An Elephant and a Chicky

Okay, first of all, it is no longer November 16th, no matter what the date above says. It's more like November 23 or something. I took the pictures almost a month ago, uploaded them last week, and it's taken me this long to post them! Pretty sad.

Anyway, here are the long-awaited photos from Halloween. We went to a ward party that night for dinner, then went group trick-or-treating in the neighborhood around the Bishop's house (which was an awesome neighborhood, by the way). This was the first year that Connor really understood what was going on - particularly since he had all the older kids to watch and follow. He started out running from house to house as fast as he could go, screaming "Trick or Treat!" as loud as he could at the unfortunate residents. We had to keep reminding him to say thank you, and kept having to explain that you can't tell people what kind of candy you wanted, you just had to be happy with what they were offering. (He kept telling people he wanted green lollipops, because they were his favorite.) By the time we got back to where we'd parked the car, he was so tired he was dragging his candy bag behind him. Elise was still too little to really participate, but we carried her and let her sample her brother's loot, so she enjoyed it.

About a week later, we went on our first beach bike ride. The weather was beautiful, which kind of surprised me. The kids did a lot better this time in the trailer, mostly thanks to generous amounts of snacks. We rode north from Dockweiler Beach for about an hour, then turned around and came back. They have a great bike trail here that, as far as I know, connects every beach in the LA area. When we were done, we all played in the ocean and the kids got totally filthy in the sand.

This is Connor after his first night working in the morgue. He actually stole paint out of his (usually locked) bedroom cabinet and painted his arms and leg to make them look like "muscles". I guess he wanted to be like the skinless guys in his anatomy books.