Trick or Treating

We hit K's neighborhood, cause it's nice and flat and quiet, and that's where we found some more cousins to hang with :) and a whole lot of friends.

Little Henry:

If you count Henry, there were 14 kids altogether. So. . .that means a whole lot of adults too:

Cute little crowd!

Seriously. Cute.

The crew.

And, the stash. This year I taught the kids how to sort 'em, so you know exactly what you got. Ahh. . .good memories.

Ben would use any excuse to make a nice tidy line anyway. (That pumpkin belly sure gets in the way though :)

Sara managed to eat through a few without anyone noticing. She's a sneaky one.

Fall Carnival!

So. . .we got all dressed up on Saturday to go to the Fall Carnival. . .a tradition dating all the way back to my own school days. It is a cool way to get to see all the classmates in costume!

(. . .and I love that when I look at all the other moms, they have the same look on their face. You know, that whole, "this is total chaos, 1, 2, 3, 4, yep. . .I still know where all my kids are" look.)

But we still love it! Especially the dressing the kids up part. That is a blast!

Ben saw everyone else dressing up, and couldn't wait for his turn!

Up till the day of, I thought Will was going to be a cop again this year. But he decided he wanted to be a pirate. "Just like Jack!"

CUTE!!!

The carnival was really well done!

Waiting for the pie walk. . .

He throws like a boy already!

. . . .a little more distance for the big brother.

Mac n cheese. Life is good.

Pretty girl.

Ben's costume got a little warm :)

Henry's first halloween!

Good. Night.

Running Commentary

As we flew through the grocery this morning, on the hunt for only the essentials, as our cupboards consisted only of chocolate bars and syrup, Ben spys a bakery display of cookies and donuts. (Seriously, how many of those are going to sell, the day after halloween?) He reaches way over to snag them hollering, "Deee-licious!!!" I managed to avoid the mass temptation and hurried over to the produce. Ben took a look around for anything he might be able to reach, and instead, wrinkles up his nose and says, "Yucky! . . .YUCKY!!!"

Definitely time to put Candy-Day away.

Happy Halloween!!!

From the beauty, the pirate, the cowgirl, and the pumpkin!
What an awesome day :)

Ben:

Josie and the twins gave Ben some little teeny weeny cars the other day. He calls them 'baby cars'. And at some point the car must've run out of gas cause I came across this:

"Baby car goes nigh-night." says Ben.

Windstorm:

This was a big one! But managed to miss the car. . . .and any unsuspecting pedestrians.

Will:

A little gift Will whipped up for Kayte for her birthday. It is a purse for her doll, Felicity. . . .Made out of duct tape.
Isn't he the sweetest thing ever?

Oktoberfest!

We celebrated October with the Casebolt's this Sunday! It was brats and applesauce and pumpkin-carving.
Joe came down with strep and missed out on the carving, and Dave had to fill in with the knife :)
The finished products:

That's Shawna's, sweet Sara's, crazy (and huge!) Will's, timid Ben's, and creative Kayte's (missing an eyeball until she just poked the other one out to make it even :)

Will put up quite a fuss about the pumpkin innards, but it had to be done! Eventually he started getting into it and hamming it up a bit :)

Sara had no trouble digging right in:

What a good memory :)

The BIG DAY!

She did it! K gave me the great idea of not leading up to the big moment by like, a whole day. So instead, yesterday I told Kayte we were going out for errands, and when she got in the car, I told her we were going to go get it done! She was really excited!
I had to take a picture of her perfect little whole ears before it happened. She's still so little. . . .

On our way in. . . she's totally psyched! (and calm!)

But, when she sat down in the chair, she was definitely freaked out!
There was only one girl on staff, so she had to do one ear and then the other, instead of both at the same time. The first was a shocker. But she did great.

She picked out pink, cause that is her October birthstone. Isn't that nice?
Wow! She's almost so-close to being all grown up.
We treated ourselves at Starbucks. The Claire's lady gave her a little bag with her cleaner in it that said "I just got my ears pierced." I didn't notice what it said until much later, so everyone was staring at her and smiling all nice, and I couldn't figure out how they knew! And just a side note: I was a little anxious about the quality of the piercing staff at Claire's, but the girl was really fantastic and professional. That really mattered to me. I mean, it's my little girl's ears and it is permanent!
What a big day!

Celebrating fall with friends

Mom invited us and our backyard neighbors (and new/old best friends) out to her house last week to decorate animals with leaves. Such a creative project for fall! Will was skeptical at first, but turns out, he loved it! Silly Will.

Pretty amazing.