Rock, Paper, Scizzors... Shoe!

Lately Gabe and Zach have been enjoying the game "Connect Four" so often before bed we settle down to a tournament, to see who will be the evening's champion. Early on I realized that when we would play "rock, paper, scizzors" to see who would go first, not only did the boys end it by yelling "SHOE!" instead of "shoot" but they would get into a pattern and go through all three options repeatedly. I pointed this out to John, who think it is hilarious to play this with them, because he knows exactly which "hand" they will put forth next, but they have no idea how he knows. It's a riot.

for some reason, Zach loves to call this game "Ketchup vs. Mustard". Looks like ketchup won!

Decking the Halls, etc

AH, the happy prospect of eating the finished product!

Yes, in case you can't quite make it out, that IS an old fashioned playpen surrounding our glorious * fake (*see "Flashback:holiday hilarity, O Tanenbaum) tree.  It at least increases the likelihood that the tree will make it another week.

Every year we decorate a ginger bread house together - it was a tradition in my house growing up,when my mother would actually bake a legitimate ginger bread, and we would build a house. As I added children to my family, starting with my oldest two  who were the perfect ages for such festive crafts at seven and nine our first year together, we continued the tradition, and I recall one year when my cousin Marisa and I were the only ones actually invested enough in this tradition to put the effort into building and decorating the annual gingerbread home (at the time we had seven kids bewtween the two of us - none of whom cared to help).   This year my "big kids" were not here to help, and so we waited for Rilla to be sleeping, invited Nana over, and decorated our first ever pre-assembled house. Even the frosting was ready to go!

Oh man, am I in trouble when Nana sees this!

The Christmas Festival

This year our church decided to up the ante for the annual Christmas party and turn it into a festival complete with an outdoor live nativity, caroling, face painting, crafts, a bonfire, hayride and cooking baking/decorating. It was amazing! Friday I spent the day helping Laurie set up our cozy faux living room in the church foyer, and Saturday around 2 we all headed over to help with finishing touches before kicking things off. My  three middle children were all quite involved, and had a wonderful time celebrating Jesus' birth. Rilla was totally fed up with being at chruch AGAIN and it was a miracle I got to eat, and that only because someone else held her while I quickly piled yummy potluck food on my plate and scarfed it down. John was working but helped set up Friday and many of the ladies sent home leftovers for him.

Rilla was SUCH a help decorating the tree at the front of the church!

A very warm shepherd with one blue and one brown shoe (probably should have caught that one before we left the house).

One of the three wise men (insert "wise guy" comment here!)

Festive face painting!

Much to be thankful for

This year - as always - we have so much to be thankful for, and that is a spirit I have been working hard to cultivate within myself. We missed Jake but he was having a nice day with his girlfriend. John was able to join us over at Nana and Grandpa's after he left work, and many of our "extended" family also made the drive to NH to be together.
A busy morning of cooking and watching the Macy's Parade and then we were off; it was a lovely day.
This morning Katy and I followed it up with breakfast at the CornerView with my mom, and Gabe and Zach had a sleepover at the Taylor's last night. All in all a wonderful holiday. Wednesday night we hosted our annual (rather sacreligious) gathering to eat snacks and watch a string of "FRIENDS" Thanksgiving episodes - about nine or ten people joined us and it was really fun.

ok, not a great shot but LOOK AT HOW BIG HE IS!!!!!!

yes, another bad shot but the outfit simply screams Cousin Eddie from "Christmas Vacation."

Now THERE is a cute picture!

Walking and teething - a lethal combination.

Yup, there I am. Enough said.

(In)Famous

In the past week 2 of my children were in the paper and one of them was also on T.V. and the stage!
It was a very big week for Katy as she had a leading role in her third highschool drama production in the play by Neil Simon, "Rumors." She was also on the local Concord channel hosting a talk show for her t.v. production class, and her picture made it into the paper from one of the play rehersals. WOW!
Then, I found out through Jake that Zach was also in the paper, a shot taken during a field trip.

Concord in the Fall

Last weekend we had our first snowstorm of the year, and it was the most snow ever recorded in NH in October! Needless to say I had to hurry out to the stores and buy gloves for the boys, snowpants for Gabe, boots, gloves and a hat for John, and boots for Rilla. (Obviously Katy and I are always prepared, at least when clothing is involved.)  Gabe and Zach spent quite some time in the snow on Sunday, both in our tiny city yard and then later in the day at Nana's, where they could really spread their (snow) wings and enjoy themselves. Katy graciously came outside with the camera but was only able to get a couple of pictures before the batteries died.

One Year Later

Tomorrow our baby turns ONE.  We celebrated today with Nana, Grandpa and the Uncles, and tomorrow we will give Rilla our gifts to her. 
All week I have been recalling what we went through a year ago, not only because it's the anniversary of Rilla's birth week, but also because Laurie is in AZ welcoming HER new baby, and although it is a completely different situation there are many similarities simply because it's an adoption. A year ago I never could have imagined what a lovely, sweet, joyful, beautiful daughter God was placing in our family - watching April Jayne grow this year has been a tremendous gift. Not a day goes by that I do not stare at her in awe, remembering the miracle of her journey to our family.

When I was getting out her tights, Rilla saw her hats in the same drawer. She pointed and did the sign for hat. It was just what she wanted to complete her birthday outfit - her pink engineer cap!

Rilla is able to walk but often chooses not to!

The chocolate cupcake seemed to cheer her up - she's had a cold all week.

Her first sugar coma.

