Happy Halloween!

 Aren't they the cutest?  At Eli's request he was a soccer player again and Connor was a tiger.  Eli hated that tiger costume 2 years ago, but Connor loved it and went around saying "Waawr!" over and over.  And I think Eli would wear his soccer outfit every day if I let him, so they were both very happy in their costumes this year.  We had a really fun Halloween party at the church on Saturday.  The boys had a great time trunk-or-treating and doing the many games and activities they had for kids.  We also had a chili contest and pie contest and I won best fruit pie! Yippee!  Hard to beat fresh picked apples.  Mmm-mmm. :)

As for actual Halloween, I'm not sure yet if we're doing anything.  The mayor of Pittsburgh has declared official trick-or-treating hours to be Saturday evening instead of tomorrow because of Sandy (mega storm), so who knows.  And speaking of the storm, we are totally fine.  It's crazy how giant this storm is and what a wide area of the US is affected.  They thought we may be getting power outages, but so far it's just been a lot of wind and rain.  Our plan for the day is to stay warm and dry and can some applesauce!  Yum yum.

Apple Picking!

We have really been living up Jeremy's Fall Break.  It's so weird, last year he had a 3-day weekend for a fall break, and this year he has almost 2 weeks.  I'm not complaining though, it has been amazing!  We had some really chilly weather a couple weeks ago, but this week has been sunny and warm.  Awesome!

Last year I really wanted to go apple picking, but it didn't happen, so I wanted to make sure we did it this year.  We went with our friends, the Arnetts, on Monday and it was so fun!  There was hardly anyone else there, and the boys all had a great time picking (and eating) apples.  We got a half bushel - over 20 pounds! The scenery was beautiful and we drove through some pretty incredible neighborhoods to get there.  Fun!

I took 70 pictures in the 2 hours we were there, so I'll try to condense..

 Ahh, farm land.  I don't know why it's so beautiful, but it is.

 Eli and Joey picking apples.  They did a great job. :)

 Can you find Jeremy in there?

 Moses and Connor enjoying the apples.

Friends!  I keep forgetting Mary's due in less than 2 weeks because she's such a trooper and never slows down!

 Mmm-mmm, juice comin' out of the teeth...

 Giddy Jeremy. :) (And Eli chompin' on an apple in the background)

 Yeah, that house is okay. Sheesh.

 Ahh!

 After picking apples, we walked back and checked out the farm's little petting zoo.  They had sheep, goats, chickens, and a pig.  Pretty exciting!

 "Connor, you want to touch the pig?"

 The view:

 "Eli, stop throwing leaves on the pig".  Poor pig.

It was a fun day!  And now we have lots of apples to eat. Yum!  We plan on making applesauce, pie, cake, tarts, you know, all the good stuff...

A Real Live Job

Well folks, it's official.  In 8 months, Jeremy will have a real JOB!

(Jeremy in front of the Eaton headquarters in downtown Cleveland.  We drove by on our way out of Kirtland last week to check it out)

I had mentioned that recruiting had been going on and it had been cuh-RAzy.  Well, last week, Jeremy officially accepted an offer from Eaton Corporation!  This is very exciting.  We feel very blessed with how everything worked out.  He had multiple offers - a blessing in itself so we could have a choice - and we both felt really good about this one.  He will be doing a Global Leadership Development Program which includes two 1-year rotations in different areas of the company to give him a more rounded leadership/management experience.  I say "program", but it is very much a job.  It's just a 1-year position, then another 1-year position, and then somewhere more long-term after that.  Yes, that means we will get to move two to three more times in the next few years.  Fun fun! :)  (But don't feel too bad for us - the company will be moving us).

