The mighty Shirley's went to Pumpkinland to see the pumpkins and the cornmaze etc. Some of these pumpkins were as big as Tori D! In the picture below, she's contemplating the wonders of God's creations!
Grandma and Grandpa Shirley are on a road trip and will not be here for Halloween, but Grandma made sure she gave Tori a Halloween suprise. This is Dada reading Tori her card from Grandma and Grandpa...she LOVES her Halloween book!
The weather has been cooler these days and Tori is getting a little bigger (yeah, not a whole lot, but her legs are a little bit longer)- at least long enough to push herself on her bike all by herself. She knows the sign for "bike" and always signs it when she hears the word bike. SO stinkin' smart!
Sometimes as a parent your first instinct is to say "no" to every little thing. No, you can't write on the table, no, you can't play in the toilet, no, this, and no that. I almost fell in to the "NO" trap when Tori wanted to help me make pot pies...but I didn't want to stiffle her creative flair for cooking/baking, so I let her help. Dada pulled a chair up for her and she just kinda took over (although I'm pretty sure she really didn't know what she was doing - she just knew she had to hold the big stick and touch the flour :) I can't wait until she's old enough to help make cookies and then decorate them with me! Too bad my nephews aren't here - they would help me for sure!
Last week, Tori and I went up to Ogden to see my cousin Paul get married. Here he is with his wife and dad (my uncle Vern - yep, the same uncle that just married off his daughter - how is that for timing? All of his kids married off in the same fall - not bad!) and Telina's (my cousin) kids. The little ones totally remembered Tori from Jessie's wedding, and she had fun chasing them around and they loved chasing her.
This has been a fun October so far, but we'll have even more fun in this last week of the month as we take Tori trick-or-treating. I have been trying to teach her to say that magical phrase, but all she does is look at me like, "hugh? Why are you so weird mom!" Stay tuned for photos of Halloween!
Below is a video I took of Tori at the pumpkin farm - "jumping" on their blow-up trampoline thing. She would just stare at the other kids' legs and then make a whole hearted attempt to jump - all while we laughed at our little explorer!
This is a birthday cake I made (all cupcakes) for Rycam's 5th birthday. Bryan was key to the success of the design...the final product was holding a balloon. 
Carving Pumpkins - Tori didn't last as long as this year as she did last year...after this little photo, she decided it was time for a bath! 
Notice the bat-shaped mouth on the left pumpkin! A very creative Bryan came up with the design.
Tori dressed up ready to go trick-or-treating - definately NOT wanting to get her picture taken! We were all from Japan this year for Halloween. I LOVE Halloween...this year was a little different, but still fun - all of the anticipation of candy and trick-or-treaters...so fun!
