September 2016 Highlights

Extra Time with Isaiah

We enjoyed babysitting Isaiah while Jon and Chelsea had a 5-year-anniversary trip to New York over Labor Day weekend. (Jason and Amy and family watched him for the first part of the trip.) Isaiah's such a sweet, easygoing boy that it didn't feel all that different to have one more boy in our care. He joined us at church, on a run, and to Walmart, and we had lots of playtime at home, too. It was fun to have the extra time with Isaiah, and we were so happy that Jon and Chelsea got some couple time.

Visitors from Up North

Our friend, Melissa, who we attended church with when we lived in Michigan, came to our area to visit her husband's family. Nathan and I had so much fun spending time at a park one morning with Melissa, her sweet girls, and her husband. The children got along nicely and most enjoyed feeding the ducks and nutria. I loved the chance to catch up with an old friend!

Lowes Build and Grow

We met Amy and her boys at Lowe's for their children's building workshop one Saturday in September. The boys enjoyed building their boats. Ian was able to make his without much help, and Ryan was surprisingly good at hammering in the nails. Nathan most enjoyed checking out Lowe's demo showers while his older brothers built. All of the boys were proud of their finished products.

Grand Opening

A credit union near Kim's parents' house sent flyers to advertise their grand opening celebration, inviting anyone interested to join them for a free lunch and fun games/activities. Our boys loved the free face painting and balloon-animal creations (they all asked for a sword). My parents joined us for the yummy hamburger lunch. Matt and I each won our basketball shooting game brackets and were able to enter the "money machine" to grab as many $1 bills as we could. We came away with over $100. It helped that Matt grabbed a $50 bill. What an unexpectedly fun morning!

Family Fun Night

Ryan's school hosted a pickle-themed Family Fun Night for all of the school families. It was so cute! After a pizza dinner, the pickle activities started: decorating Twinkies to look like pickles and creating pickle stick puppets to use for a story that the early childhood director read to the children. They also had a pickle-eating contest between one father from each of the early childhood classes. It was fun to spend time with Isaiah, Jon, and Chelsea, too, since Isaiah attends Trinity as well.

Random Events

Here's a collection of pictures from throughout the month ....
The younger two enjoyed making apple prints...

and then painting their own designs.

Ian transformed a cardboard box into a car. (The boys LOVE boxes!)

Nathan loves sitting on the riding lawn mowers at Lowes.

Ryan built a fort using the piano bench and a blanket.

Ryan loves to create buildings out of Magnatiles.

One day, while I was making lunch, Nathan was playing in the living room. In the five or ten minutes it took me to gather the lunch together, Nathan must have laid down and fallen asleep on the couch. I was so surprised to find him this way when I came to tell him lunch was ready.

Matt is getting back into biking, and Nathan loves when he can come along for the ride.

Nathan is obsessed with sunglasses.

This picture of Ryan's was hanging outside of his classroom. It's a picture of Ryan helping Daddy make the bed. So cute!

The 4-year-old cousins love to dress up in costume when they play together.

Nathan doesn't want to be left out. :)

My heart melts when I see an older boy read (or "read") to a younger brother. :)

Ryan's class did an apple-tasting test of green, red, and yellow apples. Ryan decided he liked the taste of the yellow apples best.

We thank God for a fun September!

October 2016 Highlights (part 2)

Pumpkins

Aldi had a great deal on pumpkins, so each boy got to pick out his own pumpkin! Ryan loved "dressing up" his pumpkin with various hats and costumes before we had the chance to carve them. 

I asked the boys to pose with their pumpkins, and I have no idea why they all had a foot up on them.

 Ian and Ryan looked through templates on line to find one they liked. Ian picked a "scary face," and Ryan chose a Lego man image. Nathan let us carve whatever we wanted in his (a cross). The boys (once again this year) didn't much like the sliminess of the seeds inside the pumpkin. But they all wanted to be involved in the carving process.

