November 2021!

Here are a few November highlights:

Casey took the girls to do baptisms at the Bountiful Temple and then out to breakfast. I was sick (and coughing for a couple of weeks) so I got to stay home with the younger kids.

November marks our traditional family lantern walk. We make lanterns and then walk through the neighborhood with our lights shining in the dark of night. The symbolism is that just as the days get darker as we near the Winter Solstice we can bring our light (literal and figurative) out into the darkening world. 

This year, we patterned our lanterns after the one that Sean made in preschool--mason jars covered with different colors of tissue paper and a handle strung with wooden beads. We left one of these lanterns on our neighbor, Linda Arbon's doorstep, filled with notes for her family after she passed away. Light. Sharing it feels right and good.

This year, after our lantern walk, we gathered around our new fire pit for some more light.

Poor Bear needed to wear the "cone of shame" for a couple of weeks after his man-ectomy surgery.

Dinner with the adventure friends out at Kimberly Baker's house. These ladies help me to laugh. Kimberly set out her great grandma's china, recently inherited, for the occasion.

In mid-November, we headed down to a golf course in Provo to watch the NCAA West Regional XC Championship. It was awesome to watch their cross-country teams dominate. Go BYU!

Lindy and Sean engaged in a bit of zen sand trap art while they weren't cheering on the BYU runners.

Sean and Lindy, sporting some runner's discarded race numbers for fun.

On the drive home to Salt Lake, we heard a loud thump on the side of our van and looked to see the middle passenger window (right next to Lindy's head) shattered and shedding bits of broken glass into her lap. Some sizeable projectile must have been kicked up by the giant semi that was right in front of us in the lane to our right. It completely freaked us all out. This little incident had given me a bit of anxiety driving on the freeway. We were all so thankful that little Lindy wasn't hurt. Luckily we found someone to fix it the following day (which was Saturday), knowing that I'd need it on Monday for omega-kid transport all around the valley.

The next day, Saturday, Casey and Zeke were positioning the new wooden garden boxes that I'd built along the fence between our yard and Nyoka's yard. Casey was using a big heavy pry bar to wiggle them into place and bend back the thick grape vines that had grown into the area. I asked him to turn one of the boxes to hide some questionable carpentry and he had me assist. During this team effort, said giant (and very heavy) pry bar was dislodged, gained momentum and nailed me in the forehead, knocking me down and giving me a big bloody gash on the left side, near my hairline. I was nauseous and in pain. After lying in the fetal position, holding my blood-soaked, hair-matted head for a while, I made it downstairs to the shower, cleaned up, and rested in bed for a couple of hours. I should have had it stitched up because I've got a nice scar there now.

I was thankful to feel well enough to go to the Van Gogh exhibit at Atmosphere Studio that I'd purchased tickets to a couple of months before with Casey. That was a cool experience, to be surrounded, enveloped in his work, continuously changing, projected on all of the walls and the floor, with classical music playing in the background. I left feeling energized. It felt like being inside the artist's mind--a place of beauty and birth. Very surreal, healing and nourishing.

Casey hosted the youth at our home for an activity where they melted aluminum and poured it into foam forms, embedded in sand. In retrospect, he should have had them all sign waivers, but they all had fun.

Hallee

Sophie

Sophie and I found this brazen wild turkey, standing in the middle of the road one morning when I was driving her to school. 

Our friend, Kaylee, with the Elders--Lee and Ruggieri--who taught her in our home over the course of a couple of months. She and her mom were both baptized. We came to love them all.

Cool morning rainbow in front of Grandeur Peak.

Casey took the ward youth(including Sophie, Hallee and Zeke) on a quick trip to hike through Little Wild Horse Canyon:

Zeke man.

The pod, nearly finished and looking schwank!

H.B. gifted my mom an omega Hogle Zoo pass last year (and he put my name on it as "the nanny"). Sadly, I have only used it one time, so I took Lindy and Sean there in November.

Casey and I went on an outing down to Provo early in November to see an exhibit at the BYU Museum of Art. Vik Muniz, a Brazilian artist, had an extensive collection of his work on display there at the time. We'd recently watched a documentary about his creative work and it was absolutely amazing to behold in person. I was so inspired by his artistic flexibility, passion and endless creative energy. I was moved to tears by one of his pieces and entertained by all of them. 

We found a discarded flyer in the parking lot afterwards, advertising the new "Latter-Day Cafe." Intrigued, we headed over for drinks and second dinner. They had some fire pits aglow outside the restaurant area where we sat, talking for a long time afterwards. Quality date there. It was that night that we determined that we wanted our children to experience the Vik Muniz exhibit as well. We brought them later on in the month for art and dinner (that time at the Pogo Restaurant, run by a lovely Zimbabwean woman and her husband).

Casey really enjoyed this Norman Rockwell painting (part of the museum's permanent collection) and talked about in church over the pulpit that weekend.

The family, posing in front of one of Vik Muniz's pieces, made of piles of dye (and then photographed). 

Sean at the BYU MOA.

Sophie really liked this Vik Muniz piece--a reproduction of another famous piece of art--made entirely out of bits of cut up magazines.

On Thanksgiving, we all dressed up (the contest was to see who could look like the biggest "turkey," as judged by our neighbors, the Nelsens) for our annual morning Turkey Trot. Lindy won by a slight margin. We ran up to the Mill House and back--two miles--and I'd never seen Sean run so far or so vigorously.  Yes, Bear is wearing Zeke's underwear again. It's an easy costume and (yes) he soiled them during the run.

Like last year, each of us took a food assignment to contribute to the Thanksgiving feast at Casey's parent's house. 

Casey made quince pies (fruit collected from Ann Roser's tree) for Thanksgiving.

Hallee made stuffing.

Sophie whipped up two key lime pies and I roasted a turkey (one of 4).

The day after Thanksgiving, we drove up the Uintas (this year from the Kamas side) for our annual Christmas tree cutting. Luckily it was warmer than last year so we took more time wandering through the forest in search of the perfect specimen of the subalpine fir family.

Our chosen tree stands in the background.

Upon arrival, the kids and Casey set up the tree and decorated it with Christmas music playing in the background. Like last year, I sat back and watched. It's way more relaxing that way. 

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Zeke and Hal where playing with friends so I took these three swimming at the Holladay Lions Rec Center. 

Dan Lee invited Casey and Zeke to join him on his boat up at Strawberry Reservoir for some fishing. They brought along Leroy Lancaster and John McAllister and had a blast. They caught a whole mess of fish but Zeke's was the biggest--a 22 inch cutthroat trout. 

 

That's one happy boy and one big fish!

All through November, the kids (ours and the neighborhood kids) caught these baby bunnies. The burrow was in Hazel and T.J.'s carport and there were 8 of them. The kids would catch them and put them in a little pen, hold them, carry them around and then release them almost daily. We invited several friends and neighbors over for bunny-holding sessions and often had one or two or more in our house (or out in Grandma's pod).

The growing Bear!