Field Trip!

Jane's preschool goes on a field trip once a month. Last month they went to Thanksgiving Point's farm. It was so fun and interesting. Jane and Grant loved watching and feeding the animals, going on a tractor-wagon ride, and learning about the animals. Jane was even brave enough to go on a pony ride!! I was so proud of her!Petting the calfLearning about what we get from sheepPetting a bunnyJane on her pony ride!

This month, the preschool went to a local pumpkin patch. They did a fun scavenger hunt, walked through a short corn maze, went on a hay ride, and got to sit up on various tractors. Grant stayed home with Trent for this one, so it was just Jane and I exploring this fun autumn location.

The corn maze

Taking a rest and having a snackJane and Gracie riding the tractor Farmer JaneI was so nervous for Jane to start preschool. Maybe it's something to do with my baby growing up. I don't know. But I have been so impressed with how well she is doing. She is learning and growing and making friends and absolutely loves going to preschool. Her teacher pulled me aside and told me she's ahead of the whole class on her letters (she has passed off the entire alphabet in capitals and is now working on her lower case letters.) I'm so proud of my Jane. What a smarty pants!

This is Halloween

This Saturday was the annual Bassett family Halloween party. We found out a week before when the party would be and at that point, I'd bought all the fabric to make costumes for Jane, Grant, and Trent. Needless to say, I spent much of last week at the sewing machine. But it paid off. While I still need to finish Grant's dinosaur hood and Trent's tunic, I got the costumes done just in time for the party.As always, Cathy B put on a great party! We had an excellent lunch followed by games and treats and good times. It was so fun to see all the kids dressed up and Jane and Grant had a blast!
Later that night, we left Grant with Trent's parents and took Jane to go on a "Halloween Cruise" on the Provo river. It was fun to spend one on one time with her and she loved the Pirates and the pumpkins.
Tonight we are watching, "The Nightmare Before Christmas"--a classic, in my book. There is a chill in the air, the sky is gray, and it smells like fall. This is Halloween----and I LOVE IT!!!

BFFs

Lately Jane and Grant have been the sweetest little friends. It makes me think back to when Trent and I started feeling we should have another kid. The feeling we both got was, "Jane needs a buddy" and I'm so glad we got her one! These two are so dang funny together! Jane loves to boss Grant around and he's happy to ignore her. They love to squish into the toy car together (mainly because neither one wants to let the other have a turn) and ride around the deck laughing as they go. On Sunday, I caught them in Jane's room having a read-a-thon. Jane had unloaded an entire shelf of their bookcase into her room and there they sat "reading" books and having a good time. Yesterday I found them in Bubba's room with an assortment of objects and Jane explained they were having "preschool" and that she was the teacher, Miss Jane. I'm so happy that these two get along so well. I'm so grateful that we got Jane a buddy, and I'm so glad it was Bubba.

Speaking of The Bubba: we thought he was our calm kid. Not so. Lately he has turned into this mischievous little guy getting into everything and destroying anything he can get his hands on. The TV buttons are his favorite, right up there with remotes, the computer keyboard, and anything that belongs to Jane. He has also shown a complete dislike for naps, much to my dismay. Luckily I've got him back to at least one a day but for a while there, he was refusing naps all together. I don't get it--he is so active all the time it tires me out just watching him. I don't know how he doesn't just crash. He has also shown a new interest in dancing. It cracks us up! Every time he hears music with a catchy beat, he starts bobbing, swinging his arms, and grinning from ear to ear. He's always been obsessed with music--every time he hears music or an instrument being played, he stops whatever he's doing and is totally engrossed. But now he's taking his love of music to a physical level and it's so fun to watch. He's growing up way too fast!

We Survived Havasupai!

