Sunday, October 28, 2012

Happy Halloween

My oh My do our holidays look different now.

You know those 10, woops make that 11, pumpkins we have carved out on our front porch. Well they are now according to Ribbit "leaking". Its gross, they are black with mold, bent in on themselves and yes in fact are leaking. I guess we will leave them since they look "scary"...i mean thats how some people celebrate Halloween right?...with scary "leaking" pumpkins?

We also tend to take over at Fall festivals. My two older children are very very rough and therefore they scare all of the other little children in bounce houses. I was holding Baby Boy watching my other two jump and I saw through the netting this little hand come up, desperately grab what netting they could, and then a small little girl face with a "HELP ME DEAR GOD" look followed but only for a brief second because my daughter was bouncing to close and she couldn't keep her balance long enough to scream for her mom. It was classic.

I had to laugh for several looonnng minutes before I told the mom that I think her child was ready to come out..and before I could ask my two to tone it down a bit. 

Thanks to my parents, we also have to sing Monster Mash WAHEWWWWWWW about 20 times a day as well. Its not acceptable to sing it without repeating the WAHEWWWW part at least 12 times with our arms outstretched and moving from side to side. Charming.

Ribbit also does not understand how a "cake walk" works. She walked on the inside of the circle of chairs, in the opposite direction of all of the other children playing. She ran to "her chair" every time....not the one she was closest to...but "her chair". No other child could sit there either, it was "her chair". The problem with that is that her chair never won....not for 15 rounds of playing cake walk. That number is not an exaggeration. Good thing she is cute, right?...thats what the teenagers working that station thought too and finally "pulled" her chair # to win. She immediately raised her hand, grabbed her brownies and asked to eat them all because she was " so so hungry"--her new phrase.

A look at Halloweens past.....

Our last year in TN...we were...wait for it...Ceiling Fans....haha, yes we did make this up 20 minutes before meeting our friends for a haunted house/pumpkin patch outing.


Our first year in TX...Our Pump "Cam". Ohhhh...lets just pause here and remember that glorious season and never let it fade from our memory...especially not right now when they are doing so AWFUL!


 

 Our 2nd year in TX...I was a SUDOKU puzzle and Adam was a #2 pencil....once again, our creativity impresses even us.
 And here comes our sweet sweet kiddos..trick o treating with my 2 of my sweet sweet students last year!
 And a glimpse of our Halloween so far this year....


Yup we put our 7 month old (now 8 months) in a pumpkin...don't worry we aren't THAT redneck, we put him inside a Kroger bag first :). Look he loved it!
 Elvis ran by super quick, scared to death!
 By this picture the kids were done. I had to pretend to toot on Adam and then slip and fall to get any sort of "real" smiles out of them. If our neighbors weren't already suspicious, well we have proven that we are in fact CRAZY!! I was making all kinds of sounds and weird motions to get and hold their attention, while they smiled and keeping Baby Boy from eating his way out of that pumpkin.
Love my sweet sweet family....can't wait to see what crazy things we do next :)

Friday, October 26, 2012

Diaper Blessings

Baby Boy is just now wearing diapers that his mommy and daddy purchased. He is 8 months old and we just now had to buy the little stinker diapers. We still have wipes and baby bath soap and outfits up to our eyeballs though. What a testimony to the sweetness of our friends and the prompting of God in others lives to bless us.

Baby Boy is now saying lots of ba ba ba BA with a very silly face. I think he may be trying to say bottle. Lots of da das too! When I went to get him out of his crib the other morning he was sitting there, almost indian style just talking away to whoever would listen :).

Ribbit is getting soooo smart and picking up on everything. She reminds mommy and daddy to use our manners quite often and makes all kinds of observations. She likes to tell everyone that she doesn't go to the baby class anymore at church either :). Tomorrow for Reformation Day at school she is going to be a bumble bee. She has reminded me several times over the last 2 weeks that she needed tights underneath her costume because it itches her. We finally got those tonight and she is very excited.

