Pumpkin, Pumpkin

I like carving pumpkins as much as the next person...ok, maybe not. 

Since we have little kids I usually find the actual task of carving an unpleasant one 'cause I end up having to gut and carve all the pumpkins myself (while little people tell me I didn't make it scary enough) and try to keep anyone from hurting themselves or spreading pumpkins guts far and wide. 

Last year Scott was gone for Halloween too and the whole carving experience was particularly trying, so this year I decided to try something the kids could participate in more.  And something that didn't involve knives or guts.  Painting.  Here is Matthew painting his ghost pumpkin.   We spray painted some of the pumpkins (according to designs chosen by the kids) and let them dry.  Then the kids painted their designs on top.  Matthew dressed up as a ghost and wanted a ghost pumpkin to match.  The white spray paint I got didn't give great coverage, but it still looks ghost like.

Anna wanted her pumpkin to match her costume too, so she painted a ladybug pumpkin.  I thought making a ladybug pumpkin sounded fun so I spray painted two pumpkins red, one for me, one for Anna.  I was too busy trying to keep Grant out of the paint and Anna wanted to paint both so I let her.  She was very generous with the black dots.  She also gave the big pumpkin a face.  She loves painting.

I would have let Grant paint but he refused to wear a smock, so I let him decorate a pumpkin with foam alphabet stickers instead.  He liked that a lot.

 Sometimes he was confused about which side of the letter was sticky, but he persevered.

 I actually thought his pumpkin turned out pretty cool!

 Here are the kids putting on some finishing touches.

Anna decided she needed to add some other colors to her ladybug pumpkin.  She started with blue and then told me she wanted red.  I reminded her we had spray painted the entire pumpkin red, but she still wanted to add a little more.  Later she wanted to paint it "red and yellow mixed."  There is just something weird about painting a pumpkin orange.  :)  I don't question her artistic genius though.  She knows what she's doing.

 Ta Da!  Two ladybug pumpkins.  I guess the orange part must be on the other side?

And Matthew's pumpkins.  He painted a ghost (the big one) and a "baby vampire" for the little one.  I didn't get a good picture of the baby vampire's face.  I'll have to get that later.
The painting and stickering were fun.  We may try it again next year.
Matthew was disappointed when I told him I didn't want to carve all the pumpkins, so we left one big one aside to carve all together.  One I can handle.  I hope!

Trunk or Treat

This week was our church Halloween party.  Getting everybody dressed and ready was a big job.  And getting to and through and back from the party was another feat of strength.  Luckily we all survived.  My mom was here to help me this year.  Scott was gone last Halloween too, so he has yet to experience the fun of our Colorado ward Halloween party.  Maybe next year.  In this picture we have (L to R) Anna as a ladybug, Grant as Batman, Matthew as a Ghost, me as Super Mom and John as Superman.

 Here are the bigger kids all dressed and ready to go!

 

 Here is Matthew in his ghost costume...

BOO!!  Were you surprised?  His "BOO!" also glows in the dark for added Trick or Treat fun!

We made the Boo shirt and part way through the evening I started to wonder about the wisdom of putting a 5 year old boy in an all white costume.  But the costume was his idea and he amazingly emerged from the party with only a little orange frosting on his face...nothing on the costume.  Hooray.  This ghost may make it to real Halloween!

Anna the ladybug.

Anna is growing up and this is how I know.  Last year she changed her mind semi-weekly about what she wanted to be for Halloween.  This year she decided on ladybug a few months out and has stuck with it.  Amazing.  She was such a cute ladybug.

 

Anna wanted to have something glow in the dark that went with her costume like Matthew's Boo!

She decided she would make a flower out of paper and write "Buzz" on it.  The Buzz ended up being spelled "BUS" since Anna likes to write things on her own.  I helped her put glow in the dark puffy paint on her flower.

Here is Grant as Batman!

He was busy and didn't want to hold still for a picture.

 Here is his cape.  

He didn't like the cape and wanted me to take it off him, so he didn't wear it for the party.

Super John!

Does it look like he's flying through the air?

 

 He was very cute!

