Happy Omaha Halloween!

From our little ladybug....

and Steve Jobs

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from these spooks down at the funny farm!!!



Happy 8th Birthday Savea!!!

We sure love you!

Have the best 8th birthday!!

love your Arizona fans!

This one deserved a post if it's own.

It's Fall

Hey Family!
Here are a few fun pictures from the past few days. We've had such a great fall break...it will be hard for (all of us) to go back to school next week. I hope you all are enjoying this fun season!
Love you!!!

At Schnepf farms pumpkin festival...I want one of these...it was so fun!

 Clay's expression says it all! Luckily there was no throw up involved...Andrea, you are safe to keep reading!

 More bath time pics!

 Dallen's getting the man-boobs!

I didn't want Macie to feel left out so I decided to make one too :) Thanks for starting this Rudy! This will be a fun tradition to start! Missing you all!

Thanks Rudy for this awesome idea!!!

Yearly "loves"...

I got this idea from Pinterest and thought it would be fun to do every year.

Where in the World are Morgan, Clayton, Dallen?

This week is fall break for our family. Clayton has been studying the continents in school, so we decided to make an extension of this and travel the world this week! It's been so much fun so far! Each day we've visited a different continent and the kids don't know where we're traveling until they wake up. Here's where we've traveled so far...stayed tuned to see where else we go!!!

Africa

We read a book about a little girl's love for her black hair. Morgan wanted to have corn rows just like the little girl in the story...she's been walking around enjoying her clickety clackety braids.

 Asia

We learned how to make Chinese symbols...finger-paint style!

We watched Mulan later that day! 

 Africa

We did observations of the African exhibit at the zoo. A bird decided to poop on Morgan's notebook...we decided to add it as an observation sample! haha

 Asia

Our Asian dinner. Homemade Lettuce wraps, chow mein, oranges, and fortune cookies!

 Rice noodles...these are so fun to cook up! I always thought we were eating styrofoam at P.F. Changs! 

 Europe

Where's Dallen? 

This was a dinner from England...Coronation Chicken. This was the chicken served at Queen Elizabeth's coronation luncheon back in 1953. It was super yummy....of course super fattening! 

 Our own Queen...she got dressed up for the dinner. Clayton decided if she were the Queen...he would be King Arthur!

GOP considers Morgan and Clayton as candidates after last nights debate!

So last night Blake and I watched the republican party's candidate debate. It was informational and amusing! After seeing the following portion of the debate between Romney and Perry...I had an mom moment. I realized that based on this segment...my children were perfect candidates for office. I mean, they have the perfect skills and debate talents that these two politicians demonstrated. I could almost see Morgan and Clayton's faces kind of super-imposed on top of those starched collars. The hair on the back of my head stood on end during this part of the debate just as it does some days at 5:00 pm. 

Watch the video below to see what I mean!

click here to view

The Simple Life

Macie LOVES to swing at the park. She will just sit there and watch all the other kids play on the playground. She is definitely our outdoor girl and gets so giddy and happy whenever we take her outside. Remember when our lives used to be that simple? Being a kid is the best and it's so fun to relive it through your own kids :)

Momma's biggest helper!

Sayla is my biggest helper in the kitchen these days. She loves to be in there with me watching everything I do. I was making cookies (actually the lemon crinkles I just posted) and sure enough, Sayla was right there helping me. I neglected to put the lid back on the flour bucket and this is what happened. I didn't have the heart to stop her. She wash having way too much fun.

mormon.org

Because of the media blitz here in Omaha, we were asked to make profiles at mormon.org. I know they are doing this in AZ too. I was looking up our family and saw that Michelle had one too! So I put a link on the side of our blog with our profiles on them :) I hope you don't mind! 

I thought it would be cool for those who haven't made a profile to log on and set one up. It doesn't take very long. This media blitz has been so cool... The commercials are awesome! You can watch them on mormon.org. With all the misunderstanding of mormons with the elections, this mormon.org website has been a perfect tool to clear up confusion. The church is definitely led by Jesus Christ and speaks to President Monson! This has just furthered my testimony that they really are seers.

I am so glad that we get to be a forever family and that I get to spend eternity with all of you! We have the best family! I love you.

Lemon Crinkle Cookies

For any of you that enjoy the taste of lemon, here is a recipe for you. Cookies aren't a huge temptation for me. I love baking them but I can usually say "no" to them. Um....not these. I literally had to bag them up and take them to other people just to get them out of my house. I was doing damage. I suggest trying them...right away. Don't hesitate, just do it!
(This recipe is from Lauren's Latest, see favorite recipe sites. It won best cookie for LDS Deseret book cookie contest)

Lemon Crinkle Cookies
yield: 2-3 dozen

Ingredients:
½ cups Butter, Softened
1 cup Granulated Sugar
½ teaspoons Vanilla Extract
1 whole Egg
1 teaspoon Lemon Zest
1 Tablespoon Fresh Lemon Juice
¼ teaspoons Salt
¼ teaspoons Baking Powder
⅛ teaspoons Baking Soda
1-½ cup All-purpose Flour
½ cups Powdered Sugar

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease light colored baking sheets with non stick cooking spray and set aside.

In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Whip in vanilla, egg, lemon zest and juice. Scrape sides and mix again. Stir in all dry ingredients slowly until just combined, excluding the powdered sugar. Scrape sides of bowl and mix again briefly. Pour powdered sugar onto a large plate. Roll a heaping teaspoon of dough into a ball and roll in powdered sugar. Place on baking sheet and repeat with remaining dough.

Bake for 9-11 minutes or until bottoms begin to barely brown and cookies look matte {not melty or shiny}. Remove from oven and cool cookies about 3 minutes before transferring to cooling rack.

*If using a non stick darker baking tray, reduce baking time by about 2 minutes.

Update from the Bentley Bunch!

Andrea...I'm responding to your petition for more pics! I've felt your pain and felt like I've been the only poster...sorry it's taken us a little while to get these up here. New baby days are busy!!!  ( :  I've loved looking at all the pictures you guys have been posting...I LOVE this blog. I still think there are two family members...ugg umm...that we could see more of...especially since they are such great contributors!

disclaimer...I do know that I have two older children...although looking back on the past month I see that my camera has favored my baby...no damage done...right!? haha

 family prayers

 just awesome!

 morgan was student of the week

 i love these onesies lara!

 "mom...i thought this was a private event!"

 my favorite part of this picture is clay arranged the whole thing!

LOVE YOU ALL~!