Halloween Happenings

For some reason, my mind wasn't on Halloween much this year- gee I wonder why? Here was my Halloween costume.

This is me at 37 1/2 weeks along.
Even though I was thinking ahead to the baby and the holidays immediately following his birth, Halloween still happened here. I let Jason carve the pumpkin with the kids this year.

Austin was very excited to wear his costume the day Karissa had her preschool party, though he didn't want me to put whiskers on him.

Karissa really wanted to be a unicorn this year, luckily I found a costume for her at the thrift store.
She enjoyed her Halloween fiesta and learned how to say, "Dulces, por favor!"

Victoria wanted to be a skeleton. I found this shirt at the thrift store, the pants as well, but I had to paint on the rest of the bones from the pelvic down. It turned out pretty good. This was at the church party.
For the trunk-or-treat at the church party, Austin was in awe at all the kids in their costumes and getting handed candy at every car.
Here's at Victoria's school parade.
right before trick-or-treating with Bethany- Austin finally let me put whiskers and a nose on him!
He was a trooper. He walked the whole way, even though Jason said he was acting tired. He wanted to earn his candy! He couldn't even look at me long enough to take his picture when he got back. He just had to have that sucker. Happy Halloween!

Autumn Time

Fall is a favorite season of many here in Michigan. Not only do we have the lovely weather, but we have beautiful leaves and apple orchards and cider mills that are hot spots to visit this time of year. Karissa's preschool went on a field trip to an apple orchard and she got to pick an apple.
Here is Karissa with her favorite friend and classmate, Sophie, waiting to learn about the orchard.
The wagon ride through the orchard was Austin's favorite.
They also got to pick a pumpkin.


"Driving" a tractor was another highlight for Austin.
On another day, we went to a cider mill so Jason and Victoria could go. You can't go to these places without getting a doughnut and cider. Austin likes the cider better than the doughnuts.

Yo Ho, Yo Ho!

Victoria has been talking about having a pirate-themed party for her birthday for almost a year now. It was somewhat inspired by this cake pattern that she saw of a pirate ship. Here's our cake. I think it was also inspired by the fact that her two best friends from last year, both boys from her class at school and church, didn't come to her party because she had a Girl's Rock party. Well, they have both since moved (boo!) so they couldn't come, but luckily we have a new good friend, who is also a neighbor, that could be invited to this gender-neutral party. She did invite another boy from class, but he couldn't come. So it was just Jaden and the girls, and Austin of course!
We played pin the patch on the pirate.

We walked the "plank".Played hot potato with pirate music, decorated our treasure hunt bags, and had a treasure hunt, which was the highlight of the party, I think. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the hunt as I was so involved in reading the clues to them and chasing after them all over the house and yard as they frantically searched for the clues. The treasure was hidden in a hole in the ground under some ground cover in the backyard. I had a giant spray-painted X over the area. Here's the treasure box after we had emptied most of it. That was all there was, though, just chocolate coins, necklaces, and some gems. The kids loved the chocolate coins! They also got them as prizes for the games.
Here's all of our pirates!
One of Victoria's favorite gifts was this Build-a-Bear cat that we sewed and stuffed today. She enjoyed her pirate party and the nice gifts she got from her friends.

Seven

Today is Victoria's 7th birthday and for some reason it seems really old to me. Maybe it's because she is acting so much older and is changing in so many ways. She has lost both her front teeth now, goes to school all day, is learning how to ride her bike without training wheels, and is much more helpful around the house. I can give her responsibilities now and she can do them. They are simple, like taking the garbage cans in from the street, but she can do them. She was never one for wanting to help much, she was just in her own world and couldn't care less if Mom was putting laundry in, like Austin. But she is more interested in what I do now and wants to help more.

She has taken to going to school all day very well and just loves school. To my surprise, the last two weeks she has not requested to watch a show after school and has only had her "video time" on Saturdays and Sundays, which is major for her! She used to always need that down time, but she has realized that there's not enough time in the day to play and watch a show, along with her homework and piano practice. (She started piano this year and has really enjoyed it, even though she didn't want to do it at first.) So now, instead of watching a show, she will come home and play with Tiny Town, run her own classroom with her animals and dolls and Karissa, or write and illustrate her own stories. She has always been into writing and drawing and still is. I can't count how many stories she's written and books she has made! She enjoys illustrating them as well. She's reading fairly well, though I would say she likes to write more than read for now.

Of course she is still the energetic and "full of life" person she's always been. She enjoyed the many phone calls she got on her birthday and talked every one's ear off.

This is her when she first came downstairs this morning. This look is just a look of excitement because it's her birthday, not for anything in particular. She even held it for me so I could take a picture, since the wide mouth reminds me of her mouth the second she was born, wide open! Here's her new leggings I let her open before school. She also brought her new sandwich holder to school.

After school we got to practice riding her bike without training wheels.
Here's the pillow pet that she's been wanting for a while.
She's very excited for her new leotard for dance. She also enjoyed every other card and book that she got and looked at each one with excitement and squeals of delight.

Austin had to help blow out the candles.

Happy Birthday my lively Victoria! We can't wait for your pirate party on Saturday!

Tiny Town

Victoria has loved going to school all day, but she is very worried about having time to play with her toys. She and Karissa have created a place called "Tiny Town" in the basement. It's always set up differently, but it usually involves using all of the toy buildings and character people, set up in some organized way. This week it was in a circle. As soon as she wakes up in the morning she wants to play with it before school and when she comes home she wants to play with it as many times as she can in between homework, piano practice, and whatever else is going on that afternoon. Karissa and Austin play with it when she's gone, but not as much. The kids like playing with Tiny Town so much that they actually played with it during General Conference this weekend, whereas usually they bring up all their toys to the living room. They did still listen to much of it, but instead of getting restless and whiny when they had enough, they just went and played in the basement. They told me today that they really like all of their toys. That's good, because we have a lot!