trick-or-treat

Okay. So I've been busy. And my computer has not been cooperating. But after spending 1 1/2 hours on the phone with Apple yesterday, I have a bunch of things figured out and I've made some space for new pictures. I mean, I only had some 8,000 pictures to deal with. Anyway, we've been up to a lot. We had back to back parties with Halloween and Huntleigh's 3rd birthday. It was lots of fun, but it took me awhile to get the house and stuff back in order again.

Here's my little Dorothy. She knew that she was "Dorothy" but she had no idea who Dorothy was. Seriously. I couldn't resist this outfit. Thank you to Target and that nice woman on Ebay who made me a child-size pinafore for Huntleigh's costume. I found Toto at Spicer's. And Hunts could not have been more cooperative as I was braiding her hair. It was a perfect night for trick-or-treating with our friends in our neighborhood.

Ruby slippers.

Hunts, Will as Thomas the Train, Maia as a cowgirl, Lucy as a butterfly fairy, and Mya as Tinkerbell (she was a bit behind the others, but you can see her sweet self here)

Oh yeah....Hannah and Zach stopped by in all their orange glory.  They decided that they were undecided on what they were exactly.  Usually Hunts loves Zach, but she kind of didn't want anything to do with him this night.  I wonder why?  

same, same...but different #3

my sweet babes. at about the same age. almost 10 months and just over 10 months. oh how i love them both.

more underground eats

We went to another one of those underground eateries and it was just as incredible as the first one. Those are homemade crackers there next to the cheese. Yummy yum. And the little nest of carrot risotto that had a quail egg hiding inside of it....very creative. Can't really say much more about it, though. It's [mostly] a secret, you know.

science is for everyone

Last weekend we had a family night at the Science Center. There was so much to explore, it was almost overwhelming, but our favorite part was walking over Highway 40 to the Planetarium. I love the picture of Hunts. Something about it looks like she's walking on a spaceship.

the gardens

Last week was one of those weeks when my heart was hurting and raw and all I wanted to do was get to the Botanical Gardens. Every time my heart feels sore, I want to be in the gardens. I thought about this a lot as I was driving there with the babes. There is something so restorative and healing about being in a garden and I think it has much to do with the fact that we were created in one. I think there is an ultimate longing to return to one. We weren't made for concrete jungles and endless nights due to technology and everything else that distracts us from the simple life. No. We were made to till the earth.

It was so good to be there. Get thee to a garden. It is good for the soul.

apple baby

9 1/2 months

clumpies for kiddos

The trip would have been incomplete without some Clumpies ice cream and we were able to enjoy some with the cabin boys and their families. Hunts is here with Karsten & Katelyn and some of the Tucker boys. Huntleigh held her own playing with those boys. She would beat them up with this plastic sword and they would all call "Huntleigh! Huntleigh!" and she would run after them. It was hilarious. Thanks, Tuckers, for letting us take over your home for the night. Check out Rachel's stuff. She has begun sewing bags out of oilcloth....very smart and fun.

Katelyn. Karsten. Huntleigh. Myers. 

Davis. Lyndon: check out that awesome hair. All the babies and Bode were missing in action. 

we've multiplied

We stayed with our friends the Tolsons for the weekend we were in Chattanooga. They warmly opened their beautiful home to us while we were there and the four of us shared the guest room. It was the first time all four of us had slept in a room together, and it was a super successful experience, I must say. Thanks so much, Amy and Clay. It was so good to see your family and your home. Amy, Holly, Melissa and I played musical roommates in college for a few semesters. Here we are together almost ten years later with our hubbies and our 9 kiddos.

Hunts, Teya, Tessa, John Tyler and Walker


Walker having a "discussion" with Lucy


sweet baby Parker


Melissa (with baby David), Amy, me and Holly (plus baby girl Welch on the way)

Lupi's

Okay...I know I've been absentee again from the blog. Have you noticed that every time I take a trip I'm always gone from blogging for a good week....or two? I have many pictures to catch up on.

Anyway, one of our absolute favorite things to do when in Chattanooga is to eat at Lupi's, a local pizza joint, and a place Josh and I frequented many times while we were in school there. We shared a couple calzones with our good friends, Alex and Jessica, who are both sophomores at Covenant, and were somehow able to get in some good conversation in between all the craziness with the kiddos.

chattavegas

Right upon the heels of our trip to Colorado we took a family road trip to Chattanooga. (Yeah, we're kind of crazy.) Josh and I both went to school here and we used homecoming as an excuse to go and see friends....and not participate in anything actually related to homecoming. Josh and I went to college at the same time and were friends with the same people, but we weren't ever close friends. We both graduated and moved back to StL and our lives didn't intersect again until 3 years later, when we went on a date for the first time and were married a few months later. It's a unique thing to have a shared college experience that we didn't share as a couple during our college years, but now we do as a married couple. I love it. Here we are with our babes on the overlook at Covenant.

from the west to the mid-west

We had such an incredible time in Colorado. I missed my babes a ton because they are both just so awesome. I did get to shoot a lot, which was fun, and I am so glad that I was able to go on three hunts with Josh, even though he didn't end up with an elk while I was with him.

My daily round on the sporting clays course.


The whole clan.


The excellent guitarist at our party on the last night.


Blocking the way out...see the car engulfed by sheep in front of us? We had a long wait.

afternoon hunt #2

hiking up.

my hunter man.

gabe the great.  he's awesome!

just chillin'.

the quivering forest.

hiding among the sage.  

scenes from the morning hunt

For a morning hunt, we wake up at 4:30 a.m. and grab a quick breakfast with all the other hunters and guides. Then we drive out to our mountain--this morning we had Honey Hole B--and we haul it up to our spot, not necessarily the top, but it's up there, let me tell you. The elk spend their evenings near the bottom and then they head back up around dawn. This morning the elk were moving too fast for us to keep ahead of them and so Gabe tried to stall the bull elk by impersonating the sound a female makes. He does this by blowing on a small reed he places in his mouth. He was able to stall the male for awhile, but he was never even near enough for us to see him through the forest. There were two females that walked right behind us as we were crouching in the woods. They were no farther than 25 yards from us. I was freaked out. I had no idea how they would respond to us, but they didn't see us and kept on their way. They're more afraid of us than we are of them, but that was my first encounter....I didn't know any better. By 7:40 we were done with our hunt and had hiked probably 7 miles. That's more exercise than I've had in....forever.

afternoon hunt

If you're not interested at all in the hunting stuff then you may as well skip this post, because it will bore you. I promise, I'll soon be getting back to pictures of my girls. I guess it's kind of weird that in the midst of all the pictures of my children I post pictures of camo and dead animals, but it is a part of my life and I've grown to love it because my husband loves it and we enjoy it together. Well, the camo is easy to love, because it's fun to make fashionable. The animals, though, they're another story. I'm not in love with hunting for big game, but I have gone on three elk hunts with Josh and Gabe (he's Josh's trusty guide) this year and they have been a lot of fun. It's an amazingly wild process to watch how it is all done. For an afternoon hunt, we go out at about 3:30 and hike halfway up a mountain to wait for the elk to come down to feed. The waiting process is quite long and kind of boring. But once the elk begin to bugle to one another it's fascinating. The male elks (bulls) bugle to let the females (cows) know where they are and to keep in touch with all the younger bulls who are overseeing the cows. It's like no sound I've ever heard...it's almost prehistoric. Even if there's no animal in the end, it's just incredible to be up in the mountain air.





Josh and Gabe, scoping out the opportunities.


twilight