Happy Halloween!

We are finishing up our Halloween night.  The boys are picking out a piece of candy to eat from their haul.  Today I enjoyed going to Joshua's class for his Halloween party.  I am the room mom so I had to organize the party, but his teacher is not into having crazy parties with lots of activities and sugar, so it was simple, but fun.  I like getting to know the kids and his class is pretty small and well-behaved, so it's pleasant to be there.

Later at home, we got everyone dressed in their costumes and took pictures while waiting on Matt to come home.  Then we walked down the street to a Halloween party.  Friends from the gym host neighborhood families for dinner before trick-or-treating every year and they asked us to come.  Their house was really decorated and the kids enjoyed seeing all the fun pumpkins.  We ate and then trick-or-treated at about 3 houses, but Julia was already spacing out so she and I headed home and I put her to bed.  We got one family of trick-or-treaters while they were gone and then soon after, Matt and the boys returned.  It was cold and the boys were just not "motivated", as Matt put it.

And then the candy they picked to eat was from our own bowl...so maybe we should have just stayed home!  Anyway, it's fun to do something different and hopefully all the sweets and staying up late won't make for too grumpy a day tomorrow...I'm speaking for myself too!

Here are pictures I took...sorry so many.  I just loved a lot of them!

Leaves!

After church Sunday, Matt decided to blow off/rake up some leaves and the kids had a blast jumping in them and having leaf fights.  Gray missed out jumping in a particularly big pile and came in for lunch in tears.  So Matt kindly raked him up another pile later and he was a happy boy!  

Matt called me outside to see him buried in the leaves, which he thought so fun.

He emerges (still in his Sunday suit...and crocs, no socks...sadly he had removed his tie, which he clipped on to his tan, holed, thermal shirt.  Stylin as always!)

 Handsome.  While we're on the subject of this guy, I had a conference with his teacher yesterday.  I just knew she was going to gently let me know that Gray was giving her a fit in class with his antics.  But she didn't!  She said he really rarely gets spoken to and has only had to "take a break" once or twice, which Gray has told me about.  She said he and his friends do tackle each other outside, but they are boys and she lets them be rough.  She said he's very cute, sweet, funny.  He is very involved with and interested in his classmates.  He's above where he needs to be academically.  He is doing great at carpet time now, especially since being moved between 2 girls:)  The only surprise was that the speech pathologist wants to work with him on his "s" sound.  Something about the way he says them is not usually self-correcting.  Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised, especially since he's even been in a little bit of hot water at church lately.  Hopefully he'll settle down all around and learn to really respect and care about his teachers at school and church.

And speaking of leaves, I am going to try a little activity in November with the kids.  While it's nice at Thanksgiving to think about what we're thankful for, it's just one day.  I was really impacted by the 1000 Gifts book (about the life-changing power of being thankful)  and have been meaning to try to incorporate more thankfulness in our family, so I tried to think of how we could do that the whole month of November.  Gray helped me make these leaves and I used some ideas from the blog of the girl that wrote 1000 Gifts to write on them different things we can share that we're thankful for.  They say things like "a gift that's small" or "a gift that's ordinary".

So the idea is that we'll put the leaves in a bowl and draw out one at dinner time, then go around and share something we're thankful for in that category.  Hopefully it will get us in the "attitude of gratitude" and help us see all the ways God shows his love for us every day in the things we enjoy.

The trick for me will be enjoying the activity and not making it some "program" where I feel like a failure if we forget to do it sometimes or if one night no one has anything to say.  Have to remember that I can plan to provide teaching and encouragement all I want, but I'm going to mess up sometimes and also it's only God that can really bring good from it anyway.  So hopefully it's simple and interesting and fruitful!

Recovery

I am finally starting to feel normal again.  I'm not sure I've ever been so sick before!  This week I have slowly tried to add in activities other than laying on the couch and so far, so good.

On Mama's last day here, she drove me and Julia to Gray's class for his "project celebration".  Every quarter, the students have a different project they focus on and then they invite the parents to come see their work at the end.  This time was "All about me", so we saw lots of family photos, self portraits, etc. and Gray was very happy to have us (and Nanny & Pa) to show around his class.

