End of the Week Randoms

As soon as Samantha gets home from school, rather than decompress and relax, she is still wired from her learning and insists on completing her homework.  If she doesn't have any assigned homework that night, she gets out her 1st grade practice book (that she was given as a gift last year) and works on activities in it.  I truly admire her persistence and motivation.  

 

 

********************

A couple of weeks ago, we invited Aunt Kathy and Aunt Beth over to our house to celebrate Aunt Kathy's birthday.  She was completely surprised and kept mentioning, over and over, what a great day she had.  And we did too.

********************

I went down to my office in the basement one day and found this note on my keyboard:

I have no idea when Samantha put it there, but it definitely made my day ... and every day since.  I decided to put it up on my bulletin board so that I can look at it whenever I want.

********************

Sam will graduate from high school as the "Class of 2026."  As a fundraiser, we were given the opportunity to order sweatshirts or t-shirts with her graduating year on them.  Inside the numbers, each of the first grade students printed their names.  Now, Sam will be able to wear either her sweatshirt or t-shirt on school spirit days and any other time that she wants!

********************

We don't accumulate too many leaves in our yard because Steve chops them up with the lawnmower before they get out of control.  But, the neighbor always has a TON of them.  One night, before it got too cold out, we let the kids play in them for over an hour!  Raking up leaves and them jumping in them.  It was a family affair ...

Look at those smiles!

********************

Taking advantage of the last few "warmer" days of Fall. 

The leaves hadn't quite fallen on this tree in the front yard.  I asked the girls to pose for a quick picture, and Sam took me literally ...

********************

My little "queen of accessories," picking out a pumpkin at the orchard:

As you can see, the weather was already changing and becoming much cooler within two weeks of the previous picture being taken:

 

********************

 

Last weekend, we attended Louie's baptism in Lansing.  The girls were SO excited to wear their "sparkle dresses" (Sam's was actually a hand-me-down from some friends of mine and Sophia's was a hand-me-down of Sam's from two years ago).  And Jack?  Well, he was excited to be sporting his button-down shirt and puffer vest.  Complete cuteness all on one step.

********************

Halloween 2014

As is our annual tradition, we have Halloween dinner at our house with any family members that would like to join us.  We try to eat around 5 pm so that we have time to get dressed and be out trick-or-treating by 6 pm.  The kids are not able to visit nearly 1/4 of the houses in our neighborhood yet, as they are still quite small and the weather has been formidable the last few years.  Instead, we choose a few select houses and make sure that the kids fill their baskets and arrive home excited and happy to show off their loot.  Whoever is left behind at the house takes over handing out candy and then the kids help more when we get home.

The dinner this year consisted of spaghetti and meatballs with a salad and garlic bread.  And then lots of desserts!  The day before, Sophia helped me make candy corn cupcakes -- a layer of orange batter, a layer of yellow batter and then white frosting with a candy corn stuck in the top for good measure ...

Steve surprised us with his Beekeeper costume that he borrowed from his brother-in law, and Jack was the most adorable lion (who has been practicing his "ROAR!" for weeks now):

I promised the girls that I would paint their faces for Halloween night -- Sam wanted the traditional Wicked Witch of the West green face paint and Sophia wanted pink and purple ("good witch") make-up with some sparkles:

A family picture:

Upon seeing my "costume" Sam was thoroughly disappointed -- "Mom, that's what you wear every day ..."  Well, not every day, but it is my uniform for work on the nights that I teach lab.  Steve was the one who suggested that I just wear that, and I thought that it was a great idea!

At the first house, Jack was a little apprehensive, but then he totally got the hang of it.  In fact, he was insistent from that house on and he wanted to be handed the candy and then HE would put it in his bucket himself. 

It was windy ... and cold ... and misting rain (snow earlier in the day!) ... but the kids were troopers!  We kept hopping into and out of the van and managed to go to about 12 houses before the kids declared that they were ready to go home.


My big boy, trick-or-treating on his own:

Keeping up with his sisters:

Back at home, the kids posed for one final picture with Aunt Minnie (aka Goldilocks) and Louie (a bear cub).  Louie was starting to get a bit tired and Jack was overly preoccupied with some of the candy that he scored, but Sam managed to put on her "wicked witch" face for the camera and Sophia was her usual happy self!

It was a busy day, but we had the best time!!!

Samantha's School Halloween Party

About an hour after I arrived home with Sophia from her morning Halloween celebration, it was time to leave to head up to Samantha's school to partake in her Halloween parade and party.  It was pouring rain (and starting to snow!) and parking was challenging, but I made it in just enough time to help her slip into her Wicked Witch costume.  As much as she wanted to have her face painted green, I assured her that we would do that in the evening.  It would be just way too messy for school.

 

Posing in her classroom before the parade:

 

Samantha with a few of her friends (and one little sister):

To keep the kids occupied until it was time to line up for the parade, one of the mothers read a couple of Halloween stories.  Obviously, they were very captivating.

I met Steve, Sophia and Jack down in the gym to watch the parade.  (Steve drove separately so that he could leave with the younger kids after the parade and get them home for naps.  I stayed to help with Sam's classroom party).

Sam's class had an abbreviated Science class right after the parade, which gave us time to get the classroom ready for the party -- food, crafts and games.  Once the children arrived back in the room, the fun began!

