Thanksgiving with Max

We had Max come visit for 6 whole days over Thanksgiving! They just started a Provo to Tucson Allegiant flight for pretty cheap. We split the ticket with him rather than having him make the long drive by himself. We spent most of the time taking it easy. We realized that we were on the same episode of Better Call Saul, so we happily finished the season together after the kids went to bed. We also played a lot of board games including many rather heated rounds of Citadels that Aaron kept winning.

This is why Max is referred to as "the silliest" 

We got to go see Elliot's thanksgiving play at his preschool. There was pie and ice cream afterwards! Max kept teasing me because apparently I was way too excited about it

The preschool play viewers

We went out to lunch at Max's favorite Tucson spot, El Guero Canelo. Afterwards we went to Reid Park to feed some ducks and let Elliot play on the playground. 

There are so many different types of ducks here! 

Annie was mesmerized

Uncle bonding time

Flower boy

Mom kept reminding Max to help do the dishes. And go to the dentist. Here's some photo evidence of Max being a normal responsible adult

The kitchen helpers ready to dispense Tupperware. Or just make a general mess. 

This turkey took FOREVER to cook. I think it wasn't fully defrosted. Mom says we should have run warm water through the insides. Dinner was ready 2 hours after what we had originally planned. 

The feast! Really it is all about the two types of stuffing

We had some awesome weather on Saturday and decided to hike to the Bowen Stone House.

Max was supposed to take a picture that expressed an adverb. It was fun having these random little projects to do.

My shadow getting hydrated

Max also had to film a 1 minute video. We were the only actors that he had available to him, so we got to star in "Desert Baby." Annabelle was absolutely hamming it up for the camera, and Elliot even got a line! Max cleverly overcame our lack of acting abilities by feeding us our lines "repeat after me" style. We didn't have to read a script or anything. I have probably watched this video 20 times, mostly for the adorable Annabelle smiles. 

Fall Fun

Aaron won another fancy award at work! This time it was Technical Honors. Once you are in a senior enough position, you are eligible for this award. This was the first year Aaron was eligible. It's based on peer nominations and is only awarded to about 5% of engineers. His boss told him that he had by far the most nominations than anyone else in the department. For the award, we got to go to a fancy dinner at a fancy resort. The food was delicious but also pretentious. One of the items on the menu had "micro cilantro." We realized it was just cilantro picked as a seedling. It was fairly tasteless and overall underwhelming.

Aaron in the distance receiving an award from some important people

Our Stake had a fall festival this year. They broke it up with dinner at the Las Quintas Pavilion and activities at the Anamax park with a hayride connecting the two locations. Elliot was all about the inflatable obstacle courses, and we enjoyed chatting with friends and sipping hot chocolate. Annie was mostly excited about the unlimited watermelon. She soaked her bib and shirt, so we took it off and had just her jacket on. There wasn't anything we could do about the watermelon juice pants, so she was pretty chilly by the time we left. They had a pumpkin patch where anyone who wanted to could paint a pumpkin or just take one home. I went to grab one because I wanted to experiment with cooking them. Elliot insisted on picking one too. It was dark by then, so It wasn't until we were almost back to the hayride when I realized that his pumpkin was covered in wet paint. It was ALL OVER HIM. Awesome.

Annie snuggling with watermelon

The meal in a pumpkin was kind of a flop. Too bland. And it made enough for like 4 meals so we were eating it forever. I want to try a different recipe next year.

Elliot went to Lego club at the library. This is his creation that he named "Bum Bum." He refused to change the name,so it is proudly displayed on the little card on the library front shelf.

A couple of kids getting their milk cups

We spent a weekend with Mary and Michael. A favorite activity was putting all sorts of things on Annie's head.

Benjamin and Andrew are monkeys! That is Elliot in the grey shirt making it up to the lower platform. I was proud of my little guy's climbing abilities!

Annie's hair is long enough for a little ponytail now!

The Heyens happened to be going up to Phoenix the same day we were driving to Mary's house. We went up a bit early so that we could go to this new heart museum. It was pretty neat. Here is Elliot and Carter holding a replica of a Giraffe heart.

