Happy Halloween!!!

Halloween was a lot of fun this year! Megan wanted to be a butterfly and wanted Jacob to be a butterfly catcher. She was able to dress up for her preschool party and then for gymnastics, and then for the real thing! We started Halloween night out at our friend's church for a trunk-or-treat then over to our neighborhood!

As soon as we arrived at our house to trick-or-treat the cousins arrived too! Jacob, Megan, Luke (Mr. Strong), Adam (Blue Toad), and Jessi (Elmo)! Megan had fun running around with everyone and Jacob was a trooper but we went a little too long and he started to get sleepy and fussy!
Here are the kids with their friends Schyler and Stella. The height difference between Stella and Jacob is getting funnier as they grow! It's hard to believe they are only 4 days apart!

Butterfly catcher!

Butterfly!

Cute picture with the two of them! Jacob got the hang of putting his net out there for candy!

Fun hair!

Where am I?

Megan at her preschool!

Their first house trick-or-treating! It was Uncle Jon's house and they had a good time!

Jacob with his whole outfit on!

Sweet Kids!

We continue to be busy as can be at our house! We went to the zoo a few weekends ago but didn't take a single picture. Jacob isn't a big fan of the zoo apparently. I love being home at night with the family! I sometimes miss the daytime stuff but I know Megan and Jacob are loved by their babysitter and I couldn't ask for anyone better! In the last few days she has taken them swimming at the Y, to the "beach" by the river, the library, bookstore, market, park, and the list goes on and on! Megan doesn't want to come home at night and Jacob likes it there too. As for my new job it's my dream job and I'm loving it! No two days are the same and each day presents it's own challenges. I love the kids and staff, the teachers have welcomed me into their classrooms with open arms. As for baby #3 things are moving along just fine. We will have an ultrasound done the middle of November and we are strongly leaning towards not finding out boy/girl. We aren't the most patient people so we'll see how that works out!

Jacob and Megan enjoying the beans. Jacob is a little young but it's a fun activity! I love their smiles in this picture! Jacob always has random bandaids and bruises all over because he is all boy. He is still not talking much but we are able to interpret most of his grunts...which isn't a good thing!
With Halloween coming up soon we've been playing dress up a lot lately. Megan pretends she's flying! She will be dressed as a butterfly this Halloween and Jacob is going to be a butterfly catcher!

The poor boy is always dressed in girl clothes! He loves everything Megan does and wants everything Megan wants so if she dresses up so does he!

Pumpkin Patch!

On Sunday we took our yearly trip to the pumpkin patch and had a great time. The kids had a blast and it wasn't too busy so we were able to take our time and enjoy ourselves. Each year we pick out pumkins to represent the family and then afterwards we go to Central Dairy. We picked a better day to go than last year because the weather was much more enjoyable!

A somewhat shady picture of the kids with the pumpkins taking the ride back!
The search is on for the perfect pumpkin! Jacob tripped over the vines often but both were good sports! It was definitely earlier in the season this year because everything was green!

Cheese!

Wow, it's a long way down!

My new favorite picture of Megan! I love it with the sun, hair blowing in the wind, and her casual smile!

Look at how big I am!

Cheese!

So cute!

Busy Busy Busy!

Things have been super busy lately! My new job is going great and I love it. I feel blessed to have found my dream job before I'm 30! It keeps me busy and I'm exhausted at the end of the day and ready for bed by 8:30 most nights! We're saving money because I'm not out browsing stores during the day and I'm too tired to shop at night! For some reason I woke up at 3:30 this morning thinking about all of the things I need to get done so I decided to write and add pictures to the blog too!

The kids seem to like the transition to a babysitter too. Megan usually wants to stay there all night and Jacob points and grunts at Michelle's (babysitter) van when it's time to leave...he wants to go in her van, not my car! The babysitter has a little girl, Sophia who is exactly 1 year younger than Megan so the two of them equally enjoy playing and bickering together!

Megan has been super busy this fall. She enjoys preschool 3x a week, speech 2x week, gymnastics 1x week, soccer 2-3x week, and Purest Praise 1x week (Children's choir and bells at church). Needless to say she goes to bed by 7 most nights that she doesn't have activities! It certainly takes a village to raise our family this year and yesterday Megan was bounced from babysitter to daddy to Uncle Jon to Grammy to Daddy! She seemed happy about it all because Uncle Jon and his girlfriend Laura spoil her during their time with her!

Jacob is all boy times 10. He used to talk, he used to have about 8 words, poof they're gone! He now communicates through grunts and sadly we can usually decifer about 20 different meanings for these grunts! Jacob has skinned knees and we are very happy about cool temperatures so he is in pants and his knees are finally healing. He always has some kind of bruise on his head from his various bumps around the house. He can now throw a ball across the room and kick a ball like crazy too. He climbs like a monkey most of the time. He takes risks and doesn't seem to care, he is definitely going to be our bone breaker.