Doughnut Lovers Unite

On Wedesdays our family heads to church - the boys have AWANA, which they love (Gabe just got his new t-shirt for "truth and training" and is SOOOO proud!), and John and I lead youth alpha, which Katy attends.  Tonight the boys dressed up for costume night; Gabe was Indiana Jones like he is every year, and Zach was a cowboy, wearing the vest Nana made and Uncle John's very old and very dilapidated hat.

One of the games we played with the teens tonight was the classic doughnut on a string, which of course resulted in lots of doughnut pieces littering the floor and ending up in the trash bin. The night ended and my children were rounded up to wait in our room as we cleaned up, vacuuming and putting away chairs and emptying the trash can.  As I headed over to complete the last task I noticed Zach reaching into the trash bag - and he pulled out a doughnut, planning to eat it without any second thoughts.
"Put that down!!!" I grabbed for it, but he held it up, trying to take a bite. "That's trash!"
"No," he said, "its a doughnut, and I'm attracted to it."
"Well, its trash now, so please put it back."
"Mom, I am attracted to doughnuts," he said calmly, his giant cowboy hat slipping down so I could only see one big brown eye blinking at me. "I can't help it. I have a Swedish tooth."

A(nother) Day at the Apple Orchard

Gabe and Ava navigate the pumpkin patch

Max knew how to put his cousin to work

Grandpa and Rilla share an apple

There seems to be some confusion about what is actually happening - is it a ball? an apple?

I seriously have the cutest daughters EVER

Like myself, Zach takes his apple picking quite seriously

This year I managed to squeeze in THREE visits to our favorite apple orchard - really, its the only orchard I take the kids to anymore, so I guess I don't even need to qualify which one. Last Saturday many of our cousins and aunts and uncles etc also joined us for a lovely fall afternoon, eating cider doughnuts, riding the tractor, playing amidst pumpkins, and of course, getting some apples!

Columbus Day

This year my brother Mike's birthday fell on Columbus day - growing up it was always exciting to have a birthday fall on Columbus day because I would get the day off from school. Well, this year it was Mike's turn, and he was willing to share the celebration with both myself and Alice, our "aunt" whose birthday is next week.
We spent the afternoon at my parents, enjoying the unseasonably warm day, riding the new go-cart and taking pictures. As usual Katy snapped some great ones!

They look kind of serious ~ ??

There's a smile!

Zach raced after his big sister to make sure she was ok!

Gabe proved to be very mechanical once again,helping Grandpa with the adjustments to the gocart.

The birthday boy!

So proud of herself!

Daddy took the gocart for a spin.

School House Rock Godsey style

As facts trickle down to my children some of them seem to be a bit diluted.

BIOLOGY:   "Fish don't poop. If they did they would explode."

DNA TESTING:  "I filled this cup with water, put the dried up salamander in it, took it out"   (consequently leaving it somewhere in the bedroom, location unknown)   " and now I have salamder DNA. "

AQUIRING SUPER POWERS:  "We put a dead fly in the water, let his DNA get out, and then Gabe drank it."  (Thank you, Marvel Comics.)

LITERATURE:  "It's almost your bedtime, Mom, so I got a story to read you  - "The Violin Rabbit." (known in some circles as "The Velveteen Rabbit.")

GOURMET COOKING;  "May I please have some missionario cherries on my ice cream? I mean, missionary cherries?"

"Fall is here!" or "Where is my sanity?"

One morning we were a robot workshop; some samples of our creations

She is really too big for this but it was awful fun!

Zach's friend Natalie gave him a snake skin which he proudly displayed as often as possible.

We went to a great concert a couple weeks ago in Mass - Superchick, Hawk Nelson, Mike's Chair, Fireflight

Katy with the lead singer of Hawk Nelson on my phone!

At church

Katy went to a Josh Wilson concert with some friends - it was on the beach

Two weeks ago we started Youth Alpha on Wednesdays, John and I co-lead.

As I always do when our schedule is going to change, I anticipated back to school to be a time of sipping coffee, catching up on my Bible reading, playing quietly on the floor with Rilla, and of course cleaning my house from top to bottom. While I have accomplished some of those things to a slight degree, my housework seems determined to best me. So today I decided - it can wait while I catch up on my blog. We are having a lovely fall and I want to reflect on it and enjoy my family.

Katy Renee turns 17!!!

Katy is 17! Yes, world, our little girl is growing up! For some reason I have always thought 17 is so much more adult than 16; maybe because 16 is such a big deal but when you are 17 you have already established the fact that you are just about an "adult" so you just go on your merry way, becoming who you are meant to be.
Last night I asked John to tell us what he remembered of Katy's birth story (is it just the dads in my life, or dads in general who tend to be rather fuzzy on childhood details?) and so we enjoyed hearing about her quiet entry into the world, looking right at her daddy with those big eyes. (I also figured out that since I was only 14 at the time I was most likely at youth group or learning how to put my contacts in.)
For her birthday Katy asked for tickets to the Josh Groban concert that will be in NH at the beginning of November. What a very grown up thing to ask for!!

Although it appears to be a giant doughnut, Katy actually had a double chocolate cake.

With a pillow in her lap, it looks like Floating Katy, blowing out the candles.

Puddle Walk

One of my ideas when I realized I would be staying home with the kids was to start going on walks together after dinner; like most ideas, it has taken me three months to do anything about it. Last night we went on a lovely walk after dropping the van off at John's work - we fed ducks, we played on the playground, we found giant leaves to measure. My new Walking After Dinner Plan was off to a great start!
Tonight it rained.
So we put on our rain boots, grabbed a giant umbrella, stuck Rilla in the moby wrap and headed out on a puddle jumping adventure. It was awesome.
Of course, the pile of soggy clothing on the floor in front of the door is still there, and the dishes still aren't done  - but hey, it was still awesome.