Unfortunately, we don't know where we will be going, and won't know for quite some time. They have locations in over 40 of the 50 states, so it could be anywhere.  He graduates in May and will start in June.  He will get a detailed list in March (I know, it's forever away) of locations that have opportunities and then he will get to talk with the people in the various locations and choose his top picks.  Everyone last year got their first or second choice, so that's great.  There are 12 people accepted into this program every year, and in fact, one of his friends at his school got an offer and accepted it too, so that's pretty neat.  And I'm friends with his wife and kids, so that makes me happy. :) 

Jeremy is thrilled.  This was the company on the top of his list, and he literally jumped up and down when the guy called and told him he got the offer (after he got off the phone with him, of course).  It was pretty entertaining. :)  If you want to know what Eaton does, I'm a terrible person to ask because I get confused easily when he starts explaining it, but I'll try!  (I swear I'm not as dumb as I sound, I just don't know all the lingo for the manufacturing world...)

First off, straight from their website: "Eaton is a global technology leader in diversified power management solutions that make electrical, hydraulic and mechanical power operate more efficiently, effectively, safely, and sustainably".  Clear as mud, right? ;)  And now in Jeremy's terms when I asked him to explain it very simply: "Um...they make smaller parts that go into larger things.  Like circuit breakers for buildings, hydraulic lines for aircraft, transmissions for semi-trucks..."  So there you go.

All in all we are feeling extremely blessed, and so grateful to have this huge decision over with already.  It all happened so fast, it's weird that it's over, but we feel good so that is great.  I keep thinking we don't have anything else to worry about until we find out where we're going, but oh wait, we're having a baby in a few months!  Now we can finally think about that!

Kirtland Day 2

See Day 1 HERE.

Day 2 was wonderful as well!  We all slept in, minus Eli.  He woke up at his usual 7:00 on the dot, but was thrilled because I actually let him watch TV (for like the 3rd time ever in his life), so he stayed quiet and we could get some more sleep!  We finally woke Connor up at 8:30 (!) and went down to eat breakfast.  We finally mosied out of the hotel about 10:00 - love vacation! - and headed back to Kirtland.

First we went to the Temple.  It's owned by the Community of Christ Church (formerly known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints).  They had a great hour long tour and we learned a lot.  I can't imagine them being able to build such an amazing building back then.  It is three stories high, the walls are 2.5 feet thick, and the woodwork inside is amazing.  It's really beautiful.  It took them 3 years to build it, and then just a few years later, they had to pack up and leave it to go to Missouri.

We couldn't take pictures inside, but here are some of the outside:

After that we went to the Isaac Morley farm.  Isaac Morley moved from Massachusetts to the wild frontier of Kirtland when he was a young guy.  He then went back to MA to get a wife :) and he convinced her to move to Kirtland with him.  He bought over 130 acres of densely wooded land, and it was basically just them and the Native Americans.  Just a few months later he was called to serve in the militia, so poor Ann Morley had to live by herself in their little log cabin for 40 days.  They said she was afraid to start fires for fear of attracting the Natives.  She had no friends, no nothin'.  Scary!  He eventually got sick, so they sent him back and said he was dying and was of no use to them.  She nursed him back to health and after NINETEEN YEARS, they finished clearing their land and had a thriving farm.  Holy smokes.

They were part of Sydney Rigdon's congregation that all eventually joined the church there when Parley. P Pratt came as a missionary.  Joseph & Emma lived on their property for a time, along with many other saints who moved to Kirtland.  They had a schoolhouse on the farm where many revelations were received, including several sections of the Doctrine & Covenants.  They were eventually asked by Joseph to sell the farm.  They moved to Missouri, then to Nauvoo, then to Winter Quarters (where Ann died), then to Salt Lake, and then to Manti to colonize there.  Sacrifice!  Isaac lived to be 79 years old!  Amazing.

(This is up where the schoolhouse would have been.  They call this Kirtland's Sacred Grove because so many revelations were given here).

After that farm, we drove 45 minutes to Hiram, Ohio to see the John Johnson farm.  The drive there was SO BEAUTIFUL!  We were on some small country roads and it was gorgeous.  Joseph and Emma lived here for a little while also (they lived in 5 different places in/around Kirtland).  There were 13 sections of the D&C received there, including 76.  This is also where Joseph was dragged out of bed and was tarred and feathered and then got up the next morning (Sunday) and preached and baptized 3 people.

