Recently

We visited a local fish hatchery with some friends. We got a private tour of the different buildings and got to see all the fish at their different stages.
Fish lips.
Touching a sockeye.
We spent a late night out at a local football playoff game. The kids LOVED it.
I took the kids to the Discovery Center and they had a blast. It was pretty empty so they got to run around as much as they wanted.
We had a picnic at the park afterwards. Taytum finally loves the swings!
On the way home Taytum fell asleep with her hand in her cup of marshmallows. If you look closely you can see her little hand fingering some mallows.
Other than that it's just been the usual around here... which is good.

Halloween Marathon

Our Halloween celebrations literally lasted a week! It started last Friday night with an adult only costume party at our good friend's house. These were the treats I made to take to the party. The ghosts were a marshmallow fondant so they tasted much better than regular fondant (though I still don't love the taste, but my kids did!)

Our costumes made a comeback from a couple years ago. Total cost: free.
Wednesday the kids' had their school Halloween parties. (No school Friday) We did Andi's hair in sponge rollers the night before and she thought she was so grown up. It was pretty cute.
Here is Andi as Sleeping Beauty. I should dedicate a whole post to Andi's dress. I sewed it based off of a tutorial for a Belle dress, which I was originally going to make, but Andi insisted on pink and then decided she wanted to be Sleeping Beauty. I wanted to make the dress primarily for their dress up tub because it was made out of knit, so it would be comfy and withstand their playing. So, it's not the fanciest, but it's going to be around for a while. Andi's reaction when she saw it finished for the first time was priceless. She LOVED it to say the least.
Her joyschool party was a blast. They made huge skeletons, colored pictures, frosted cookies, and had plenty of candy. (Andi is about a foot taller than everybody in her joyschool).
Carter got all decked out for his preschool Halloween party. He had a great time too and came home with bag fulls of treats, literally.
Friday was the trunk or treat. The kids had a blast at it.
I just love Taytum's little round face in this duck costume.



On Saturday we finally carved pumpkins. Our kids were so funny about putting their hands in the guts at first. It was a little too messy for their comfort zone. Carter finally got into it a bit, but Andi never did warm up to the idea.
Andi has her hair in curlers if you were wondering what look we were going for with the bandanna.
Carter tried his hand at carving and did a pretty good job with a little help from mom.

Andi's final pumpkin.
Carter's...
And Jefferson's pumpkin. Jack from the Nightmare Before Christmas.
That night a couple of Jefferson's patients wanted us to stop by with the kids.Yes, his patients love him. It was an older couple and they just ate our kids up and had special treats for them. Plus they have a little dog named Bob and that was treat enough in and of itself!
Sunday we had a few of our favorite families over for chili and scones with honey butter. Then the kids played and frosted sugar cookies.
Unfortunately, after they frosted their one cookie they were done frosting and us ladies had to finish the job.
After a Halloween movie and a few more treats, we sent our kids off to bed and then handed out candy to trick-or-treaters (one of my favorite parts). It was a happy Halloween!

KF

We headed to Klamath a few weeks back to visit family. My SIL and her kids were going to be there and we could use the get-away. I didn't get a shot of the kids in their matching Halloween shirts that my parents got them, but you can see them here where my mom is reading them stories.
We celebrated my dad's birthday while we were there. The kids were super "helpful" when it came time to open presents.
The kids also picked out Grandpa's cake. Chocolate with orange frosting and candy corns all over.
Taytum's piece of cake started off looking like this....
Then this...
And finally...
We did some fun Halloween festivities while we were there. Frosting sugar cookies is a must.
I love the look Cal is giving Andi in this one.
Then we let the kids color their pumpkins that they picked out. Carving seemed a little intense for them. We wrangled Tay by putting her in my parents convertible with the top down. It was perfect!
The kids used permanent markers... hence the no clothes look.
The bonus room has been ignored in my parents house until this trip. The kids spent the majority of their time up in this room. They colored up there, played cowboys up there, wrestled Grandpa up there...
And Carter started a little barber shop up there too!
Yup... he cut not only Andi's hair, but also Calvin's and his own. Andi came to the top of the loft looking down into the kitchen while us lady folks were down there finishing up dinner, and said that Carter had cut her hair. Her hair was in a messy bun, so I couldn't see if he really had or not. I high tailed it up there and started looking frantically for the evidence. I didn't see anything so thought for a split second that maybe we had dodged a bullet. Then Carter said he had cut it in the chair. I went and looked in the chair and there were just a few strands of cut hair. Then I looked at Andi's bun and saw a bundle of hairs sticking straight out as if they had been cut. It appeared that perhaps Carter had cut off all of Andi's hair and that once I let it down all of her hair would just fall out. Fortunately upon closer inspection it was only that one small strand. It definitely could have been a lot worse and I think he learned his lesson. Carter still looks like he has polka dots on his head, but with his hair done you can't really notice. Sorry about Cal's hair Sharon!! :)After the weekend the Stewart family headed home and my mom and I just played with the kids some more. We chanced upon a random little pumpkin patch/petting zoo thing. We had been trying to find one all weekend for all the kids to go to, but couldn't find one. Then we saw a little 8.5x11 piece of paper with the info on it in a store window and decided to go.
It was super small, but nobody was there so we got the royal treatment. They let us into all of the animal pens and let my kids feed all the animals: goat, sheep, calf, pig, bunnies, chickens...
Taytum was in heaven the entire time. She LOVES animals and will do this hilarious laugh, excited noise and shake whenever she sees any animal.
The kids each got to pick out a pumpkin.
And play in the hay bales.
On our final night there Grandpa popped up some popcorn in their industrial sized theater popcorn popper for the kids and we put on a movie.
It was a such a fun, relaxing, much needed break, as usual. We can't wait to go back to Gramzee's and Grandpa Paul's for Christmas! Let the countdown begin!