The Thatchers: Happy Birthday Daddy, Mom, and Rachel!

Allright. It has been a while since our last post, so we have a million pictures to show you. I'll narrate some but mostly they are just us Thatchers having fun :)

I think I was about 5 months in this picture.

Our corn harvest. It looked cool, but tasted gross. The bugs got most of the kernels and the rest were very starchy. We'll try again next year. I couldn't let these go to waste, so I dried them out and made some corn meal with my blendtec.

My girls have stopped napping. Anne grew out of it and Rachel just wouldn't go to sleep at night. So they wake up at about 8 and go to sleep at 8 without any fuss. Most of the time they are so tired they ask to go to sleep, which we love. Another upside is that we have the whole day. No interuptions. The downside is I lost my naptime. This was a day that they just couldn't stay awake.

Anne and Rachel participated in the Cougar Run at BYU's homecoming. They ran 200 meters with other 1-4 year old girls. Anne finished in 16th place and ran the entire distance by herself! Rachel was a little startled by the gun and everyone running so it was not a happy event for her. She finished in 34th place.

But they both loved their ribbons they got at the end.

I'm so proud of my little runners. I wish Anne could've competed in the mile. She's run a 1.5 straight with me before. She would've rocked it. In a few years :)

After the race we watched the Homecoming Parade which is a favorite of ours.

That and the crazy blue pancakes they hand out before the parade starts. They're actually pretty gross but it goes with the festivities.

Rachel loved the marching band.

My little helpers. They love to help me bake or cook anything.

Zac had his birthday on the 16th. He loves these cookies so they became his cake. The Angels volunteered to watch the girls so Zac and I went out to eat at Texas Roudhouse and then went suit shopping! He picked out some snazzy suits that look awesome. Very sharp. We sure love Daddy :)

I've been doing a lot of yoga lately to help with my pregnancy back. So the girls and Harvey perfected "Downward Dog".

Another day they just couldn't last.

The day of Anne's primary program. I know I talked about it on facebook, but just to archive it here in our family journal, here goes. The day before she and I went to her practice for the program and it did not go well. She was terrified. She didn't want to go up to the front with the other kids and sing. She cried and cried. I took her out and talked to her one on one and helped her say a prayer. Then she did a little better and would go up with everyone but would still cry through the song. But by the end she was doing a little better. We said lots of prayers the rest of that day and on Sunday morning to please help Anne to be brave. On Sunday I went up with her but tried to hide behind a wooden panel so the congregation couldn't see me. I had lots of tissues ready. She sat with her class and her teachers, bless their hearts, brought her a ball to squish and hold to help distract her. Well, the Lord heard our prayers and Anne was blessed with bravery and even had fun! She walked to the front and sang all the songs holding onto the hand of her Primary President. She even helped conduct the last song and smiled and waved at the hundreds of people watching. She got up and said her line into the microphone with no problem at all. I was teary with gratitude, amazement, and a grateful heart to my Heavenly Father for blessing me with this sweet spirit. She is such an example to me. I know that Heavenly Father hears our prayers and gives us strength.

Halloween night. We decided to all be pirates this year. The girls loved it and would say "Argggggg!" all the time. Rachel was not a huge fan of the face paint so this picture is a little sad, but still pretty cute. We pretended to wash it off and that appeased her.

We had a fun Trunt or Treat that I was helping to be in charge of. The girls had a fun time trick or treating and ate more candy than they had probably in their entire lifetimes. Rachel during the night while I was MCing the cakewalk and asked so sweetly if she could have one of her little Snickers. I said sure. Zac came over a few minutes later and saw what she was doing and said "You know that's like her sixth one." Little stinker :) We all had a great time.

I had a great birthday as well. I figured if I kept the girls happy during the day, that I would have a happy day as well. So we went to McDonalds and had happy meals for lunch and then went and rode the carousel, then went to Costco. That night Zac took us all out for Thai food which was so yummy. Then we came home and I got to eat my chocolate covered apple Zac got me. Happy Day. This is a picture of me showing some of my birthday presents I got a couple months ago (so I could get good use out of them): skinny maternity jeans so I could wear my boots and a cute sweater. Thank you all for the thoughtful presents for my birthday!

