Howcroft Family: New Swing, Barrett, Conference

October has been good to us so far this week!
We spent a couple days at our new favorite park (pictures courtesy of my little photographers)

We bought a new outdoor swing (for $100 off) and LOVE it! It replaces our outdoor table and chairs that just wasn't used as much as we thought it would be. The swing has already been used triple what the table and chairs were in the 2 1/2 years we've had them! Our favorite is to sit out there at night as a family and tell stories (Halloween ones at Audrey's request).

We have a new nephew! Brett and Jess had their first baby, Barrett. We are so excited to welcome him to the family and can't wait to meet him later this week. I love thinking that Timothy's best friend/partner in crime is here and soon Timothy will be too!

Kirsten had her first school field trip (have I mentioned I love her teacher?). We went to the local fall carnival. The kids got to ride a ride, pet/feed the petting zoo animals, slide down the huge slide and do the obstacle course. It was fun to see Kirsten with her little class mates. She totally is really really shy, which kinda cracks me up because she's SO loud at home. One little boy totally watched out for her the whole time and kept holding her hand and sticking to her like glue. It was so cute. She didn't seem to want much to do with him until we were leaving then she shouted "I love my Aaron!" There is only one other girl in her class and they were totally competitive the entire time (in a 4 year way) and that was also so entertaining. It was such a fun day with her. I am so glad I am lucky enough to be her mom!

We LOVED general conference and were lucky enough to hear every speaker. It was so nice to be home all weekend and soak up the goodness of our latter day prophet. Favorite talks were Utchdorf, Eyring, Holland, and Monson. I'm also excited/slightly panicked that my kids will be leaving for missions sooner! To see it from the mothers side, oh my! The spirit of the weekend left both Kirk and I wanting to be better and do more to serve. Yesterday between the afternoon session and priesthood Kirk helped me clean the windows and blinds in our living room (they were embarrassingly dirty). It was so fun to work with him and discuss life. Discussing life plans with the spirit of conference is the very best, highly recommended! After conference today we took the girls up to the temple. Audrey begged to go inside but we told her not yet. On the way home she out of the blue declared "I'm going in the temple someday!" it was so cute!