 In the end, the pumpkins all turned out super cute. I'm surprised as I look through these pictures that I forgot to take a "finished product" picture. We did learn our lesson, though. We carved these about a week before Halloween, and (even with spraying the pumpkins a few times with a bleach solution) they were SUPER moldy by Halloween night. The warm Texas weather doesn't preserve the carved pumpkins very long. :)

Trick-or-Treating

The boys were spoiled by having multiple opportunities to trick-or-treat this year. One evening, we met Jaden, Cody, Amy, and my parents at Kroger (and the surrounding stores in the strip mall) for trick-or-treating. Most businesses had tables set up in front with an employee or two handing out candy (or snow cones or other treats).

Ryan (race car driver), Ian (ninja), Cody (Mario), Jaden (Luiji), Nathan (Batman)

Grammy and Papa invited us to their neighborhood for a "Trunk or Treat" event. Local businesses were handing out candy, and there were also free inflatables and train rides.

 Grammy invited us to their house for dinner (including Halloween cupcakes) afterward!

 On Halloween night, we met up with cousins and friends at a local memory care facility who had invited us to trick-or-treat in their halls. The residents were thrilled to see the kids in their cute costumes!

 We then came home to do some trick-or-treating in our own neighborhood.

 After our feet got tired, we came home. The boys were very excited to hand out candy to other kids while they enjoyed some of their own treats!

School Events

Ryan's class had "Funny Feet Day" during their F week.

 Ian enjoyed attending his Thursday after-school Lego Robotics group.

 The "big school" celebrated 50's Day on the 50th Day of School.

Random

Matt and I were invited to sit at the CLHS Crusader table at the Trinity Trivia Night. Our team was just barely out of medal contention in the event, but we enjoyed the fellowship, laughs, and great costumes. :)

 I took the younger two boys to a fall festival while Ian was at a birthday party and Matt was at a school event. Ryan's favorite game was getting to shoot cup pyramids down with a Nerf gun. Nathan preferred the big inflatables.

 We enjoyed spending some time with Uncle Mark and Aunt Kathy when they came to visit my parents.

 Nathan went through a brief stage of wanting to sleep with LOTS of stuffed animals.

 Grammy read aloud to Ryan's class. Since it was "E" week, she wore her land of Enchantment shirt, a name tag with Elaine, and a hat full of E's. She also read two Elephant books. Ryan was SO proud to have his Grammy in his classroom.

 I attended a professional development workshop (still trying to maintain my teaching certificate!!) at the zoo. We got to learn about some fun animals (like this sloth), and I even got to spend some time exploring the zoo with my family!

 The little boys had fun "painting" the house with branches from our foxtail fern. I thought they had a creative idea!

 Speaking of creative, this little guy cracks me up. Ryan was frustrated that Nathan kept removing the Halloween window clings from the bottom window. So, Ryan stood on a stool and put them all out of Nathan's reach. Next thing we knew, Nathan had grabbed his kiddie broom and was standing on tiptoe trying to push the clings off with the broom bristles. Clever! :)

 It always warms my heart when Ian reads to either of his two younger brothers.

 We had our first cooler days in October. The boys get really excited about wearing gloves/mittens/ hats since we don't have to use them much. :)

 Matt and I enjoyed attending the CLHS Gala!

 Nathan enjoyed putting all of his blueberries through the middle of his bagel one day during lunch.

 Nathan, pre-haircut, engaged in a show, likely "Mother Goose Club" on Netflix.

 Bubble bath time, post-haircuts!

 The younger two found "walking sticks" and insisted they must be painted.

 We joined Daddy at a few football games he had to supervise in October. The boys' favorite part continues to be playing in "Daddy's Big Sandbox" (the long jump pit) near the football field.

 I got the fun idea from Amy to do some "splat" painting with my guys. They stripped to their underwear and had fun using fly swatters and pantyhose legs with rice inside to "splat" paint on the paper (and fence ... and themselves ...).

 All three boys don't usually take a bath together, but they did this particular day. :)