I volunteered to help my friend can some of her tomatoes as well as the rest of ours that were actually ripe. It was actually a lot of fun and didn't take that much effort. I blendered them all up and then boiled them in a bit pot then just boiled a couple at a time to seal them up. Should make for some yummy tomatoe sauce throughout the winter! (That jar to the left is the cornmeal.)

I think in this picture I'm about 5 1/2 months along. This little one is a strong one. I can feel her kicking and moving throughout the day and she has some big kicks! I love it.

I love this picture of Rachel. She has some of the funniest expressions. This is her on her birthday morning. We started the day off with chocolate chip pancakes (she loves chocolate chips).

There's a sweet smile.

I put her in a cute cupcake shirt for her birthday and a few minutes later she took it off and insisted that she wanted to wear her football shirt. This little one is such a football fan. It warms her father's heart :)

I wasn't feeling good that day so when they started to fall asleep I let them snuggle together.

Rachel is showing me one of her presents from Daddy. He got her glow-in-the-dark bracelets, growing sponges (you put them in water), stickers, and temporary tatoos. Such big hits.

Her cake.

We got her a baseball tee because she had so much fun with the one that Aunt Michelle made. The advantage to this one is that they can put the ball on it themselves and it stays there. We play with small soft balls in the house and it will be a source of entertainment inside throughout these cold months.

Such a pro.

Rachel loves her lady bug jacket, mittens, and scarf from Grandma Russell and Aunt Jennifer. Thank you! She asks to wear the jacket whenever we leave the house. And it actually matches a dress Grandma Thatcher sent perfectly! She was all decked out for church on Sunday, we just forgot to take a picture.

The girls had so much fun playing with the stickers. I love that they play together so much these days.

Bandaids and stickers are the same thing to them so here they were putting "bandaids" on each other.

A few days later we got a pretty big beautiful snow storm that gave us almost a foot. The girls were soooo excited to go build a snowman and go sledding.

And now going back in time cause these pictures are from Zac's camera.

Just a cool picture of the sky.

The awesome Estey Reunion (my Mom's Mom side of the family).

Slurpee time. I love living two blocks away from 7-11 :)

At the Disney store at the mall.

Our last time at Seven Peaks for the summer. The girls sure loved going swimming and playing in the water.

On the way home from the pool in our fun jeep.

Our ward campout. It was a little rainy but still very fun. The girls loooove camping. Anne even thought the storm that came through at 5 o'clock in the morning was funny. Rachel just slept through it.

Our garden. It didn't turn out as well as we would've liked mainly due to bugs eating everything. But a few things survived like our corn and lima beans.

...the zucchini and pumpkin..

...the chard, beets, and lettuces.

This is when I was about 3-4 months along.

Rachel liked the Rhubarb.

We took the girls to a football game at BYU which was a huge hit. They still talk about it every single time we drive past the stadium (which is almost every day).

At the end of the game we got to go down on the field as part of Anne's Cougar Club. Rachel was reaching for the goal line!

The girls are huge fans of Cosmo and get so excited whenever they see him or a picture of him.

Anne's birthday. I'm not sure if we put these pictures up here on not, but just in case. Us waiting to ride on the bus, which is what she asked for for her birthday.

It was everything she hoped it would be.

Then she got to go get her picture taken at the mall in her pretty new dress.

Zac and my's anniversary. We took the girls out to eat sushi. They loved the edame and Rachel loved the miso soup.

Me and my buddy and older sis Michelle :)

Harvey's Birthday at the Malt Shoppe.

We were very blessed to be able to see my Mom and Dad, Kenric and his family, and have Michelle and her family here all at the same time! It was so good to see everyone and play together!

Random day at the park. The girls loved watching leaves float down the gutter. It entertained them for literally a half hour. I had to tear them away to go home.

More pictures of the ward campout.

At Costco.

Anne and I took a Sunday morning and went to see the Provo temple. She loves the temple and talks about getting married there all the time. On this morning she kept taking my keys and would go up to the doors and try to unlock them so she could go in.

At the football game.

Duck pond.

Great Grandma and Grandpa's house.

These girls love bugs. They found this grasshopper one Saturday with Dad and didn't want to let it go.

One day I just needed a sanity break so we drove up to Squaw Peak and thankfully they fell asleep. I relaxed for a half hour and just took in the beautiful scenery. When they woke up we took some pictures.