I made this teepee on a particularly inspired parenting day

A perfect spot for playing with Legos! Annie starting trying to pull it down on herself as soon as she woke up, so it was a short lived presence in our house.

We went camping with the Coe's at Gilbert Ray campground. It was pretty close to replicating a camping trip we went on with them in February of this year, except this time they are the ones with a 3 month old baby. The Coes have a camper trailer. It was nice being able to warm up our dinner in their microwave (fires are prohibited year round) and eat breakfast in a nice heated area. It got really cold overnight. We were all bundled up, but I needed to have the sleeping bag over my face to stay warm. The last time we camped at Gilbert Ray was the first time Annie slept through the night. This time we got to experience the worst night of her young life. I think she kept waking up because her face was cold, even when the rest of her was all bundled up. I kept having to get her to fall asleep on my chest inside my sleeping bag. I would fall asleep too until my arm would fall asleep. I would transfer her back to her pack and play or later to her carseat, but she would start crying in an hour or so. It was rough. 

The next morning was great though! Elliot slept in quite late. He miraculously didn't wake up at all during Annabelle's shenanigans, so he at least was well rested. We loaded up after breakfast and went to the Desert Museum. We haven't been since they built the new Packrat Playhouse. It was so cool!

I loved the desert sunset running around the room

Wyatt was scared of walking on the nets, but Elliot was loving it.

She was having way too much fun with the rubber baby scorpions. I'll need to work on somehow instilling a fear of scorpions in her so that she doesn't try to pet any that she finds around the house

Halloween with Mimi

We were lucky enough to have Mimi visit for a week over Halloween! She flew out for my cousin Hayley's wedding, then hopped on a flight down to Tucson before heading home. 

Don't let this picture fool you- Elliot was thrilled to have his Mimi around!

We made a pact to do pilates every day. We failed miserably and only actually did it once. 

Mostly we went on tons of walks to look at Halloween decorations

By far the best yard in terms of ridiculous quantity of inflatables and no dismembered limbs

Our Halloween dinner of hot dog mummies and jello. Behind Mimi's awesome witch hat is a display of the spooky face sticker craft that Mimi brought for her to do with Elliot. It was a HUGE hit!

Mimi and I took Elliot trick or treating with Wyatt and Allison while Aaron and Annie passed out candy. Afterwards, we had a partial repeat of last year where Elliot gave a way some but not all of his candy.

Annie was Winky the house elf from Harry Potter. We only ended up dressing her up for the Ward Trunk or Treat party. 

Elliot was an off-brand Nemo. When asked, he always said that his costume was "a fishy."

We went and saw "Dracula" at the Gaslight Theatre. That place is always a hoot

We also had a ton of fun driving around looking at model homes and talking about a hypothetical retirement home for her and dad in a few years. I learned a lot about the 55+ communities around here. They have some cool stuff going on!

Thanks for coming, Mom! We never have enough time with you!

Annabelle at 1 Year

Oh Annabelle. You bring so much joy to our family. You are the perfect mixture of chill and affectionate. You are usually content doing your own thing (lately this involves pulling all the books off the bookshelf and climbing into drawers), but you are always so happy when someone comes to play with you. If I get down on the floor and smile at you, you will drop everything and sprint crawl across the room to climb onto me. You give the sweetest hugs, kisses, and reassuring back pats. You love belly flops and knocking over Elliot's towers. 

The aforementioned climbing into drawers.

She rubbed peanut butter on her face and got this alarming superhero mask of rash. We got her tested and she is somewhat allergic to eggs and nuts. We have an appointment with an allergist lined up. 

A favorite activity of both kids

She's a budding capitalist

I don't know why she keeps thinking she can fit through the bars at the park

She was so close to falling asleep in this weird position at play group

It has been quite a year, miss Annie! We are so lucky to have you in the family!

Rocky Point

We finally made it down to Rocky Point! Rocky Point, aka Puerto Peñasco is the closest beach to us. It is 4 hours away in Mexico. We made the trip with the Wiscombs (our veteran Rocky Point goers) and the Knells. Annie and I rode with the Wiscombs and Aaron and Elliot rode with the Knells so that we could save on Mexican car insurance. We found a rental house on Airbnb that was in a gated community and only a 5 minute walk to the beach. 

