First, I've moved our family blog, so if you just want to hear ramblings and thoughts from me, keep it right here, otherwise, go to BrentandDelwynFarnsworth.blogspot.com.

Today is the day I'm sending off my Christmas letters.  And I'm taking all the kids to the dentist.  A great day.

I've moved our family blog to the following link:

http://brentanddelwynfarnsworth.blogspot.com/

Pumpkin Time

Our annual pumpkin carving night. Its a tradition each year, and then we light up the pumpkins for Halloween, for all the trick or treaters.

Here's Michael, alias Super Why, checking out the pumpkins.

And here we have Got Milk 1% (Kimberley),Got Strawberry Milk (Kayla), Fall Witch (Karina), Transformer (Matthew) and Super Why (Michael.)

Our cool Transformer Matthew.

Brent, lighting up the pumpkins for the trick or treaters.

And narrowly missing getting kicked by the witch on our door.

And finally we have the trick or treaters before they went off trick or treating.

The witch on the door stayed, and so did Kimberley because she handed out candy this year.

The scariest part of Halloween this year were our pumpkins. A friend stopped by and complimented us on our pumpkins. He said he'd never seen a moustache on a pumpkin before. So we looked, and our pumpkins all had hairy black things growing on their top lips. The joys of living by the very humid ocean. I cleaned up the pumpkins while the kids were off trick or treating with Brent, so no young children were disturbed or harmed during Halloween at the Farnsworths.

Our Day Trip to the USS Alabama

We drove to Mobile, Alabama, to visit the USS Alabama. The ship is huge! We were able to climb all over, and tour all the levels, and see first hand what living on a ship entailed.

The ladders were scarey. I'd hate to have to climb them in the middle of a storm.

My kids will never again complain about sharing a room. Where can I get some of these bunkbeds?

Nothing like a little time in the brig for the whole family. Finally, some peace and quiet.

The phrase "bringing out the big guns" now has a whole new meaning.

Some family time on the Biloxi beach.

Just a few pictures . . . Kimberley has her braces off! Karina shows her spirit of entrepreneurship.

These are some of the prices: Back scratch 2c Back Rub 2c

Michael showing off his car bed, and the vehicle he created out of leggo.

So, notice the little black things Michael is pointing out. These are dead lovebugs. They become a plague around early September. For some reason, they think my front entrance is a great burial site, and they flock to my front entryway before expiring. I think its the welcome mat. Who says my home isn't a heaven on earth? Karate kid Matthew getting in on the action.

Here we have Matthew's feet, again showing off our Love bug cemetery.

Kayla after her awards ceremony.

A great picture of the artwork a local artist created out of the trees that were destroyed by hurricane Katrina. Instead of carting off the dead wood for firewood, this was symbolic of how they took the tragedy, and created art.

Those Little Touches That just say home. Thankfully, in the past seventeen years of marriage I've finally learned to cook. Of course, I've begged, borrowed--okay, shamelessly stolen, some fantastic recipes which I'm quite content to claim as my own. I do, after all, change one or two ingredients. Well, I'm normally missing the ingredients when the time comes to use the recipe, so the end results are all my own. So I'm pleased that my children are developing some artistic culinary skills, too. This is Michael's contribution to food art:

I wasn't allowed to remove this masterpiece from the counter for three days.

Food adds a lot, but what is a house without that decorator's touch? This piece of modern art has not been allowed to be moved from the corner of my front room for about two weeks now.

And finally, what kind of a parent am I if I don't lead by example? Every home needs a great filing system and mine has remained undisturbed for about--well, lets just say slightly longer than Michael's little projects.

Boring In The Morning Is Good.

We have four out of five children at school now, and so this is how our mornings go:

• 5:00am: Brent wakes up
• 5:15am Kimberley wakes up
• 6:00am Seminary starts in our dining room (Brent is the teacher)
• 6:25 Delwyn gets up (she's been awake, just didn't want to get out of bed.)
• 6:30 Kayla, Karina, Matthew wake up.
• 6:40 Breakfast
• 6:50 Seminary done, Brent leaves for work.
• 6:55 Mad scramble to finish hair,brush teeth, and get into the minivan or mom leaves without you.
• 7:00 Michael wakes up/gets carried to the minivan, we all leave for school
• 7:25 Drop off Karina and Matthew at the Elementary School
• 7:35 Drop off Kayla at the Middle School
• 7:50 Drop off Kimberley at High School
• 8:10 Feed Michael breakfast, and begin the day.

Okay, so that's a (relatively) normal day. Today, however, was a little scarier. Matthew woke up at 2:am throwing up, so he didn't actually go to school today, although he still had to ride in the minivan. (Yes, throwing up is scary, but thats not what I meant.)

So, dropping off Kimberley at the high school, I had Kimberley, Matthew and Michael in the car. There is a very busy intersection that really needs a stop light. We have to cross the busy road to get to the high school. Today all four of us witnessed an accident two cars in front of us, where a high school student in a truck and a lady in a compact car, had a head on collision. The truck spun a couple of times (a backpack, among other things, flew out the window). The car, which was travelling very fast, went spinning off into the ditch, and there was lots of steam, and broken car parts.

