Mid-October Catch Up...

***CAUTION: I've just finished writing this post and it is somewhat long. Remember, nobody (except for my mom and Jacob and o.k., maybe my sisters), should feel obligated to read all my ramblings. This is after all, a sort of journal for me. But happy reading if you do decide to read!***

I wrote the date for something tonight and I couldn't believe that half of October is already gone! Amazing. I also realized that a lot has happened that I haven't posted about... uh oh! So here goes a big catch up session. See, my dedication to this blogging thing sometimes waivers, but I always (well, almost always) find my way back. Here goes:

October 3-5: I didn't want to be alone with the kids for General Conference weekend, so I pulled Ammon out of school early and my three kiddos and I made the drive to Anchorage all by ourselves (I felt like such a big girl... making the drive alone was a first for me). We went to Value Village (a really cool second hand store) and bought Halloween costumes (this was a blast) and some more jeans for the boys (they're growing much faster than our budget can ever hope to). We also did some Costco shopping and had dinner there. This was an interesting experience. Every time we got to the farthest end of the warehouse, one of the boys decided that he needed to make another trip to the bathroom. Usually, Jacob or I would make the trek while the other continued shopping... I'll just say that Costco shopping without Jacob took us A VERY LONG TIME! When we finally finished at Costco, we made our way to a vacation rental that our friends own and bunkered down for the night. In the morning, we watched Conference on our laptop while we had some breakfast. It really was a lot of fun and I enjoyed what I heard. I'm learning to relax and just try my best at getting out of Conference what I can rather than be upset that my children are the only ones in the whole entire world who can't sit reverently for two consecutive hours ;)


After this morning session of Conference, we drove to Palmer to be with Jacob for the Cross Country State Finals Meet. This was an interesting drive for me. In the two years since we've been in Alaska, this was my first time going beyond Anchorage on the same road that brought us here back in 2006. I had mixed feelings (a whole post in itself... maybe another time!). A couple of interesting notes though (I wish I had pictures to go with these):

• Ammon had fun counting the overpasses/ bridges that we drove on. I realized that living on a peninsula, this isn't something that is familiar to him. Ammon's excitement about highway overpasses reminded me of my mom telling me about my Mama Gollita (my great grandmother) who on her first drive through Los Angeles looked out of the car window in utter shock and amazement as she drove through the city and saw the hundreds of overpasses. I guess my children are very much "small town" kids now.
• It was fun for us to see highway signs signaling that the next exit had fast food, gas stations, hotels or restrooms. It was a subtle realization, but again, I was struck by just how different it is where we live now. I realized that the highway signs we are used to seeing tell us about the hiking or skiing trails, the camp sites, lake or river access, or the moose that may cross the road right in front of your car.
  

Anyway, on to the Cross Country meet. KCHS only had two girls that qualified for this state meet and the entire Munyer family was there to cheer them on with all our gusto. As I usually do, I cried as I watched many of the races. I cried because Jacob told me about the little freshman girl from a place called Kenny Lake who showed up at her school and told her PE teacher that she enjoyed running. Well, with no team or uniform to speak of, they somehow managed to send her to a couple of races (Jacob said that at the last meet where he saw her, she still didn't have a uniform to wear). She did manage to borrow one for this state meet where she quickly ran to the front of her race and beat all the other runners by quite a margin (she beat the second place runner by 14 seconds and the third place runner by almost an entire minute). I also cried when I saw the famous Dunbar kid beat his own state record by about 30 seconds (many thought he couldn't do it on such a cold day - it was after all, only about 34 degrees). As I've written before, I'm pretty sure there is an unfulfilled runner somewhere deep inside of me and every once in a while, she gets glimpses of awesome running accomplishments that make her cry.

As they always do, my kids had a fantastic time at this meet. Jacob and I have both said time and time again that cross country is definitely the most "family friendly" sport for a coach and his family. I think my kids would agree.

I'm posting this picture separately because it just reminds me of how "wild" Alaska is. I love it! Look at all these different school mascots:

After the cross country meet, we went back to Anchorage and we had a scrumptious dinner at Red Robin. I have to say that ever since my little nephew Isaiah went to Red Robin in Salt Lake City for his birthday, I've been craving it. I forgot that Anchorage has one! Ymmmm... I super enjoyed the dinner not only because the food was good and the experience was fun, but mostly because it satisfied a major craving that I erringly thought was un-satisfiable. We spent another night in Anchorage, watched the Sunday sessions of General Conference on our laptop again and then drove back to Kenai. We saw our first snow of the season on this drive. I didn't snap a picture, but we did in fact see snow falling on October 5th! Here are some other random driving pictures.

October 7: Jacob came home from school with a huge bag full of hockey gear intended for Ammon. It fit Abraham instead... and Ziya. I don't know if we'll really sign the kids up for hockey, but at least one of them now has a new super hero costume! I never thought my kids would be interested in hockey, but it seems to be one of the things to do up here to keep kids busy during the long winter months... and my boys have started talking about it. We'll see... I kind of think it's a violent sport and my kids are violent enough on their own without being "encouraged" and "taught" to be so. I may change my mind about this as the winter continues (and continues and continues) on.


October 9: I don't remember exactly now, but I think we actually had some snow accumulation a few days before this. October 9 is just the first time I actually pulled out the camera and took pictures of the kids playing so I have the date recorded on the pictures. Either way, it sure is early for snow, although nobody seems to be too surprised given the very wet summer we had. What I think is most tragic about all this is that we didn't really get a chance to finish out our beautiful fall (I kept telling myself to do a fall post with some pictures of our beautifully colored landscapes, and now I'm too late!).

One Tuesday at story/craft time at the public library, Abraham made this beautiful fall tree. The very next Tuesday, the mood had drastically changed and he made this snow hill scene! The change is all so sudden! I snapped a picture of a tree in our neighborhood: its beautifully changing leaves never even had a chance to gracefully flutter to the ground before the snow forced them to schlep down! Tragic, indeed!


My poor Abraham doesn't get to play in the snow the way Ammon does at recess. On this day, I got both him and Ziya all geared up (except for Abe's hat... oops), picked Ammon up at school and met a little friend at the high school to play on this small hill. They had fun jumping and sliding down the hill. I couldn't force a smile out of Ziya - she didn't seem too happy about not being able to move very freely. At a mere 30 or 32 degrees, Ammon got hot and decided to take his coat off. So not only are they small towners now, they are also quite acclimatized!

October 11: With the cross country season over, we finally got to enjoy a Saturday with absolutely nothing on our calendar! It was great. We spent part of the day doing apartment work. The kids helped Jacob pull the flowers out of the planters, sweep up the mess they made and then put out the snow shovels at each of the apartment entrances. I truly enjoy working together as a family. It's amazing how when we work together, all the arguing and fighting stops and we're able to actually be productive and have fun while we're doing it. Even Ziya got in on the action. Her job was to hold up the dust pan as I swept stuff into it. I'm convinced that soon, very soon, we need to buy a home with enough land with it to have either a few animals or a small orchard or at least a garden so that we always have work to do together. It's one of my goals. For now, we will have to be satisfied with dousing the hallway windows with a ton of Windex, wiping down the coin operated washers and dryers in the laundry rooms and vacuuming our eternally long upstairs hallway (this is the family work that we're going to do this Saturday!).



And now, I'm officially caught up. Maybe I should send Jacob away more often since this is the only time I ever seem to blog these days! Tonight, he went to a stake dance, after which he is supposed to take the Young Men and plan the next couple months' of activities while having a sleepover at a big fancy cabin (oh yeah... there's also paint ball guns and snow ball launchers involved... I wonder how much "planning" will get done?).