Goober is going to be Sampson. Sooo..we got a muscle suit, but a wife beater over it and bought a long crazy wig. Nothing else will do.
He is going through chapter books faster then we can buy them. We made a very large donation to the book fair this week...its something we are definitely encouraging but we have to constantly ask him to stop reading in order to do homework, eat dinner, walk :).

Here's our adventures of pumpkin carving this year. Both kids were extremely disgusted...thus the faces :)
 She wanted to reach in and feel it but then had to shake her hands vigorously to get the "yuck" off.
Check out Goobers face..he is literally disgusted :)
 EWWWWW
 My yittle punkin
 Mommy its got EW!
 Showing her how to light the candle inside.
 See my punkin with de light?
 He finally reached in to dig some out but then immediately washed his hands!
 His "goofy smile" face. Love those sweet glasses and curly hair!
 Our ghost.
 2 of our 10 pumpkins lit :)

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

New Fav Verse

1 Peter  2
13 Be subject for the Lord's sake to every human institution,[b] whether it be to the emperor[c] as supreme, 14 or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good. 15 For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. 16 Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants[d] of God.  
17 Honor everyone. 
Love the brotherhood
Fear God. 
Honor the emperor.


This is one of my new favorite verses. It speaks so well to our hearts around election time. We must not forget that when we honor our authority, we honor God. 
As a fleshy flesh sinful dirty rag I also love that when we do good foolish people are silent....we don't need to heap coals on them or get the last word.  
It also reminds us that we have a dual citizenship....to America(our gov't) and to the Kingdom of Heaven. We must be active participants in both but only when they run parallel. If they ever contradict then our loyalties stay with God, we are living servants for Him. 
Finally, these verse keeps my blood from boiling during the debates..:)

More pictures of my sweet blessings at their birthday party celebration with friends...I know its a little late...there goes my Mom of the Year award :)

Playing with Papa....you can see that little tongue out...probably saying " dada da"
 Jumping away!

 That little face melts my heart.
 "HEY DADDDDYYYY"
 This cute little thang played dodgeball pretty much the whole time with his friends...Dylan and Zach....in his teachers words " being friends with Zach is the goal for 2nd grade"  :). Thats okay with us, they are all sweet little men.

 Speedy man grabbing the balls to throw back.
 Always smiling!
 Oh, those little teefers......Look at that hair, its starting to get crazy like big sisters!!
 Getting ready to eat cupcakes and sing!
 Chocolate and football themes for Goober....
 ......and vanilla and princess themes for Ribbit.
 She needed some help blowing out her big ole princess candle.
 Her best friend "Naphan"...Nathan came to jump with her. When he left his mom said "give Ribbit a good bye hug"....instead  Ribbit tackled Nathan and gave him a big ole kiss on the forehead. They both died laughing which set me and Nathan's mom off as well....two very sweet friends. (now lets hope she gets that whole tackling boys and kissing them thing out of her system QUICK)
 Mommy drew football lines and Dallas Cowboy stars on all the little boys.
 OH sweet BOYS!!!! These two are super sweet together and love one another!
 Playing with Naphan!
 Dancing to the song inside of her !
 A little swing action!
 Tickling each other in the bounce house.
 Collision :)
 I saw this move a whole lot during the birthday party :)
Happy Friend Birthday Party you two...We love you....remember no pinches to grow on since we want you to stay the age you are right now for forever!!!

Sunday, October 21, 2012

Punkin Carving

Another one of our busy family weekends is here! Last night the kids and I went to our school's Homecoming football game. Our guys are undefeated this year and in 6 games have only allowed 1 touchdown against them. I knew that Goober would really enjoy it and I figured Ribbit and I could have some good cuddle time.....DEAD WRONG. Goober acted as if he was 16 years old and ran around that stadium with his pack of friends from the minute we got there until the minute I corralled him to leave. Ribbit is wayyyy to popular to sit with me as well. She sat with her friend Tristen for about 30 minutes...they played horsey to the amusement of eveyone sitting around us. Then she sat with her friend Jack for about 30 minutes and they argued over whether if the B I B L E was for Ribbit or Jack since the song does say " yes thats the book for me" and Ribbit takes everything literally :). Then she sat with her friend Jordyn, one of mommies students and "ballyball gurls" and was sang too, sang with, took lots of pictures, got drinks and food, played with her puppy and got loved on. It was still fun, I got to have some good girl time with lots of my students parents and fellow teachers!

