The Stew

Casey went hunting in Utah last week and brought home some venison from the buck he shot. It's the first deer meat we've had. So today, we had ourselves some stew. I admit, I was scared to cook it, but it turned out really good.



Willa was really excited and hovered over me the whole time I was putting the stew together. She dove right in and chowed down, and absolutely loved it. She said the blessing and made sure to add in a thank you for Daddy for shooting this yummy deer, and kept on and on while she was eating about how yummy it was. It was a little disturbing when she said that Bambi tastes good, though.



No, Christian didn't get any stew, but how cute is this little face? (I can say that now because he's finally sleeping again.)




We made cookies for dessert since we didn't get to go trick-or-treating tonight. I thought the kids would be upset about missing out on the trick-or-treating, but they were totally okay with it. In fact, we still gave out candy to the neighborhood kids, and Andrew and Willa were the ones who did the handing out. They were great, complimenting people on their costumes and wishing everyone a happy Halloween. Frosting does soften the blow, though.

Happy Halloween

Willa was so excited about her school party and parade this year. For the past month she was set on being Snow White for Halloween, but we had a last minute change of mind, and she went as a ballerina. Thank goodness for an extensive dress-up wardrobe!



If you look closely, you can see that Christian's first little tooth just poked through the day of the parade. What a big boy!




We went to the ward Trunk or Treat tonight, which was a lot of fun. We had a huge turnout. I had to go buy more candy for the trick or treaters tomorrow night.




Andrew was a ninja, for the 2nd year running. But this year Casey found him some cool ninja weapons, which made Andrew's year.



Christian did not like the costume or the whole trick-or-treating thing.



Andrew was definitely down with it.



Willa hates candy, and although she was really excited to dress up in her costume, she was adamant that she wasn't going to collect candy. We finally convinced her to get chocolate for Daddy, so at every car she told them, "I need to get lots of chocolate for Daddy!"

Costa Mesa

The Hammonds gathered in Costa Mesa this year. The kids had a blast with the cousins. I only wish we could spend more time with them each year. One of Casey's sisters wasn't able to make it this year, but the other 11 cousins were there, so it was pretty much madness for a couple of days.










Casey grew up in the house his parents still live in, so his room is full of treasures and collections from his youth. Each year Andrew has more and more fun exploring his dad's treasures, and this year he selected a few things to bring back with him. He is so proud of this wallet. He's become quite the saver, checks out all kinds of books on money and budgeting from the library, and has been asking for a real leather wallet for awhile. When he found Casey's old wallet he thought he'd won the lottery. Check out that stash in it. I don't have that much cash to carry around!


We also (finally) blessed Christian while with our family. It does feel a little unusual to bless one baby when another one is already on the way.

Where have we been?

So, it's been a little while since I've updated the blog, but we've been pretty busy. In the last 3 months we:

Sold our house (and did not buy a new house);


Packed up all our belongings and put them in storage;


Went on vacation;


Celebrated our 10th anniversary;

[I have no pictures of that event]

Lived in a hotel for a month;


And found out we're having baby #4!

Big times around the Hammond house (I use that term loosely)! I'll update more below.

Big News

Okay, I'll start with the biggest news first: our vacation. Okay, okay, I know, it's baby #4. And because you'll make your own assumptions anyway, I'll just settle the facts:

Baby is due April 3, but since all my babies have been 2-3 weeks early, we're anticipating welcoming the baby home during Birthday Week.

That will make Christian and the new baby 14 months apart. And yes, I remember that Willa did not walk until she was 18 months old.

Of course we planned this. Who wouldn't want to get pregnant when they have a six month old?

We won't find out the gender until mid-November.

Willa is very excited, because she sees this as her chance for justice to be served and to finally get a sister.

The House

I'll be brief on this one, and then on to more fun and interesting topics. We decided that after 7 years it was time to sell and move up to a bigger house -- and that was before we had any idea we would soon be a family of 6! So we fixed up the house, put it on the market, and sold it. Great news, right? Except we can't seem to find a new house to buy! We're trying to stay in our ward, and found a few we liked, but weren't able to get a contract on any of them. We did ultimately sign a contract on a short sale, but as you can surmise from the post above that didn't quite go as planned (thanks Bank of America). So, our stuff was in storage for a couple of months while we were between houses, and we're currently in a rental house, still looking! Our lease is up in March -- good timing, right?

And now for the fun stuff...