 He only sort of liked his costume

 And sometimes he didn't like it at all.  Poor John!

And here I am in my costume: Super Mom!

I'm not a real super mom, I just like to dress up as one for Halloween.  :)  I had a mom utility belt complete with diapers, wipes, A&D ointment, a sippy cup and goldfish crackers.  During the party I had to take the sippy cup (which was a spare) and wipes off the belt for real use.  And I almost took the goldfish off when a toddler (not my toddler) started asking me for some.  It's good to be prepared.

Ghosty and Batman again

 Everyone getting ready to go

 

And all of us together again before we head out the door.

 At the party!  Matthew was excited 'cause they had hot dogs to eat.

They also had chili and all the chili accoutrements.

Yum!

 

Grant at the party.  He was starting to fade and wasn't his usual rambunctious self.

 John decided to take a nap at the party which was very accommodating of him.

Most of the pictures turned out blurry.  Here are Grant and I waiting for the other kids to do the cake walk.  Grant was getting pretty sleepy by then.  First he tried walking around with the other kids.  Then he wandered into the middle and just stared.  Then he wanted me to hold him.

 Anna finally won a cupcake...

...and they let Grant have one too

Matthew never won at the cake walk but got to eat most of Grant's cupcake after it was abandonded.  We had lots of fun going around to the different games at the party and finally Trunk or Treating out in the parking lot.  It was around or below freezing so the Trunk or Treating didn't last long.  Too cold.  Everyone had fun though!

Day at the Zoo

We took advantage of a day off school last week and went to the zoo.  The kids had a lot of fun.  Grant really liked looking at the animals this time, and John was a good little traveler.  I would never attempt such an outing with all four right now without my mom helping me, so thanks mom for making the trip possible!!  Anna wanted to bring her stuffed animal, "Wool," who she says is a female husky dog, to meet the other animals.  So extra points for spotting Anna's husky in some of our photos.

 Grant by the big giraffe feet

The kids all got to feed the giraffe some lettuce leaves. Anna decided she didn't want to when she saw the giraffes big tongue but Matthew and Grant gave it a try.  Here's Grant pointing at the giraffe.  I tried to get his different excited expressions on camera, but it wasn't that easy.

 With the giraffes.  Grant is saying, "OOOOHH!"

In the Budgie Buddies room (aka the room from the movie The Birds).

We'd never been in this exhibit before so we thought we would check it out.  You go in a set of double doors and as soon as you enter the room, there are budgie/parakeet type birds flying EVERYWHERE.  I was afraid they would poke my eyes out a few times.  The kids were terrified.  Grant cried and wanted me to hold him while Anna clung to my leg.  I kept telling the kids that the birds wouldn't hurt them (although I didn't feel entirely sure of this, what with the eye level flying going on).  I was right in the middle of telling them they shouldn't be afraid of the birds when two large-ish ones landed on my back and head at the same time.  I screamed and tried to wave them off me, which seemed like a natural reaction at the time.  This, however, cast serious doubt on the credibility of my "the birds won't hurt you" speech.  Oh well. 

We eventually got used to the birds.  Another one landed on my shoulder and wouldn't fly away.  I figured if I tried to take a picture of him he would fly away before I could get a good shot.  It didn't work.  So here we are with my bird friend.  I didn't freak out this time when the bird landed on me.  Progress!

There were little bird seed sticks the kids could use to feed the birds.  Of course, when you have a stick you WILL get attacked by a million birds.  For this reason, the first few sticks we had ended up being thrown on the floor by the kids during the initial attack.  Later, Matthew decided he would like to try again.  He was very brave and a nice green bird came and sat on his stick for a while.  No other attackers.   Although I think Matthew was on his guard...just in case.

He looks like he's ready to drop and run at any moment.   I was too. ;)  So from these pictures this just looks like a fun place to see some birds...and not at all scary.  :)  I guess it wasn't so bad.  No one got their eyes poked out.  That's something right?

Next we checked out the snakes.  Matthew, Anna and Grant were all very fascinated by the snakes. Grant would even say "Nake" as he pointed at them.  He is learning so many new words!

