my boys laying down together on the floor listening to what dad is reading, it won't be like this forever. The boys will not want to be around us for that much longer.

Train track Ryan built. He wanted me to take a picture of it, but he did not want to be in the picture. Don't worry, Ethan wanted to for him.

Yup, my office is a mess, don't judge.
This is why you should go to school before you have kids! If you think it's going to get easier, you're wrong. I love my boys, but they like to be around me where ever I go. But like I said before, they're only little once.

Is this not the sweetest thing you've ever seen? Ryan was caressing Ethan's head while they were watching cartoons.

Ethan trying on Buzz. They love when I pull the Halloween Costumes out. I love Fall/Halloween/October!

Love is a Battlefield

So everyone knows that song by Pat Benetar, We Are Young, right? Start singing it in your head, then imagine this:

You are walking up to your neighbors' house to talk to them, and you don't think they see you. The neighbor is
a). a grown man
b). working on his yard
c). singing very loudly to, We Are Young (it was playing on his radio) and playing air drums while working.

You walk within 3 feet of him, and he finally notices you and is totally embarrassed. He just got caught singing....(apply tune) love is a battlefield.

Now let's pretend that the neighbor was one of our neighbors, and the "grown man" was Ben.

Oh man, I died laughing! I wonder what our neighbor thinks of us now? Probably that Ben is awesome.

Saying Thanks

My friend had the ingenious idea of bringing treats to the Fireman who have worked so hard and for so long on the Herriman fire. I had Ryan & Ethan color them a picture (they were so cute!) and say thank you. We made them cookies and brownies and brought them to the "command center" (The Herriman Fire station). The road is blocked off so we had to sneak in the "back way". These fireman shown above just got off the graveyard shift and were so tired, but so grateful for the treats, and so sweet to the kids.

There are 400 + fireman working not including police officers and military. Here are some tents set up for them. We are so grateful for all the hard work they've done to protect our homes. The chief was telling us about a fire in San Diego that took blocks of homes and he was grateful they were able to stop that from happening here.
So are we!

Thank you!


To my readers: I love all your comments. Thanks for all your kind words!

Fire Photos

We are back in our home now. There are still 450 homes evacuated, and they only have the fire 25% contained. We feel safe though, if it got bad again, we know they'd let us know and kick us out again. And surprisingly our home does not even smell like smoke!
There are a lot of photos here, but I wanted you to get some perspective on how close we were, and how much closer other homes were but did not get burned!

Helicopter lowering the bucket

After we ate dinner with my parents, we decided to go up to the reservoir above our home to see the helicopter come scoop up the water. It was really cool to see! The kids also loved it...until the fire started to get closer and closer. We were not up by the reservoir for too long, the fire was going faster and faster.
Okay perspective time: See that mountain behind the helicopter, it is completely black now. The fire came right down to these homes' back yard!

Helicopter dipping the bucket

Taking it to the fire

We felt pretty safe here. Just seeing the smoke.

We could see the flames in the reflection off the smoke. We're getting more nervous.

Smoke going clear across the valley. The fire is scary close the the homes. These homes are still evacuated.

Looking worried. Poor Ryan was the most scarred. He was squeezing his bear pretty tight.

It's getting bigger.

Where we start to see flames. Ethan just thought it was cool to throw rocks in the water.

My camera is not meant to be used at night, so sorry for the bad pictures.

Flames getting higher. And coming down the mountain.

Here we saw the fire "jumping" down the mountain. This is when we decided to head back home. And see what we were supposed to do. We live a 1/2 mile from this fire. Other homes were a lot closer though!

This picture was taken from my back yard. This is when we heard the bull horn saying it was time to evacuate and get out now. We took 10 mins. to pack up some belongings and headed out with the rest of Herriman.

Thankfully our home is just fine, so are all of our neighbors homes (that I know of).
We are currently hearing helicopters and planes fly over head still trying to beat this fire. The winds are supposed to pick up this afternoon. I better go shave my legs just in case we have to go again :-)

(I'm just teasing, I'm sure we won't have to evacuate again)

It's Getting Hot in Here (so hot we can't stay)

Yes, we live in Herriman. Yes, we are a 1/2 mile from the Herriman Fire (click here if you have not heard). Yes, we have been evacuated from our home.

My parents came over for dinner Sunday evening and showed us the fire on the mountain behind our house (we were oblivious). We watched it all during dinner, then decided to go up to the lake above our house to see the helicopter scoop up water to fight the fire. We sat there for about an hour and watched the fire start to come down the hill. We decided it was time to go pack up. We took some valuables (you know, like our season tickets to the U games) no really though, it was tough going through the house choosing what you were going to take. We decided on medication, birth certificates, passports, computer (it hold our photos), and clothes to get by for a few days. We left when we heard the policeman with the bullhorn saying, "leave your homes now, evacuate now". We are staying with my parents in Stansbury Park until we are told we can go home. Poor Ryan is really worried for our home, and his friends' home. We've assured him our home will be just fine. And that even if it did burn we still have each other and that's all that matters.

Our personal opinion is that our home will be just fine. They have done a great job at keeping the fire away from most of the homes. I feel awful for the people who have already lost their home though. Right now the fire is still considered, "out of control".

Pray for the people who have lost their homes.
Pray for rain.

(Photos to come later)

(p.s. some of you have asked about my "classes". It's no big deal, I've just started going back to school. I'd like to be a college graduate one day) :-)

Bison: They Really do Ram Trains

I get out of class on Monday nights at 10 p.m. So by the time I get home, I'm pretty hungry. Good thing Wendy's is open until 1 a.m. because I sure crave me some chili and baked potato (seriously, it costs $2 and it's super filling and delicious). Although, this last Monday Ben took a picture of it. Apparently he thinks drinking chocolate milk with chili is super gross. He asked if I was pregnant. I said, "No I am not, but who does not like chocolate milk with just about anything??" Except for Ben I guess.
Side Note: That is my favorite green t-shirt you are seeing above. I gotta have me some ugly green comfy shirt every night! I put that thing on and I go, "aww, that feels nice".
And Ben goes, "Kelly, that shirt is really frumpy".
And I go, "You're just jealous you don't have a pooh green colored shirt that flows over your body so nicely".

Warning for this next picture: Don't look if you get scarred easily.
Just sayin'.

Oh my goodness, is that my favorite green shirt again...yes it is!

I am not an attractive sleepy person as you can tell. I should just be like all the movie stars and wear natural looking make-up. Or maybe I just shouldn't wear that unforgiving color of green? Anyway, I guess Ben thought it was amusing that Ethan I sleep the same.

Don't mind my messy room. I like it that way, really.

We love the zoo! Especially when it's not busy.

Proving a point:
Do any of you remember that story I told in 2008 about the zoo train and buffalo? Click HERE and read before you move on if not.

waiting...
waiting...
waiting...

Okay, so I took the boys on the zoo train when we went to the...wait for it, wait for it...ZOO.
As we were riding past the Buffalo I noticed a brand spanking new fence around them next to the train tracks.
I got home and informed Ben of this ASAP. Ben, see I was right! Buffalo really do ram trains, that's why they put up a safety fence! HA!

And Ben replied, "No Kelly, they did that because of the passengers. You see the zoo train passengers have been jumping off the train to try to wrestle with the Bison...it's a new thing now. They were protecting the bison from the human."

Boys - they just can't admit when they're wrong.