Zavoral Villa!

Our town's homecoming was Sept 27. We've learned that part of small town living is that everyone goes to the high school homecoming parade and game. (Homecoming was Sept 27). The parade runs past the house of a friend from church, so we watched in her front yard. Seeing the high schoolers on their not-so-glamorous homemade floats brought back a lot of memories of being on my own Niwot High School floats each year. At this parade, the bands were the highlight. When the first one came by, Tanner smiled and stared. Dallin cried. When the second band came, Dallin stared and kind of smiled and Tanner whined, so I guess there were mixed feelings about which band was best, haha. Here's two pics of Dallin on the day of the parade. Later, we had dinner at another friend's house from church. We ate chili and laughed and watched our kids play rough house. Then we all went to the town's main event of the month: homecoming game! It was Tanner's first football game ever. He l...

Needless to say, we are missing our life in California, especially since it snowed today for the first time! We miss the beach, the constant 72 degree weather, and the endless restaurants, theatres, and sports games to go to. BUT we are trying to stay positive and dwell on the actually long list of things we like about living in a town in the middle of cornfields. Things we like about Austin, Minnesota No one is in a rush. People take time to chat and say hello. In the summer, everything is green, green, green!  We feel like we're part of the agrarian society, like we're in the heart of America. Fireflies! We have a beautiful house with lots of neat rooms, including the library, workout room, playroom, garage and yard! (This is Dallin in our Library/office) Did I mention we have a garage? It has changed our lives! Humidity. I love it! Short drive to Jeremy's work- 5 minutes and no traffic. Free food from our garden! We got lucky this year. Remember when DadR helped me plant...

During the weekend of Sept 20, we had the special privilege of entertaining Grandma and Grandpa Davidson! They came to meet baby Dallin, their great-grandson, and enjoy some places where Grandpa served his mission here in Minnesota. We had a super wonderful visit with them! We drove up to the city on Friday to pick Gma and Gpa up from the airport. Then, we went to the Flour Mill Museum in downtown Minneapolis. Jeremy went there with MomZ a few weeks earlier and was so excited to show us the musuem. At first, I thought it was a flower museum and thought, okay cool! But then when he clarified that it was a FLOUR musuem, I wasn't as excited.  Luckily, this place exceeded our expectations. It was amazing! This is an old flour mill that General Mills used to own. Check out the view of where this place is on the river in the city! We learned how the factory worked by riding a cool elevator tour and exploring the different hands-on exhibits.  The museum brought back a lot of memories...

I'm a little behind on posts, so here's an effort to catch up! It is so fun watching Tanner entertain Dallin. They love each other. Dallin especially is always transfixed on Tanner, watching his every move. He loves it when Tanner lays beside him, not minding at all when Tanner rolls onto him or knocks him over. We went to the Austin Re-Fest, a festival devoted to recycling and being green. We had mixed feelings about being there. The weather was nice and we enjoyed ourselves, but the smallness of it (among other things) reminded us that we live in the middle of nowhere. During this week, Dallin continued to be obsessed with sucking on his pointer and middle finger. While I did the laundry, Dallin chilled out on the rug. After breakfast, we usually have project time. One of our favorites is playdough! Dallin fell asleep playing on the ground. I was shocked because he barely fussed right before falling asleep! This is not typical; he was obviously really tired. Our little Guy Sm...