 Upstairs in the home.  Mother Johnson was very fashionable and artistic and had lots of fun colors in the house.  This room was her favorite - their bedroom - that she sacrificed to give to Joseph as an office.

 Outside the home.  I can't get enough of these trees!  The boys loved playing with the leaves.

 Connor ran out there to be in the picture with Eli. He didn't want to be left out. :)

After going there, we drove another 2.5 hours to Columbus!  We figured we were already on the road, we may as well go to the temple.  The boys slept most of the time and we brought them to Jeremy's cousin's house and Jeremy and I did a session at the temple.  We then picked them up and headed home about 9:00 and dropped into bed just after midnight.  Whew!  It was an amazing trip and we're so glad we did it!

Family Vacation: Kirtland!

I really should be unpacking from said vacation, but blogging about it is way more fun!  Jeremy finished finals on Monday evening, and on Wednesday morning we took off for a little 2-day family getaway to Ohio!  It was GORGEOUS.  Wow.  The drive was incredible with all the fall colors.  And it was so nice to just be together as a family after the crazy month and a half we've had.

I took a TON of pictures, so I apologize for the length.  Everywhere we looked we were just oohing and aahing over the scenery and so, naturally, we snapped pictures approximately every 2.5 seconds.  Whatev.  It's hard to capture the beauty on camera, but it was all so picturesque and breathtaking.

It was a nice leisurely trip too.  We didn't leave until 10am on Wednesday (partly because we did nothing to prepare the night before since we were watching the debate!) and we just took our time doing everything.  It was perfect!

Pics from the drive (not the best through a dirty windshield)..

 Wall to wall trees the entire drive in gorgeous colors.  Amazing!

 

We arrived in Kirtland around 12:15 and we ate lunch and started our tour!  We saw the Newel K. Whitney Store, the Newel & Ann Whitney home, the Schoolhouse, the Inn, the Sawmill, and the Ashery.  Very cool.  We loved learning about the history of the early Church members there.  They had so many trials and had to endure so much, but were so faithful.

Where we ate lunch...tough life

 The Store:

 Inside the store:

 The store is 80% original in structure and is on the original foundation.  Bro. Whitney was an excellent record keeper, so they know this is exactly what he would have had in the store.

 Upstairs from the store, where Joseph & Emma had their living quarters when they stayed there for a few months.  Also up here in another room (that I forgot to take a picture of) is where the school of the prophets was.  It was such a small room, not what I had imagined.  Often 25 men would be crammed in there, and all but 2 smoked.  Yuck.  That's where the Word of Wisdom was received...

 Gorgeous!

 We couldn't seem to take enough pictures of the beautiful fall foliage...

 Inside the Whitney home, they were very well-off.

 Coming toward the sawmill and ashery.

 Sawmill...

 It actually still works today.  President Hinckley and President Monson have both cut logs using it.  Pretty cool!

 Up ahead is the ashery...

 Inside the Ashery.  It's the only standing Ashery in North America!

 Say cheese!

 The pearl ash after baking in these oven at 1000 degrees for two days!  They sold this for $100-$200 a barrel and used it for making china.  Newel Whitney owned the Ashery as well and that's where he made most of his money.

 This barrel is original.  This is holding pot ash, which they used to make soap, gun powder, and other things.

 Cute boys!

 Love this blondie boy.

 My new favorite pic of him.  He looks like a Stephens here to me (my mom's side of the family)

 Outside the sawmill...

After that we drove into downtown Cleveland to check it out on our way to our hotel.  Jeremy's parents were supposed to be joining us on this trip, but his dad had an emergency at work, and his mom decided to stay home too. :(  We were REALLY sad they couldn't come, but they were so generous and let us use their hotel reservation for the night anyway.  We lounged around a bit when we got there (the boys hadn't napped, but by then it was 4:00 and useless), then we ate dinner at the hotel - free dinner reception! - and put the boys to bed early and enjoyed a night of relaxation together!  (Of course until Connor woke up at 10pm screaming because his bed cover had come off and was smothering him and didn't stop screaming until 11pm...other than that it was very relaxing) :)

I'll post Day 2 of our trip next...