Halloween Celebrating begins!

Grandma Bell has a great tradition of throwing an awesome Halloween Party every year--so since she and Phil and Lisa were here this last weekend we had to keep the tradition going. Blaine and I have never really had costumes to dress up in--but this year I made us costumes. They will probably be our costumes for the rest of our lives. The party involves three main events: 

1. Pin the Tie on the Ghost

2. Great Neptune of the Sea--where you ask "Great Neptune" behind the sheet for a prize and you put your fishing line over and he gives you a prize. 

3. The Ghost Cake--which is a cake with a ghost with real flaming eyes--its a big hit. 

We had so much fun! Even better to have the Moore's here with us to celebrate!! 

"The Big Bad Wolf" and "Little Red Riding Hood"

All the kids ready to party (We had to put Ellie to bed because she was having a melt down she was so tired.)

Kelsey playing "Pin the Tie on the Ghost"

Grandma and Emma as "Kitties"

The Fabulous Moore's

Mount Vernon on the Potomoc

We visited Mount Vernon this last weekend with Blaine's mom and his brothers family. Mount Vernon is the name for George Washington's beautiful mansion home and farm that overlooks the Potomoc River. It is one of my favorite places here and we went on the perfect Fall day. George Washington was an incredible man--how lucky we are that good men like this once lived to start our country. 

Cam in front of the front lawn and mansion.

I love this picture--Cam and Ellie with the Potomoc River in the background--it really is a spectacular view. This is the view George Washington had from his back porch!

Our family in front of the Washinton Mansion
 

This is a replica of a famous portrait of George Washington. The original hangs in the White House--Blaine and I actually went on a tour of the White House today and saw the original!

Cameron turns 7!

Cameron celebrated his 7th bday on Sunday! It was fun to be in Pittsburgh with cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents to celebrate--that hasn't happened since he turned one!  Cameron is a great kid--here's what we love about him:

1. He's our little science guy--he can tell you more than you ever wanted to know about animals and science stuff.  He's learning about fungus right now at school--today he wanted to do an experiment to grow mold on a piece of bread. Is that FUN or what?!

2. He loves books--he asked Santa for science books last year. 

3. He can make friends with anyone.

4. He says his prayers and reads scriptures every night all on his own. 

5. The force is strong with this one--young Jedi Cameron. 

6. He loves hanging out with his Dad. He still hugs me when I drop him off at school. He is a great brother to his sisters (most of the time). 

Cam--Happy Birthday! We love you so much. 

Weekend in Pittsburgh

We are just 4 short hours away from Blaine's brother Phil and his family! We went there last weekend to celebrate the birthdays of Grandpa Bell, Emma, and Cameron (on the 18, 19, & 21) and to see our sweet neice Emma be baptized. Our sweet Dad Blaine was left at home once again because he had to be at a mandatory class over the weekend and it was so sad that he wasn't there with us and his whole family! Emma's baptism was wonderful! She set a great example for all her cousins. Then we headed to Chucky Cheese for more celebration--our kids LOVE that place. Great times! AND--we saw our dear friends the Westovers who just moved to Pittsburgh which was wonderful! I forgot to take any pictures but they are doing great!

Hanging out downtown with Grandma

We spent the afternoon hanging out downtown with Grandma Bell on a beautiful day! I love this city! We went to the National Aquarium which wasn't spectacular--but it kept the kids entertained. Then we just strolled past the White House and had a great time. We LIVE here!! So fun! 

Wearing Mommy's "Slippers"

So Ellie loves to wear my high heels---she calls them her "slippers". Every little girl needs a pictures in their mom's high heels right? 

Moving on!

It's taken me awhile to post since our move here to Fairfax, VA! It took awhile to get our internet up and going, and its just been busy getting settled in! But we are here and settled in to our place here. (Pictures of our place will come soon). I'm really liking our place here--its a townhome with three levels in a real quiet cul-de-sac. The basement is by far the greatest thing--we have all the toys downstairs and its been GREAT to just send the kids downstairs to play! So, its starting to sink in that we really LIVE here now! Cameron started 1st grade.His school is just down the street so he loves that we walk to school everyday. Blaine started his LLM program at George Washington University, and life is going good. I am less than 2 miles from my dear friend Natalie and that has been so fun to see her just like our Lexington days. Our ward is really nice---there are A LOT of attorneys in our ward. Senator Hatch is in our ward--he was there on Sunday. It was really hard to leave Lexington. It has been home for the last 5 years and really hard to leave such a great place, and even harder to leave all or our incredible friends there. Y'all better come for a visit! We miss you so much. Thank you for being our "family" in Kentucky.

We are also excited for Baby Blood #4 that is on the way (if you didn't know already)! I am about 12 weeks now and I'm due in March! We (unlike the Westovers!) are just having ONE baby. I was going to do some cute post to "announce" in a more exciting way--but we better just finally let everyone know! It's gonna be an exciting year!



Cam our 1st grader!



We went to the Nat'l Air and Space Museum Annex--which is a huge hangar of full sized famous planes. Here we are by the SR-71-the world's fastest plane, Blaine in front of the Enterprise--a full sized space shuttle (really cool) and my Dad in front of the "Enola Gay"--the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Japan. So many cool things to do here!