The Monsens: October Wrap Up

We started October with an awesome weekend watching General Conference-

We had some soccer games and Thad finished up a fun basketball tournament league, but we were still able to catch most of Saturday's session.

Sunday morning started off with Orange Julius for breakfast like we do every conference. We didn't have Grandma Sycamore's for toast, but it was all still delicious!

We also got this shot because we played our favorite conference game, "Listen for the word on the cup and get a treat out of that cup if you hear it." It's a really good game.

And it was amazing to hear from our leaders at conference. This weekend is always the lift my soul needs.

I love to snap pictures of little scenes like this when I remember. We were talking about scriptures in the boys' room, and this is the mundane and routine, but also the stitching that binds our family together.

I love these kids and their dad and this beautiful life.

Mae continues to just be DARLING!

The Deer Run Run was back this year, so I had to head to the school and cheer my little runners and their friends on!

Luckily 4th and 1st grades ran at the same time and I only had to go once!

They both started of strong and that strength came and went, but they both had an awesome time!

Mae was their best little cheerleader-

Mae was also ready to leave and let me know it after we'd been there about 30 minutes...

So I snapped a picture with my cuties and we were on our way!

Liz came to town for the weekend and we had an absolute blast! We did brunch, lunch, dinner, fire pit, and bike riding and just had an awesome time. I sure miss having her in Ohio.

Me - Liz - Kara - Lina

My favorite thing that we did was bike the Olentangy River Trail and it was just absolutely gorgeous!

Liz, Lina, and I started at the beginning of the trail and rode 12 miles down to Columbus. We had perfect weather and beautiful scenery to enjoy during the ride!

We had dinner at Nada and then rode the 12 miles back to the car and were in pitch dark for the last 20 minutes of the ride!

Liz and Lina are much more adventurous than I am so it was awesome to have them drag me along and have an awesome time!

Thad and I met up with Liz, Lina, and Denton at the pickle ball courts on her last night and I had a blast being introduced to this awesome game for the first time!

Fall sports ended this month also and we are sad to see them go!

Eve and Wes both made some major improvements on the field and we had so much fun watching them this season! Eve's team is still really young, so not a whole lot of strategy going on, but Wes has been playing with his team since Eve's age and they have become an awesome little team!

Impact (his team name) went undefeated during the regular season and only lost one game at a tournament. Unfortunately, the season ending tournament had to be completely cancelled because of so much rain, but we're pretty sure they would have blown that out, too!

We met up with Wes' team for dinner because the tournament was cancelled and it definitely softened the blow to hang with all these cute kids and awesome parents!

We are also going to miss weekly football games for Thad!

We are still so proud of him for trying football out after never playing before and having a good time doing it.

Lucky #7!!

Cutest cheerleaders!

Way to go, Thad! We can't wait to see you grow as an athlete over these next few years!

We went to his football banquet the week after they finished and I dared him to wear matching shirts with his four siblings, but he wasn't having it. HAHA!

Love this football guy!

Luckily we don't have to wait too long to be watching Thad at the middle school again. He is being brave for winter sports and trying out wrestling for the first time, too! He didn't make the basketball team like he was hoping, but will play rec basketball and wrestle at the school. Brian wrestled a bit when he was a kid and had a fun time showing Thad some basics before he went to practice for the first time-

Some more "routine" scenes I want to tuck away in my memories forever...

This is Wes every night. I love him.

He also loves his little sisters with his whole heart.

Sleeping beauties

Sweetest siblings

Brian and I got crazy (or I got crazy and forced Brian into it), but the crazy worked out and we got our master bedroom painted in a couple days! We have vaulted ceilings in our room and really hesitated taking it on ourselves, but we did it and we are so proud of ourselves!

(Please note my high school volleyball knee pads protecting his knees)

He really does love me!

This room is still a work in progress, but this is a giant step in the right direction!! Here is the before-

Some fun little happenings-

Eve got to go to Cora's birthday party at The Bounce Club!

She also gave a talk in Primary and did a fantastic job-

This girl is getting so good at reading and writing and she makes any event like this really simple because she loves to read and write!

The weather and Mae continued to wow us during October!

She loves little things and is sitting on the barbie furniture here.

And here she is serving us Lego-sized "milk."

This girl loves a chance to visit the library, so we met up with friends and walked across the bridge afterwards-

Hanna came to visit and we just had too much fun. I didn't want her to leave!

She flew into Columbus and stayed the night with us before heading to West Virginia to help her parents move from the home she grew up in to a new town by her older sister. I was just so happy to spend time with her even if it was less than 24 hours!

Of course she loved on my babies (and big kids!), I introduced her to Perk (which she loved), and we just kept talking until she finally had to leave to go help her parents out.

This girl! Oh, how I love her!

Isn't it so fun to reflect on the beginnings of friendships and just be in awe of how far it has come and how you could have just never imagined it?! I love her so much!

My sweet friend Christine invited me to take pictures of her family while they went and received a marriage blessing from a priest at their Catholic church for their 15th wedding anniversary.