See Gray's family tree?  It's at the top left of the photo.  Not sure what's up with the smile:)

Later in the week, Julia and I made a quick trip to the grocery store...the first time for me in almost 2 weeks!  And I went to Gray's class for lunch duty.

Yesterday, we carved pumpkins, which made it really feel like Fall.  I haven't quite felt in season after spending most of the month on the couch.

Gray points out the pumpkin face he likes from our festive towel.

 The boys take turns digging out the seeds with spoons.

 Julia enjoyed making "breakfast" for us by stirring seeds.

 Matt was the only one willing to get dirty.

 Joshua designed the big pumpkin face (see the drawing on the table) and Matt executed it as best he could.

 Gray went on his very first field trip to a pumpkin patch on Wednesday.  I was sad to miss, but he had fun anyway.  I carved his pumpkin from the trip.

 Gray took this picture of his pumpkin.

 Here's the finished big pumpkin.  He looks so angry that he's sweating...really Matt had just rinsed him off in the sink.

 Julia decorated her little pumpkin with a black marker.

What Makes Our House Our Home

I wrote this post sometime when I was sick and laying on the couch all day.  There's something about being forced to slow down that makes you think about this sort of thing....

Some of these things may be typical of many American families with little kids, but some are definitely unique to us.  Here's what you may find at our house on any given day:

Julia pushing her hair back in the dramatic fashion of Scarlet O'Hara.

Joshua taking his shirt off when he enters the house.

Matt practicing a perfect squat while breathing as if he was lifting a heavy weight.

Matt drinking a huge glass of milk.

Someone telling this knock knock joke:  Sawyer who?  Saw your pants walking down the street!

Wrestling between 2 or more parties, or the new favorite climb-on-Daddy's-back game referred to as "Bucky Bronco."

Someone staring at a plate of food or pile of clean laundry.

Someone asking what we're having for breakfast...at all times of day.

Someone asking how many more days till _____ (birthday, visit to Mimi and GrandGene's, etc)

Me absorbed in a blog or book about orphans.  (Though I think I've read all the ones at the library now...so fascinating)

Matt absorbed in a book about strength training.

Boys playing legos.

Joshua asking to play the computer/iPod.

Someone eating a banana.

Julia calling Mimi (or on occasion Amanda) on my old cell phone.

Some little person having a mouthful of food from a past meal.

3 kids running circles around the downstairs.

Julia changing outfits...again.

Joshua correcting everything Gray says and Gray correcting everything Julia says.

Julia chattering away about nothing and everything.

Gray or Julia not wearing underwear.

Drawings laying around the house that boys have proudly done of themselves with weapons and/or weights.  (just Joshua and Gray, but isn't it fun to imagine Matt doing that?)

Someone spontaneously breaking into a workout (usually Matt, Joshua, or Julia).

Someone asking for his back to be scratched (usually Matt or Gray).

Julia asking, "Where are the deers?"

Crumbs on the counters and floors; toys, clothes, and books on the floor.

Julia dressing up in my shoes and jewelry...then leaving them all over the house.

Someone taking a nap, needing a nap, or wanting a nap.

Matt calling me in the room to watch him snuggle the kids.

Julia asking "What was that?" about various noises.

Gray appearing out of nowhere in a bizarre get-up.

Tote bags of random things (Julia's) laying around.

Plenty of arguing, crying, snuggling, holding.

Joshua's Birthday

Well sometimes life just does not go like you plan it.  The middle two weeks of October were so packed on my calendar.  I was scheduled to volunteer at Joshua's school several times and at Gray's.  I had a doctor's appointment and several church meetings.  We were planning a birthday party for Joshua and then wanted to make his actual birthday a special day too, even though Matt would be working most of it and Joshua would be in school.

I was prepared for the busyness, but not for being suddenly struck with a virus that would have me on the couch for a week with aches, then finally going to doctor and finding out it's pneumonia and being on the couch another week (or who knows how long!).  This is not the way October was supposed to go!  But that's the way it's going anyway, so I'm left to either complain or make the best of it.