Arriving at Hacienda de Bouginvillea

Isn't it cute? ("It" referring either to the baby, the house, or that guy I married. Take your pick)

There was a courtyard dividing the casa (kitchen, living room, and one bedroom) from the casita (3 bedrooms and a mini kitchen). It rained the first day, which knocked off this layer of flower petals. It was kind of fancy and kind of annoying to walk on barefoot, especially when it was raining

Who needs the beach when there is so much great sand in the parking lot?

The house cleaners were running late, so we headed to dinner at the famous Pollo Lucas. The only things on the menu are chicken, rice, beans, and tortillas. And they are so good at those four things!

The place was packed. We foolishly picked the week that most Arizona schools have their fall break. The Wiscombs were continually surprised at how much busier things were. We gave up on waiting for a table and decided to eat at home.

The gals went on a grocery run while the guys waited for the pollo. We attempted to get some mildly adventurous Mexican snacks that were mostly flops. When we came out, we saw what was literally the most gorgeous sunset I have ever seen.

The guys beat us back to the house and went on a quick sunset walk on the beach

This first day at the beach was also Annabelle's first birthday! I had thought about making cupcakes or something, but it quickly became too logistically challenging so I just bought her a cake at the grocery store in Mexico. It was so the right call- this cake was delicioso! (I apologize for the Spanish words that I will not be able to stop myself from interjecting in this post)

Singing happy birthday with the remnants of our pollo feast proudly on display 

The babe was pleased! She was all business at first, but we got some good smiles by the end of the slice.

The next morning it was time to head to the beach! There was a big storm predicted for Friday, but it ended up only raining at night. We didn't have to miss any beach time at all!

Making the long low tide trek. This whole area is under water at high tide. 

As you can see, we had pretty much the whole beach to ourselves!

There was a very even inch or two of warm water covering a huge area. Natural kiddie pool!

There were also these cool rocky tide pools a bit farther out. There were tons of hermit crabs, a few bigger crabs, and snails. We spotted a dead purple-striped eel. Chris has a sting ray phobia, but sadly we had no encounters with these mild mannered creatures to tease him about. 

The water felt great. It was pleasantly warm, not at all what I would expect of a beach in October.

Water levels starting to rise

On Friday and Saturday we enjoyed some low tide fun in the morning, came back for lunch and naps, and then went back out for a couple hours in the late afternoon. Elliot was the only non-napping kid, so he got to watch some TV while the grown-ups played board games and watched with confusion as Aaron and Chris laughed themselves to tears over a dumb Star Wars sand video. 

Elliot started making this face all the time. My theory is that it is based on this "steely eyed" look that Brother Castillo uses sometimes during primary singing time. 

The beach at high tide was completely different! There was a steep drop off that let us swim over the nice soft sand. Swimming at low tide was rough because there were toe-stubbing rocks around. Not at high tide! We took turns watching the kids on the beach while the others floated around. 

We are standing/treading water this close to shore. Weird!

Theodore and Annabelle

Beach baby in all her sandy glory

Something irritated her eye. It was pretty red and puffy, but it went away after we rinsed it and she slept it off. 

Trent with his fancy pina colada. People selling things wandered by us periodically.

I kept forgetting to bring cash. Finally I remembered during our last afternoon on the beach. I bought a mango frio from this nice guy with a wheelbarrow. He was super fast with peeling and carving that tasty little treat!

We looked up a nice seafood restaurant for dinner on our last night. We found one that had a balcony overlooking the ocean. The view and the food were great! Although it was a little weird there were people wandering in and out of restaurants trying to sell us food while we were in the middle of eating. It seemed like a questionable business model to me. The musicians and the kids folding flowers out of palm tree strips made a bit more sense. Regardless, the food was great! I got to try my first fried ice cream. Every one else was not super impressed by it, but Elliot and I thought it was awesome.

On Sunday morning, we went to Sacrament meeting at the local church. It was a testimony meeting. I was disappointed that I only understood about 20-30% of what was being said, even after all of my Spanish practice. I'm still working on it, and hopefully it will be better next time we make the trip!