A week ago Trent and I left the kids with my parents and headed to Arizona to hike into Havasupai. Being with the kids 24-7 I was ready for a break. Imagine my surprise then, when I started missing them 5 miles down the road. Darn kids.
We drove straight through the 12 hour drive taking turns resting and listening to books on tape. We passed over the Hoover Dam--neither of us had ever been to see it-- and were amazed by the new bridge they have constructed there. It was so big it made us dizzy to look up at it.We got to the trail head at about 11 pm and slept in the car so that we could get an early start in the morning. We started our hike down around 8 am. The sun was just lighting the sky and it was cool. It was my first time backpacking so the first couple of miles I had to get used to the 30 lb pack on my back. My arm kept going numb. But eventually I stopped noticeing the dead arm as my feet and butt and legs started making protests. By the time we reached the village I was done. I think we both were. It was just past noon and the sun was hot. Too bad we still had 2 more miles to camp. They were the longest 2 miles EVER! But at the end was a most beautiful waterfall, and more importantly, camp. We set up the tent and I collapsed for a few hours while Trent went exploring. Needless to say, the place was worth the hike. The campground was surrounded by streams of clear, blue water on both sides and it was between the main falls and, further down, another waterfall. The canyon walls shaded the camp nicely and we were right by the natural spring that supplied drinking water. We had a nice dinner of freeze dried spaghetti and went to bed around 8 pm. The next day we played in the falls. Our favorite was Rock falls. Trent, against the advice of his loving wife, jumped off the top of the falls.

His most daring wife jumped through the falls from behind. It was paradise. Later in the day we hiked down to Moony Falls. We almost died. The hike down was almost straight down at points with nothing keeping you from falling to your death other than chains attached to the mountain. You also had to go through tunnels and down some sketchy ladders (missing rungs and not secured to anything). But we made it and it was sooo worth it! Moony falls is breath-taking! It is so tall and standing at the bottom, it just mists you. The water is a light blue, and against the white bottom (from lime deposits), it looks like blue kool-aid. The next morning we got up at 4 am, ate a quick breakfast, packed up camp, and got on our way. We hike for a few hours with head lamps and then the sun started coming up. Trent had gotten 7 big blisters on his feet on the way down so he was having a pickle of a time hiking back up. His feet were killing him. I was so determined to get out of that canyon before the sun hit us that I cruised as fast as I could. We only hit sun the last 2 miles but still wished that we had left earlier in the morning so we didn't have to hit any. 10 miles and 5 1/2 hours later, we made it out of the canyon and have never been so relieved to see our air conditioned car sitting there. We are now proud to say that we survived Havasupai. It will be a while before I strap a huge backpack to my back again. Thanks for the adventure, Trent!

He did it!!!!!!!!!!!

Ever since he graduated with his BS, Trent and I have been stressing about our next move: graduate school. This summer, Trent worked his butt off studying for tests and working on applications. And today, that paid off. We found out that he was accepted into Midwestern University's Nurse Anesthesia program (in Arizona)!!!! I'm so proud of him and excited to start this new journey in our life. He will still apply to a few more schools to see what options we have (We'd love to get into California or North Carolina, and if we could get into the school in Utah, we wouldn't have to worry about selling the house quite yet), but we are just so relieved to know that no matter what, he will be in a program next year! Woot woot!!!

Jane's 1st Day of Preschool

Today was Jane's first day of Preschool! I can't believe my baby is that old!!! She was so excited to go--when we went to the open house last week, she screamed and threw a holy fit when it was time to leave yelling, "TAKE ME BACK!!!!" She was happy that I took her today and dropped her off. Of course when I picked her up, I asked her all about it. She said, "I'll tell dad". "Can't you tell me?" I asked. ""No, I'll tell dad first and then you." Don't worry, I still got it out of her :) She had a great first day and can't wait to go back! We are so proud of our little student!

Beauty Parlor

What's missing (besides the other half of Grant's head)?Half of Jane's bangs is what's missing. Last night I was laying down because my head was killing me and I heard her come in the room and go to the bathroom. Then I heard scissor sounds. I asked her what she was doing. She said, "Shhhh, go back to sleep" so I went in there and all I could see was that she had cut up some ribbon. I took away the scissors and thought nothing more of it. Then this morning at breakfast I was looking at her and noticed that some of her bangs were significantly shorter than the others. Upon further inspection, there was also a clump missing from the back. It honestly could have been worse (I butchered my hair when I was little). We will go try to have a real beautician fix it tonight.