Here is the Candyland Program for Parents as Teachers. Megan's birthday party was such a huge success that we thought it would work well for a program and boy did it! We had almost 30 families (80+ people) and it was a great time. Megan especially liked painting with the pudding and Jacob just ran around everywhere!

Sleeping beauty!

It's a monster!!!! Jacob is huge like always, he was in the 95th% for height this last time at the Dr's office and this is trouble because he can reach things that kiddos his age are not ready to reach!

Megan playing soccer! Megan is loving soccer and our team continues to improve, the first game the score was probably 50-0 and then the next game we scored our first goal, the next game they won, another slaughter, and a game on Saturday! Megan is one of the younger players and she likes to trail after the ball and sometimes gets a toe on it if nobody is around. She enjoys going but says her favorite part is snacks at the end! Eventually she'll find her competitive spirit!

Here she is with a teammate waiting for their turn to play!

Megan's Preschool Days!

Megan has started her new preschool at Small Fry this year. She is loving it so far and it's a cooperative preschool so we are able to be in the classroom once a month to help out. She will have field trips and parties too! They do a special "Super Star" week for each child and Megan was lucky number one. So the first week of school she was the superstart and Mommy had to work on her poster. Our hard drive is toast so the pictures we used were mostly from Michael's mom and when Megan was a baby. I think it turned out pretty well considering!

Here she is posing with her poster.

The first day of school picture! She also has show-and-tell every Monday so she brought her flamingo for the first one and the next week she brought her piggy bank she decorated.

Megan and Jacob playing in a box. Somehow they found a way to both fit side by side in the box put this was the best picture! Who needs toys when you have a box!

Megan all geared up for her first soccer practice.

Megan's cousin Jessi came over a few weeks ago and the girls had a blast. They destroyed Megan's room taking all the clothes off the shelves so they could pretend to sleep on the shelves and they found fun pajamas to change into! It's going to be fun seeing these two grow up together since they are only a year apart!

Megan Soccer Star!

For Megan's birthday Pop-Pop gave Megan soccer lessons and all the equipment needed. She is very excited for practices to start and in the living room her skills on the ball are awesome! We can't wait to see what she's like out on the field!

Jacob likes to get into our cabinet with all the food. This day he found powdered sugar and had a blast, big sister went in and found him, told us but then got right in there with him!

This picture scares me. She is dressed up in high heels, policeman's outfit, and a weight in her hand! And she looks super old!

Megan completed her birthday Dr. Seuss puzzle and is proud of her accomplishment!

CandyLand Birthday Party!!!!!

Megan's 4th Birthday!

Megan chose a Candyland theme for her birthday this year and we loved it! I searched the internet for ideas and came up with a lot on our own. We were able to create an awesome cake to look like the game board. When it was time to eat the cake everyone wanted a different part...except for Mr Mint, no one wanted him!

Notice Megan looking out of Candy Castle!

Megan and Mommy with the cake. She couldn't keep her eyes off of it! She helped bake the night before but that was it, everything was a surprise!

Outside we (my mom and I) created a life-size Candyland for the kids! The first station was Lord Licorice (aka Michael). To pass this station the kids had to beam Michael with a water balloon! Unfortunately we didn't think to take a big picture of the whole thing from the deck!

Here is another picture of Lord Licorice.

At Mr. Plumpy (which apparently is no longer a character in Candyland) the kids (and Norm!) had to pick a balloon and sit on it to pop it. Inside they found a pixi stick.

At Mr. Mint the kids had to wrap an adult in red and white crete paper to make new candycane trees! Luke wrapped Jon and his girlfriend Laura up together!

In the background of this picture you can see Mr. Mint's area. It was the best one complete with 3 Christmas trees and 4 pool noodle candy canes!

After Mr. Mint the kids continued on to Gumdrop Mountains which I didn't take a picture of! After that they continued on the game until they got to Princess Lolly. They had a great time picking a lollipop out of her head!

In the background you can kind of see Gumdrop Mountains! This station was Queen Frostine and they had to fish for a balloon. Apparently we put the balloons out too soon because it was hot and they kept popping!

Here is Gloppy. They had to dig through the pea gravel to find treasure! Gloppy even had a red tongue sticking out! The finale was making it to Candy Castle where they had to climb up and go down the slide and get a goody bag! Overall it was a huge success and Megan had a blast. She was so excited that 2 of her friends came too! This would not have been possible without my mom's help...and Michael's!