The title of this post rhymes! Halloween is a crazy day at my house. Not only are there the usual school parties, costumes to put together, dinner to prepare before the kids stuff themselves sick- but it's my birthday as well! I never really liked birthdays as I child because I was extremely shy and hated being the center of attention. But now I love it! I feel like EVERYONE is celebrating my birthday.
The day went something like this: Breakfast, take Owen to preschool, take Jack to buy a second sword for his costume since his first one broke, stop at Albertsons to buy juice boxes for Jack's school party, pick up Owen & a friend from preschool, take them home, feed them lunch, take Jack and pick-up his friend and take them to the bus stop just in time, go to lunch with my girl-friends to celebrate my birthday and drink lots of diet coke, go back home and wake up Owen and Lucy from their naps, drag them to Jack's Halloween Party, pick-up pizzas on the way home, clean my messy house like a crazy woman before my in-laws arrive, eat dinner, open my presents, take the kids
trunk-or-treating, take the kids
trick-or-treating, return home and put kids to bed, rent a movie at Blockbuster to watch with my hubby and in-laws, fight to stay awake because the movie is painfully slow and boring, finally go to sleep. (Saturday was just as busy- but I'll spare you the details.)
During the trunk-or-treating, Lucy looked dumb-founded with an expression on her face like, "I am surrounded by imbecils." She'd walk backwards any time she encountered a masked person . . . which was pretty often. So I finally just scooped her up and held her. But by the time we were trick-or-treating at homes instead of car trunks, it clicked and she totally had the hang of it. She completely embraced it and would say after each house, "Neh How!" (Translation: "Next House!) She'd point her finger to the next house as Adam, her vehicle for the night, carried her from door to door.
During the trunk-or-treating Owen would examine each piece of candy before dropping it into his pumpkin pail. He'd exclaim, "Cool! Look Mama, a tootsie roll!!!" It was as though this tootsie roll was something he had never tasted or seen before, a rare gem. He did this with each candy. Fortunately it wore off by the time we began trick-or-treating at homes. I was some what exhausted of sharing his enthusiasm for skittles and starbursts. (Had they been dropping Sea's Candies into his pail, I could have definitely kept up my enthusiasm.)
And now, I present to you:
A witch, a ghost
(not a member of the KKK), and Zorro . . . . . . . . . .
Here is a darling picture of Jack, at his school Halloween party:
All the snow shoveled off our driveway created perfect sledding hills. Jack was pretty bummed that school was canceled the last two days before the holidays. He was so looking forward to the Pajama Polar Express Party, and all the other festivities. Instead, he got to stay in the house for two days. Poor Jack. He was such a good sport. He LOVES playing in the snow. Adam was so good to take him outside sledding.
Owen is our little mole. He digs, digs, and digs- whether it's dirt, snow, rock, dried peas (@ Green Bluff), sand- he is content to digs for hours! I am so excited for him to visit the Oregon Coast this summer. He is going to be in digger's paradise with that endless amount of sand!
Here are the boys on top of one of a few hills in our front yard. I'm so glad they like the snow. 
Lucy was all over the table that night:
Those gingerbread were just as fun to eat as they were to decorate. Yum!
We played musical moons (just like musical chairs, but had cut-out moons instead of chairs), raced "meteors" (crazy balloons) to see whose could go farthest, and made snow-globes with space figurines inside of them. Here is his rocket-ship cake, we lit the candles for "blast-off!"
Happy Birthday Jack! We LOVE you!
Jack had a blast playing with his cousins, but he wasn't too thrilled about me taking a picture.
Here's my Dad playing games with the kids in the basement.
Lucy didn't need any time to warm up:
And who can forget dinner at the kids' table?
Highlights of the holidays included: shopping with my Mom and Robyn the day after Thanksgiving- only fun if you have fun people with you; going to see the movie "Australia," adults only; the boat ride "Santa Cruise" on Lake Cour'd Alene; board games after the kids were in bed; having my family visit me! Thankyou and please come visit again soon!
"Don't forget to open the card first!" Jack heard us say about a dozen times.
Here are the 'crazies' with their cousins, Zack & Hailey, and their much beloved Aunt Coco.
We love you Jack. We hope you realize how much you are loved and cherished. You bring us happiness that we never knew before you were born. You are a special spirit and we feel blessed to have you in our home.
Here is a perfect example of Owen's passiveness. Lucy is grabbing his precious piece of dough that he so diligently worked on rolling out. Check out the grin on her face in the 2nd photo after she successfully stole his dough. Poor Owen.
Despite the mess, the sugar cookies were soooo yummy and so worth it. And eating a cookie put a smile right back on Owen's face.
Anyway, it was weird seeing these innocent kids get fingerprinted. Owen had a special, quiet moment with one of the officers as he was wiping Owen's fingers to clean off the ink. He was such a nice man. Their little conversation together was precious, so I had to capture the moment:
The book is "The Tale of Despereaux: Being the Story of a Mouse, a Princess, Some Soup, and a Spool of Thread." I read the book in one night and found it charming. I highly recommend it. It really helped reading it first on my own because now I can read the dialogue the way it should be read. Oh- and the movie is coming out next month. Perfect timing!
.jpg)
We were bribing our children with fruit snacks in between takes, but that didn't help much. I would've loved a photo where Lucy isn't squirming, or where Owen isn't doing his "squinty" eyed smile that he does when we tell him to "smile!" Nonetheless, there's a part of me that is at peace with all of it, because this is how they are! It's hilarious the way Owen poses for the camera, and Lucy is incapable of holding still when we're at a park. 
Four days later, on Friday, we went as a family to a different pumpkin patch. This patch offered much more than the previous one, as the following pictures will illustrate. Here are Owen & Lucy eating their pumpkin doughnuts:
You can't see Lucy's dougnut because it's inside her mouth:
The kids had a blast in the corn maze and could've stayed there for hours! I felt guilty when we had to drag them away from it:
Three days later I went to a pumpking patch again, the same one I went to for Jack's field trip. But this time I went with Owen's preschool:
I think it would be fitting to say I am pumpkin'd out! And we still haven't even carved them . . . . 
