More Fall Fun

In between some of the craziness we have managed to do a few more fall activities. A very few.  Here's Anna in her Halloween T-shirt.  She thought this was her multi-holiday outfit: Halloween shirt, 4th of July skirt and Easter (actually spring) socks.  Lovely!

 We decorated some foam pumpkins

If you are very observant you can see me in the background changing John's diaper.

Even Grant got in on the fun.  His pumpkin had a few suspicious teeth marks in it by the end.  Hmmm

 Anna with some of her finished pumpkins

This was not a high intensity craft.

 Our plum jam

My mom made delicious plum jam with the plums off our tree.

It is so good.  I hope we get lots of plums next year to make more.

We played a little dangling donuts game

Matthew had a lot of fun with it.  I like how Grant's hand is sticking into this picture.  I think he wanted to grab the donut for himself.

 Anna had a go at it too.  She found the "using your hands" method to be very successful.

 Mmmm...donuts!!

With some of the leftover face stickers from our foam craft kit we made mandarin orange cup pumpkin faces.

 Anna's had ears...or at least I hope that's what they are.

I wore one of the pumpkin smiles like a mustache and then the kids wanted to do it too.  It didn't quite look like a mustache when Anna did it.  :)  Maybe a weird shaped goatee.

 Hmm

 It just got worse and worse after that.

 See

 

And this picture is for Scott.  We made spider crafts earlier in the month and Anna decided she had to kill her spider by stepping on it.  RIP spider.  This was just after eating some chocolate candy, which is why Anna has chocolate on her face.

 

And here is part of Matthew's Halloween costume (a sneak peek).  He wanted to be a ghost, so in lieu of the sheet with eye holes cut out, I got him some white sweatpants, a white hoodie sweatshirt and a shirt to go underneath.  We used printable iron on transfers (leftover from a pack meeting activity) to make this BOO! and then ironed it on to the shirt.  And I outlined it in glow and the dark puffy paint.  Now Matthew can zip down his hoodie sweatshirt to BOO! people.  That's what ghosts do, right? I don't know.  We'll see how it goes.  :)

Seven Years!!

 Seven years ago today I became Mrs. Scott Guptill.

It's been quite an adventure, these past seven years.

This is the first time we've spent our anniversary apart,
which isn't bad for how much he travels.

In case you missed anything in the past seven years, here's a recap...

 We met in Florida


We dated


We had fun together


We dated some more


We decided to get married


We got married


We kept having fun together


We moved to Monterey


We had a baby (Matthew) 


We moved again...to Okinawa


and had another baby (Anna)


Scott deployed to Afghanistan


Scott came back, safe and sound


We moved again to Colorado this time
 

Scott broke his leg


We had another baby (Grant)

We kept having fun together...but there were more of us


We had another baby (John)

Scott deployed to Afghanistan again...

 ...and now you are all caught up :)

Things have changed a lot in seven years.
We have been blessed with these four beautiful children

Outgoing and kind Matthew (5 1/2)

Smart and sassy Anna (4)

 Happy and rambunctious Mr. Grant (18 months)

 and sweet, smiling John (2 1/2 months)

And some things have stayed the same.

We're still having fun together.

 Happy Anniversary Mr. Scott Guptill

Why Little Boys Need a Father

Reason # 76:

Grant found these dress up shoes of Anna's and wanted to try them on.  I thought it was kind of cute, plus he got mad when I tried to take them away, so I let it go...and took pictures.   Please forgive me Grant...and Scott.  At least he was wearing a very boyish robot shirt at the time.  :)

He thought it was a little tricky getting the shoes on, but eventually figured them out.  Standing up was tricky too, but he persevered.

But walking was another story.  I happened to get a picture just before he slipped in the shoes.  Heels are hard to walk in...especially for first timers...or 18 month old boys.  He didn't want to wear the shoes anymore after that.  This sort of thing would never happen on Scott's watch.   

Whisper voice:  Sorry Scott!!

Snowy Pike's Peak

While my dad was in town we took the cog railway up to Pike's Peak.  We went early hoping to beat the weather.  It was cold and clear when we got up and cold and snowing about an hour later when we started coming down.  We didn't spend a lot of time walking around outside 'cause it was so cold, but we still got great views from the train.  And it was kind of fun and cozy going down in the snow.  When we got down to Colorado Springs again it wasn't snowing...just a little rain.  We got to see a lot of nice fall colors though.  Pretty.  I didn't get a lot of pictures.  My camera is broken and I also had my hands pretty full.  My mom let us borrow her camera again to take a few pictures of us heading back down the mountain.  Here are John and I on the trip back down.  He was a good little traveler.  I like his little hat.

 

Matthew and Anna were also good!

And here's Grant with Grandpa.  Grant had to go boneless a few times when I made him come in from the cold.  Poor Grant.  He just wanted to run and run.  But I think he had fun too.

And wore himself out.  He wasn't the only one who got tired.

It takes a lot to get up to 14,114 feet.  ;)

The Tea Party That Wouldn't End

Anna had a tea party birthday party this year.  The party was a great success and Anna has been throwing impromptu tea parties for anyone she can find ever since.  Sometimes her tactics are a little aggressive, especially for a tea party.  She likes everything to be done just so and the party is not over until Anna says it's over.  A few weeks ago I attended one of these parties and Anna told me I couldn't leave or she would make her "angry face."  Eventually she let me leave.

So, while my dad and brother were in town, and sitting at the same table one afternoon, Anna saw a target of opportunity and "invited" them to be a part of her tea party.  They were good sports about it.  Here's Anna enjoying some of her orange juice/pretend tea.

Grant and Matthew never want to be left out of a big boy event...and since Grandpa and John were there, they thought they should be a part of it too.  Grant really wanted some tea of his own, but I dumped it out when he wasn't looking.  Too scary!  He insisted on having his cup on the little green plate with a spoon in it, just like Anna's.  :)

Anna served some Halloween cookies...well, she actually crumbled them into one of her tea pots and passed that around I think.  Luckily there were still plenty of intact cookies to go around.

Everyone was a good sport about the spontaneous tea party.  Eventually Anna decided the tea party was over and that her tea party hostages were free to go (she didn't even have to use her angry face!)...but not before they all did some kind of cheer.  Here she is having everyone put their hands in for the cheer.  That Anna throws the best tea parties!