Happy Halloween!!

Wednesday, Sam and Alice had their Fall parties at school and now they are off for two days. District 11 scheduled conferences for the 30 and 31st, I think mainly to avoid school on Halloween. I have to admit that it is really nice not worrying about parties and costumes and making treats for school on Halloween. This way we can relax all day and then go out with lots of energy on the candy hunt. Paige had her Fall Party yesterday morning at preschool. All the little ones looked so cute!

Alice was really sweet to Paige and held her hand around the classroom as all the kids trick or treated....

Some of the children in Alice's class pose for a pic. Note the kid in front squeezing his sister's face:)

Sam decorating a mask during his Fall Party.

Last night, we carved our pumpkins into scary Jack O' Lanterns. Sam did a great job on his and only needed a little bit of help from Dad. Don't worry, a 7 year old with a knife does sound alarming, but Scott was very close. Alice and Paige designed their pumpkins with sharpies and then Scott and I did the cutting to reveal their creations! Afterwards, we played a mean game of Go, Diego! Go! rummy and snacked on the pumpkin seeds.

Alice and Scott making silly faces. Oooo....scary!

Back to conferences...Alice (Kind) is doing great and is really doing well with her math skills and is reading up a storm. Sam (1st grade) is also doing great. He loves to write and is working on a pirate chapter book right now. He eats up anything that his teacher gives him and is always ready for more. I am more than proud of them....if you can't tell :)

Have a happy and safe Halloween.
Jennifer

Father Fall Festival

Last night, Paige's preschool had a father fall festival. Scott took Paige and Brendan to the festival and they decorated pumpkins and ate ice-cream. Brendan attends the same preschool as Paige. The had a blast! Paige thought it was so cool to go with just Daddy and Brendan (no Sam or Alice). Of course, she HAD to wear her Pocahontas costume. Here are some cute pictures of her pumpkin and her and Brendan being silly.

Birthday Boy!

I think that I start most of my posts with a little line about how busy we are. I am finally realizing that this is how life will be with 3 (soon to be 4, someday) and that I just needed to adjust my thinking to include less sleep and more events.

On Friday night, we took Sam and the girls out to dinner at our all time favorite pizza place, Il Vicino, downtown Colorado Springs. While we were downtown, we surprised Sam by swinging by the Skate shop and letting him pick out a skateboard for his birthday. He could not believe it! Beaming would not be a strong enough word for the look on him face as he left with camo skateboard in hand. When I tucked him into bed, he said "This was the best day of my life!".

Well, I have been emotional all week just thinking about the fact that he is turning 7. Wow! I am definitely not old enough to have a 7 year old....

On Saturday, we spent part of the morning at Garden of the Gods and then headed down to Manitou Springs for the coffin races. Yes, I said coffin races. Every year, around Halloween, teams ready their "coffins" to race through town. They are dressed in fun costumes and have coffins decorated to match. Someone has to sit in the "coffin" and be pushed very fast down Manitou Ave. We had never been and it was very amusing! Later in the afternoon, the kids donned their costumes and we headed out to a Halloween party. Ellie and Brendan went along with us so that Kent and Victoria could have a night out. We had a great time eating chili, making caramel apples and decorating pumpkins. All 5 kids fell into bed without a peep.

Sunday, we took all the kids to church. After church, we spent the rest of the afternoon decorating and getting ready for Sam's birthday party. At 3 o'clock the house was full with 13 very excited kids. Sam had an Under the Sea party. Scott started out by reading a shark book to them and then we went down "under the sea"to the basement where I had decorated to make it look like you were really below the water. They crafted and played games, had a snack, whacked the shark pinata and feasted on blue cake and ice cream. We sent them all home full of sugar and a bag full of candy (note Sam's blue Gatorade mustache)! The last big birthday down for this year.

Paige and I are laying low today. I think she might have croup. After we put her to bed last night, she woke up coughing and having a hard time breathing. I put her in the shower and it seemed to break it up a bit. Scott put the vaporizer in her room and she succeeded in sleeping through the night.

Sometimes I think this is God's way of telling me to slooooowwww down. Take a day off. Cuddle my baby. Wear my pj's all day....okay, maybe not THAT but it does sound good. :)

No peeking!!!

Candy!!!!

Alice, never look down the barrel of a gun, even a Nerf gun!

Have a great day! If you happen to come by, don't be surprised to see us in our jammies!

Jennifer

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It.....

Snow!!!! AHHHHH! I knew that it would happen eventually but I am so not ready for this!!! We woke up this morning to a couple inches of the white stuff all over our toys on the deck. I guess it is time to put the summer fun away. On to coats, hats, mittens, boots, etc. Bummer!

We had a idea that this might be coming by yesterday afternoon. The kids had their last track meet. When we first went out to set up the sun was shining and we were all comfortable in our short sleeves but by the last race the wind was blowing and the temp had dropped about 30 degrees. The kids did great and ran really well despite the colder temps. Sam says he is a cold weather runner :) He took 4Th in his race and Alice took 11Th in hers.

Let's all pray for the sun to come out and melt this snow away. Come back another day, like, um, maybe Christmas!

Have a warm day!

Jennifer

BOO!

My little Darth Vader, cow and bumble bee. I was so lucky this year. I didn't have to make a costume. I would have been sad if I had not just made poodle skirts two weeks before.