 Playing in the spider web at one of the kid play places there.

 And hatching out of the egg.

 Coming out of the big tree
Grant had such a fun time exploring and keeping up with the big kids

 Matthew got to climb the big spider web

John was on this outing too.  He was very good.  I fed him and changed him just once while we were there.  He rode in the stroller or baby carrier the rest of the time.  And the weather was nice that day too.  He'll get to enjoy the animals when he's older.

Grant deciding whether to check out the little cave at the otter exhibit.  He eventually went for it.  He walked all over the zoo and had to check out everything.  Maybe that's why I have so many pictures of the back of his head.

They closed the zoo early that day 'cause they were having a special Halloween event there that night.  We got to see their garden of jack-o-lanterns and a lot of other Halloween decor.  We had a great time at the zoo, but by the time they were closing we were all ready to go.  We'll be back.

Moments

I've been trying to post a lot so Scott can see pictures of what we are up to here.  Some of these posts may be boring.  Sorry for that.  You've been warned.  :)

These are a bunch of random moments from life the past few weeks.  

Here is Anna interviewing Grant.  I thought it was sweet she included him in her make believe play time, 'cause she doesn't often do that.  He loves being included.  And he gave a great interview.

Matthew has been feeling short on guy time lately, so he was very happy to have my dad and brother come visit.  My dad offered to help him with his marble works, which I think DOES take an engineering degree of some kind to build.  Luckily my dad has one.  I consulted a little bit on this project.  :)

 John does his tummy time.

He didn't love it.

 He was glad when someone helped him turn over.

 Anna gives a puppet show for Matthew.

I'm not sure what this puppet show was about, but it went of for a looong time.

It reminded me of some tea parties I've been to lately.

 Pay no attention to the little girl behind the curtain.

Anna and Matthew have both been practicing their writing and doing a great job!  Anna wrote this note all by herself (with no grown up or Matthew help of any kind).

She wrote "DADE" at the top for Daddy.  And down below "R DADE MUESD" which was supposed to be something like "Our Daddy is missed."  I thought it was pretty impressive that she sounded it out on her own.

John is growing and growing.  He likes grabbing things now and trying to put his hands in his mouth.

 He hasn't quite gotten the hang of it

Our porch swing.  I've been wanting to get a new cover or new cushion for this swing and finally bought some fabric to recover the old one.  I never got around to sewing it, so my mom offered to do it.  I think it looks nice.  Thanks Mom!

 Matthew bit his pita in the shape of the United States.  So patriotic.  ;)

After our pita dinner that night I asked Matthew to bring the one remaining pita half into the kitchen so I could save it with the other uneaten pitas.  He was happy to help, but between the dining room and the kitchen he decided to take a bite of the pita...you know, before we put it away.  I was amazed that he would take a bite of the leftover pita we were going to save after leaving half of an uneaten one on his dinner plate.   He said he got hungry on the trip (which is probably 10 feet).  I had to take a picture.

I warned you some of this might be boring, right?

And here's little John getting sleepy.

 

And sitting with Grandma.  My mom helps me a lot with John and Grant - my two babies.  Grant is really 18 months and getting more self sufficient as time goes on, but I had the realization after John was born, that for all intents and purposes, they are both babies right now.  And having two babies to deal with at once can be pretty insane sometimes.  So its nice to have help.  I think John was getting held here while I tried to make dinner.  He looks happy about it.

 And here is another little helper of mine.

Anna is growing up and growing out of some of her tantrum-y behaviors (that's a word I just made up).  I had a parent/teacher conference with her preschool teacher last week and she told me how wonderful Anna is in class.  When I mentioned that Anna is sometimes prone to tantrums at home, the preschool teacher was truly mystified.  She said Anna never even steps out of line in class and gets along well with all the kids.  She said Anna even sticks up for other kids when they won't stick up for themselves.  She has been doing fewer time outs at home and having fewer tantrums (still some...just fewer) so I'm hoping she's going to outgrow some of that.  Being strong willed is not a bad quality...as long as it doesn't rage out of control.  We love you Anna!