This morning we headed to Arlington for a 4 hour adoption class .....one that we have been in twice already....one that we could probably teach ourselves. BUT, if this is what it takes to wrap up Baby Boy's adoption then bring it on! They had childcare provided but with all the adoptive families there the 2 workers looked a little overwhelmed......(us adoption families are HUGE). So, Baby Boy stayed with us and got lots of holding time with momma and dada...and lots of crawling around on the floor time...he did super. After the class we headed to Target to get lots of things for all the parties we have coming up...birthday, halloween and reformation day. We also got about 5 Christmas presents...wasn't expecting to but we found great deals. We aren't doing a normal Christmas this year. Last year disgusted me, meaning I was disgusted with myself. I read the book "Kisses from Katie" and immediately decided that my children were not going to have the typical American lifestyle that consisted of buying tons of crap just to fill up our house and make ourselves feel good for about 20 minutes. Therefore for their birthdays this year they asked for donations to Katie's ministry instead of presents. We have also been talking to them about being satisfied and thankful for what we have and about a different christmas. They are asking for one thing they want, one thing they need (clothes) and then Santa is going to fill their stocking. I was shocked at how much they got last year (not angered or offended at all, just shocked.....and thankful:)...but even more shocked at how long it took them to break it, get bored with it, ask for yet another toy at the store or be ungrateful about it. I hope I don't come off as self righteous to anyone this year when we explain our christmas but I bet if you read that book you will find yourself wishing you could give everything you have away and go live a REAL life like Katie Davis in her book.

So anyways, that was a long explanation for why we bought christmas presents today....they were a good price, they are going to mean something to the recipient and they are small...just something to say we love you......without going broke or indulging in the materialistic side Christmas can sometimes have.


After Target we stopped at a local Farmers Market and bought pumpkins. The lady there was smitten with Goober and gave her a free pumpkin and was so impressed with Goober's manners (that handsome little heartbreaker) that she let him pick out the largest pumpkin he wanted and then charged him 1/2 of the price she had written on it. We now have 10 pumpkins....its a little extreme. We carved out 3 tonight with the two older kids on the front porch, put candles in them and made plans to finish them all tomorrow. The best part was hearing them both say "ewwwwwww" everytime we would reach our hands in and grab pumpkin guts....like they were both seriously disgusted. Goober would run in and wash his hands everytime he got a little gooey :). An older man that lives in our neighborhood walked by and just smiled and smiled and waved at us and finally yelled out " those kids will remember this moment for forever". I sure do hope so.....it was a fun thing to do together!!!

Speaking of pumpkins here are some pictures from our trip to the Pumpkin Patch with my parents last weekend.

This cute little pumpkin patch was perfect for pictures!
 More pictures with CC and Papa.
 Into the corn maze we went!
 This is the face we would make when we got to a dead end....there is no denying who their Daddy is :)
 This was Baby Boy's preferred mode of transportation. He just clung to my dad's head and rode around...I'm not sure who liked it more...Baby Boy or Papa?
 AH, Another dead end!
 Ribbit, Goober, CC and Adam found the exit to the corn maze. Papa, Baby Boy and Mommy got distracted and ended up coming back out the entrance. Now many jokes could be made here since both Papa and Mommy are artists....we tried really hard to get out of that thing but in the end we took one for Baby Boy...he was getting hungry and needed a bottle. We could have found the exit. That's our story and we are sticking to it :)
 They had this neat old truck there and the let the kids crawl all in it.

 She had to concentrate so hard to climb up on to that tractor, thus the tongue was out!
Riding on the "wittle chapters".
 Petting baby goats with Papa.
 Enjoying looking at the baby piggies and playing with Mommy's cup.


 Sweet Sweet scarecrows!....no one told her to pose like that :)