We had a busy fun weekend. The only thing that we had planned for our weekend was cleaning up the landscaping and getting it ready for winter. Well.....we decided to take the kids to the zoo, have dinner with friends and pretty much play for most of the weekend. On Friday night, we took Sam, Alice and Paige to Boo at the Zoo. They were so excited to dress up in their costumes and get an early start on their candy stash. The weather was awesome and the crowds were manageable :) Here are some cute pictures, before, during and after the zoo.

Sam hangin' out with some Star Wars guys. (Sorry, Vic, I can't remember what you called them.)

Don't bother us, we're eating...

We are so blessed to have wonderful friends living so close to us. Our dear friends, The Young's, have moved back down from Monument this summer and we are so thrilled. Anyway, we had dinner at their house on Saturday night. Kent's mom is in town this week and we really love visiting with her when she is here. The kids were all surprised with a birthday cake and presents to celebrate everybody's birthdays throughout the year. Thanks Sue, and thanks Kent and Vic. We always have a good time at your house! Boccie ball rocks :) Especially when the girls win!!!

Here is Scott's yearly hunting update....no need for a new freezer. Better luck next time. At least he got a boys' weekend out of it....if you didn't hear the hunting license story, ask Scott. It is worth hearing, but I don't think he would appreciate me posting it for all to see.

Have a great week.

Jennifer

Is it Tuesday already???

I just wanted to give everyone a quick update on Paige. She had a biopsy on her "bumps" yesterday and all went well. If you don't know, Paige has two little bumps on her lower gums and nobody seemed to know what they were or what to do about them. It was starting to get unnerving. Anyway, finally I scheduled a biopsy with an oral surgeon. He was fairly certain they are just benign cysts but sent them to pathology just in case. While she was under, he took both the bumps off. He seemed to be more concerned that these cysts would grow and push around her baby teeth and possibly even dissolve roots. She was such a trooper and only cried when they gave her the shot of anesthesia. It was a scary sight for me as she was hooked up to oxygen, heart rate monitor, blood pressure......I only cried when I went into the waiting room. Aren't I a big girl! :)

She is back to running around like a normal 3 year old and is bump free. The strawberry shake from McDonald's seemed to make any lingering pain dissolve! It really made Paige feel better too!

Have a wonderful day and kiss your babies.

Jennifer

A little bit of everything

We have kind of had a crazy couple weeks and I have to admit that I haven't been doing a great job at juggling all our activities and responsibilities. I will be really glad when a couple of our commitments go away (i.e. soccer, cross country...) Needless to say, I haven't been blogging much. This might be a bit random so bear with me :)

Last weekend, Air Force played Navy and that means FLY OVERS!!! Here is the stealth bomber flying right over our house. You can't see them in the picture, but two Thunderbirds were flying behind it. We all really love watching the planes.
Papa Gary~ I took this for you! Pretty cool. You can't even see it until it is almost directly above you.

Alice had her last soccer game on Wednesday. Finally she realized that you run at the ball and kick it! She played an awesome game and luckily I had the camera.

Throwing the ball in.....

Yeah! Yeah! She is dribbling and kicking!!!!!! I think I cried. You would too after sitting through 5 weeks of games. Great job Ladybug!!!

Scott snapped these pictures of Paige playing outside this week. Isn't she sweet sitting there on the bench? Don't mind the two HUGE bucks hanging out behind her!!!! Of course, before moving her, we had to snap some photos!!!! We have a lot of deer pictures taking up space on our hard drive. Maybe if I had a bear living under my deck :) I could move on to other wildlife! Check out my friend Laura's blog http://3boys247.blogspot.com/2008/09/do-not-go-out-and-play.html. She really does have a bear living under her deck and it won't go away!

Scott is off this weekend on his annual romp through the woods with a gun (hunting). We are looking for lots of fun to fill up our weekend while he is away.

Jennifer

Sock Hop

Last night, we attended the annual Sock Hop at the kid's elementary school. The pictures tell it all!

TOO MUCH COTTON CANDY!!!

SMILE!

Yesterday I started out my day with a long walk with my friend Victoria. We met at the church and walked for about an hour. It was really nice to chat and get some exercise as well. I then headed to Target to look for black t-shirts for our family pictures, which were later in the day. Of course, I did find black t-shirts for all AND lots of other stuff I needed. Why does this always happen? I think that there is some subliminal music in Target that makes you put crazy stuff in your cart that you think you might need at some point some time in your life. Anyway, like I mentioned earlier, we were having our family picture taken for our church directory and since we only have one taken every 3 years (taking a self portrait with the digital camera does not count), we needed this one to turn out! 3 kids, it is a long shot.... So after picking up the kids at school, running to track practice, getting home, eating a snack, throwing the kids in the shower, doing homework, getting everyone dressed and redressed (I do have a 3 year old), we headed down to church for "the picture". While waiting for our turn, the kids managed to become undone, shirts untucked, hair bows hanging, shoes off...I am sure you can imagine. Wow, now I know why we only do this once every 3 years. After what seemed like days of waiting (really only 15 minutes) we redid the kids back into their cute charming selves, brushed ourselves off and finally said "CHEESE!". Every picture had %80 of our family smiling. Pretty good odds. We picked the best one and headed home. Thank goodness that is over...until 2011. Maybe then the odds will get better. Oh wait, we will have another child. Scratch that....let's just prop up the camera on the mantel and get it over with.

BTW, in case you were wondering I didn't actually throw my children into the shower. Gentle nudges :)

Paige and Alice sitting and waiting to get pictures taken....

Here's to a quiet day for all. Enjoy your Friday!
Jennifer