There were plenty of games (lots of candy to be won for prizes), and I was in charge of supervising the ring toss game.  For that reason, I didn't get a lot of pictures, but I know that Sam had loads of fun moving from one station to the next.  We ended with a craft -- which I insisted on finishing at home.  Sam was fine with that idea and understood that it meant that we could leave a few minutes early and beat the after-school traffic jam.  Also, I had many things to prepare before our evening guests arrived at our house to celebrate the holiday!

When we arrived home, Sophia and Jack were still sleeping so Samantha needed to be relatively quiet.  Steve set her up down in the basement with a show on TV and a pillow/blanket.  Within minutes, she was sound asleep ...

Sophia's School Halloween Party



Steve took the day off on Halloween so that we could enjoy as many of the festivities that day as possible (and also to help me out with the childcare!).  After dropping Sophia off at her school at 8 am, we headed back home for a little over an hour before I needed to go back into town to partake in her Halloween party.  I arrived at 9:10 am, ready to get her dressed in her witch costume.

 

The girls decided early on that they BOTH wanted to be witches this year for Halloween.  Sam made it clear that she was going to be a "bad" witch (said in an evil voice) and Sophia was quick to add that she was going to be a "good" witch -- I think that the idea of being bad/evil was bothersome to her. 

 

I easily found a "Wicked Witch of the West" costume for Sam and Sophia was excited when I showed her a picture of a potential costume for her.  She LOVED that it had pink on it and thought that the "kitty cat on the apron" made it more friendly.  I bought the girls each a broom for their costumes (go figure, they chose the same one!) and everyone was happy!

 

Surprisingly, there were four witches in Sophia's preschool classroom ... and one of her friends had the same costume as her -- just a different color scheme.  Naturally, they had to take a picture together ...

 

Gabriella and Sophia (Gabriella's older sister went to preschool with Sam and is in Sam's 1st grade classroom):



 

Once a few of the kids saw me snapping pictures, they huddled together and posed:

Sophia and Mrs. Hicks, her teacher:

The kids began by decorating bags with stickers so that they would have something to put their candy from the pinata in.  This activity was made for Sophia.  That girl loves stickers!

One of the mothers read a Halloween story and held the students' attention for a great deal of time.  She was a great storyteller.
 

Having a Halloween snack:

Playing a game of Halloween Bingo to win a prize:

Scrambling for candy from the pinata:

I had to stand back and laugh at the scene that unfolded with the pinata.  Mrs. Hicks explained to the children that there were 12 strings on the pinata and only one of them would actually open the pinata.  She didn't know which one it was ... it could be the first string pulled or it could be the last string pulled.  It turns out that the very first child pulled the lucky sting!

The kids scrambled for the candy and were scooping it up by the handful.  Not Sophia.  Nope, she was painstakingly picking out her most favorite kind of candy.  It was adorable.

Afterwards, we packed up and headed home to eat lunch before Sam's Halloween festivities began ...

Carving Pumpkins

Time seemed to get away from us the week leading up to Halloween ... With dance lessons on Monday night and me teaching on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, our only possible day left to carve pumpkins was Halloween Eve (Thursday) -- after Sam got home from dance.

We had everything all set up so that as soon as Steve walked in the back door with the girls (Sophia likes to go and watch Sam dance) at 6:45 pm, the girls set to work cleaning out their pumpkins. 

I didn't even bother to have Sam change out of her leotard and tights; the girls simply donned their aprons and worked at lightening speed to remove all of the "guts."

Sometimes they used and their hands, and at other times, they attempted to use a spoon:

 

 

 

Now, Jack was a different story all together.  He was definitely intrigued ...

 



But any interest in actually sticking his hand into the gooey mess, was short-lived.

Within seconds, he was DONE.  Nope, absolutely no pumpkin cleaning happened with him that night.

 

So, Steve took one for the team and finished cleaning out Jack's pumpkin for him!

And Jack got moved over to an area where he practiced putting Sophia's top on her pumpkin and taking it back off again about 62 times, much to her frustration.

 

 

Soon, I jumped in and helped carve Sophia's pumpkin exactly to her specifications.

 



Those directions included me carving "six square eyes, one triangle nose and two curved mouths."

The final products waiting to be placed outside with a candle in them:

Fall Fun!

The weather is starting to turn crisp around here; cool evenings and colder mornings.  I bought extra gloves last week for the kids and hat for Jack ... The girls still have hats leftover from last year, but Jack needed one to fit his growing head this season.

A few nights ago, we needed to get out of the house.  The kids were restless to run and we had a good hour before bathtime.  We hurriedly threw sweatshirts on and ran outside, eager to play in the leaves encompassing the wet ground.  Cheeks and ears were red, hands were dirty and leaves were stuck in everyone's hair, but the smiles were big!  It was some good old Fall fun!

Sophia has been a little "under the weather" this week, and it was good for her to be able to get some fresh air ...

Jack is getting so much better at keeping his hat on. 

Copying the girls and sitting down in the leaves:

And then laying in them, laughing the whole time:

 

 

 

Attempting to make a "snow angel" with the fallen leaves:

 



Being "one with nature":

 

My three happy babies:

 

 

 

The best part of playing in the leaves is being able to throw them up into the air:

 

And what is even more fun than that?  Having someone else to do it with ...

Yup, runny noses, messy hair and rosy red cheeks.  It was worth every minute of it.