Thursday, October 31, 2013

"I cooking"

Mr. 2 has not been much of a talker.  Although his receptive language is good, his expressive consisted of about 12 words at age 2.  So we're very excited to hear him say new words.  This weekend he started saying "I draw" as he got out papers and a marker (another lefty in the family).  And "I cooking" which means put something in the microwave.  Sometimes it's his muffin, sometimes a shoe, whatever object he can find.  Then he randomly pushes buttons and sometimes he actually manages to turn it on.

Happy Halloween!

So a funny thing happened last night...

We had plans for some friends to come over and go trick or treating with us and then order pizza.  We have a great neighborhood for trick or treating and love to get together with friends so everyone was excited for Halloween to arrive.  Last night some other friends emailed out to out small group that they would love to get together with some others for trick or treating and was anyone interested.  I emailed back about our great neighborhood and invited them to join us - to the whole group.  So tonight we had an impromptu party with 22 people over for pizza.  There were actually supposed to be 26 but sadly one of the families got stuck in traffic and didn't make it.  It was unexpected but very fun and we were glad they could all make it.

It was fun to see everyone's reaction to trick or treating this year.  Mr. 2 would run wildly down the street and I would try to send him up to a house to get candy and sometimes he would go and sometimes he would just yell no and it was unclear what criteria he was using to decide.  Mr. 4 got a bit tired at the end and I ended up having to bribe him with Skittles to get him home (he kept saying I'm too tired so I would give him a Skittle for extra energy which would get us a few house before he needed another).  Mr. 8 charged ahead of the crowd.  And Mr. 10 would wait and come up after the other kids had started to move on and say "this is hold-up - give me some candy".  Then he would chat a bit and end with "you should have given a trick instead".  The funniest part is that a couple of times he was so into his routine he just walked away without the candy.  One woman kept shaking her head as he walked away saying she had never seen a kid pass up the candy.  For Mr. 10, the performance was worth much more than the candy.








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"Raking" leaves

Mr. 8 has been asking if he can help rake these all fall so last Saturday (between hockey practice, flag football, and soccer) we raked leaves together.  Really it was just an excuse to jump in the leaves over and over again but they had a grand time.  After they all jumped through the pile they buried each other in piles of leaves and then buried kids under piles of leaves in the wagon.  Their grand plan of jumping out and surprising someone walking by never actually worked out because of the need for a bit more patient waiting than they wanted to put in.  Fall in New England is really the best season there is!













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Climbing ladders with Mr. 2







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In the orchard (aka time for family photos)

David's parents joined us for some apple picking this year and it seemed the perfect time to try and get a few family photos (it's not often we have a 1:1 adult to kid ratio).  Unfortunately getting all the boys to look at the camera is a bit like herding cats so there is not one of my 240 photos with everyone looking at the camera and smiling.  But we had a great time and got some great pictures (and some great apples).  Everyone had a fun time climbing ladders (especially Mr. 2) and of course eating cider donuts.  With Mr. 10's trip to the orchard with his Tweens group (how do we have a tween), that makes for 3 apple picking outings this fall.  We're still working on what to do with this last batch!