Somewhere in the midst of the sickness, before I knew what I had, we did manage to have Joshua's party.  It's all a blur to me now, but I seem to have a good many pictures from the afternoon.  HUGE THANKS TO MATT FOR BEING HEAD IN COMMAND AT THE PARTY!!

Event 1- Obstacle Course

 The Snuggle Section

 Event 2:  Snipe Hunt (2 teams each hide a little creature, then try to find the other team's first)

 Event 3:  Cake and Ice Cream

 Event 4:  Presents

 Event 5:  Dodgeball

 Joshua's actual birthday was less than the special time I wanted it to be.  I struggled to get breakfast on the table and Gray taken to school and then while Joshua played alone, I called Matt crying because I just couldn't function and he came and took Joshua to school and me to the doctor, while his mom watched Julia and the gym.  There was no eating lunch with Joshua at school like I planned and I didn't get that special Happy Birthday note in his lunch bag.  When the boys got home, it took all my energy to get a frozen pizza cooked and cut and then I had to tell the boys to get their own supper while I rested.  By the end of the night, I was able to play a little bit of a game with them.  My voice was gone too, so there was no reading through his 7th year scrapbook pages and birthday letter together, which is another of the special things I like to do to commemorate the year.  I don't know if Joshua even thought his birthday wasn't special or was missing the extra attention from Mommy.  Either way, that was how it had to be this year.  I'm certainly hoping next year will be an improvement!

And the Crowd Goes Wild!

Gray's school did a read-a-thon fundraiser this month to raise money for a playground (the school is new but I guess didn't have enough in the budget for that).   So we read about 10 books a day.  At first it was easy since Gray loves books and we had at least 40 library books in the house.  Plus there is a wait between picking up Gray and picking up Joshua so that was a good time to read too.  But then it started getting old for one of us.  Especially if that person was asked to do the reading.  That person had a few choice words for the read-a-thon, but still kept chugging along while we reminded ourselves that we needed to work for the money we raised and help our school.

We found out yesterday that Gray won 1st place for most books read of kindergarteners.  I was pretty surprised considering I had no idea how many books would be considered a lot for a week long read-a-thon.  The awards assembly was today and Julia, Matt, and I were there to cheer him on.

Gray before school this morning, ready to be a rock star.

The assembly was pretty wild.  400 kids, kindergarten to 3rd grade, all screaming and kicking the bleachers in excitement, some even trying to start "the wave".  Gray was clearly very happy to have us there (when we walked into the gym, he stared us down until we saw him) but he gave a sort of half-smile, half straight face most of the time.

And then some of the teachers came out as Cat in the Hat characters and you can see here that he and he buddy in red thought that was pretty cool.

 Then the principal began announcing reading winners, starting with kindergarten and it got so loud.  You can see Gray covering his ears!  One sweet little girl went up to accept 3rd place (and everyone cheered), another sweet little girl was called for 2nd place, and then....I made a bad decision to take pictures instead of a video.  You'll have to try to get in the moment from my description...

 Gray's name was called and the crowd went WILD.  Girls screaming in high pitched voices, all eyes on Gray as he solemnly and quickly made his way across his classmates and down the steps.  I love the pat on the back he gets from his friend in red (sorry, haven't learned names yet!) and if you can click on the picture to make it bigger, check on the kid in the gray Duke sweatshirt because his shocked face is pretty priceless.

 Gray walked as fast as he could to the teachers to accept his award, nearly turning around before they could give him both the medal and a Barnes & Noble giftcard.  He hasn't been this focused on a mission in...ever.

 He went directly up to his teacher (note the little blond congratulating our celebrity) and handed her his giftcard before his could even sit down.  Either he thought it was important grownup stuff or he thought it was worthless paper:)  Then he enjoyed looking at his medal the rest of the assembly.

 The classes were dismissed and we got a couple more pictures as he passed by.  His class actually won the award for most books read of the kindergarten classes, so they get to display this trophy, which Gray's teacher kindly let him hold for our pictures.

 One final shot.  His expression is somber.  He knows what happened here today will go down in history.

It really was fun and funny to be there and we're happy that he got to experience winning something, though I had no idea was a huge celebration there would be for just reading some books together!