I had three very quiet children in the car. Accidents are very loud, very fast, and the amount of damage is hard to believe. Luckily everyone walked away from this wreck, but it could have been deadly.

So now I'm answering four year old questions like, "did they die?" (no honey, they were very lucky) and six year old questions "was that real mom?" (yes sweetheart, that was real) and fourteen year old questions 'Why haven't they put in a stop light in that intersection?" (I don't know, but you're right, they need to.) Me? I'm greatful nobody was killed and I'm driving even more carefully than usual. I'm enjoying the little things, like the lush green trees, the flowers, and the weeds thanks to all the rain we're enjoying. I'm hugging my children more. And I want everyone to know that boring in the morning is good. I love my morning schedule, my children, Brent, and my life.

Mississippi Musings . . .

I suppose our countdown to leaving Mississippi begins. We have less than a year left of our stay here on the Gulf Coast, (actually, ten months.) We'll be going to Tucson next May, to go back to school for a one year Hematopathology fellowship. This should be a familiar feeling for our family, as Brent has been in school for about 11 years of our marriage. (Hematopathology just sounds cool, so thats okay.)

So here are some of the things we'll miss. Brent wearing "blues" on Mondays. He looks very handsome in uniform. Michael is dressed for swim lessons (which he was fine with until he realized he had to put his head under the water.)

We'll miss the live oak trees. (I'm not sure why they're called live, as opposed to dead.) Here's my tree hugger kids appreciating nature at a park across from the beach on 90 in Biloxi.

We'll miss the art. When the beautiful trees along the coast were killed by hurricane Katrina, instead of chopping them down and cutting them up for firework, the city had an artist create sculptures instead. Beauty out of devastation.

We'll miss picking blueberries in 94 degree weather with the humidity factor putting it over 100 degrees, at seven in the morning.

We'll miss hiking along the coastal forests in Ocean Springs, and checking out our friendly alligator (not shown).

So we'll make the most of our next ten months, and make some more Mississippi Memories.

So, The summer is coming to a close, and we've almost completed everything on the summer wish-list the kids helped put together at the beginning of the summer. (We still have "sew clothing" which, technically, we did with Kimberley's skirt. But I think Kayla and Kimberley and Karina were thinking more of sewing pioneer clothing.) Nauvoo was absolutely amazing. At first, I thought it would be nice, but I was more worried about the drive (14+ hours) than the destination. Isn't there a lesson in there somewhere? Parley Street, where the pioneers drove their wagons down to the Mississippi river as they left Nauvoo, with the temple on the hill behind them, was heart breaking, and inspiring. After visiting the various reconstructed houses, I've realized that the pioneers were a) short and b)very industrious. And I'll never be able to take for granted picking up eggs, milk, and bread (and clothes, shoes, matches, chocolate, etc. etc.) from Wal-mart ever again. Or complain about "what's for dinner" as I don't have to butcher the cow, and chase down the chickens or hunt the eggs. Or make the butter. Or bake bread in bustle ovens, although I have a great whole wheat bread recipe I bake from our church-bought wheat if anyone is interested. I've decided that parts of Nauvoo is like Broadway with the spirit. We were able to catch two of the shows, "High Hopes and Riverboats" and "Just Plain Anna Amanda" which were a lot of fun (for all our children, which is unusual!) The pageant was well worth the visit, all in itself. A couple of hours before, they have a sort of fair, where the kids get to play games (oh alright, the adults too) like walking on stilts (I'm not boasting when I admit I'm actually quite good) and stick pull, and tug of war, and pull-the-entire-family-of-five-kids-in-a-handcart. Brent and I would have to discuss how high or low to have the handles if we ever had to do that again. Did I mention that it rained just before the pageant? Here's the wet (wet) girls, pulling their (wet) brothers and a stray who hopped on behind Matthew. Attending the temple was a definite highlight. Brent went one evening, and I swam in the hotel pool with the kids, who'd had a very long, wonderful day, and needed some down time. The next day, I went while Brent took the kids for lunch in Nauvoo. (We stayed in Keokuck--I just had to add that because its fun to say Keoukuck. Keoukuck.) As I walked up the stairs to the temple, a lady in front of me turned around to look at the view, so I turned around and looked, too. The temple is on a hill overlooking the valley, with the Mississippi River at the bottom. Can I just say wow? Breath taking, literally. In front of the temple is a statue of Joseph and his brother Hyrum on horseback, taking one last look at Nauvoo as they leave. I had the opportunity of changing out of my street clothes in a temple worker's change room, right under the round windows with the red and blue glass stars. The temple has been reconstructed to have the "old" feel of the original temple, while still having every modern convenience. It truly is, as is every temple, awe inspiring. Brent found where great, great, grandpa Farnsworth lived, as well as some great stories on file in Nauvoo (he found a story he'd never heard involving Indians) and we drove to the actual lots in Nauvoo. We could have spent two weeks in Nauvoo, not just the three days. We're making plans to go again when Michael and Matthew are a little older.

Today I found out I need bifocals. Enough said.