superhero halloween

halloween.

halloween is great. it's a wonderful excuse to throw a party and do fun things like:

making witch hat cookies.

pretending you're kent clark...

(he's such a little hunk!)

...or a super gorgeous supergirl.

...or a pretty green ball of kryptonite.

she's a natural.

or just living out a fantasy and holding a super cute batman in your arms.

halloween is also a good excuse to ask people for candy without appearing odd or rude.

ok, so i'm not too fond of the candy part - which is why i only let them have half of their stash when they do something nice to deserve it. what happens to the other half, you ask? taxes.

mimzy was overly enthusiastic, but her "treat?!" was too cute to deny.

we took quite the walk around town.

this one never ran out of energy.

this was my least favorite costume of the night. "indian maiden," blech. if she was more accurately dressed and less generically stereotypical, it wouldn't have made me roll my eyes. thankfully, i only spotted one.

we rushed home to eat our halloween dinner: 

mummy dogs with eyeball chili,

"bloody bandaids" - which sam would not touch and gagged when he saw mimzy licking off all the jelly, er, blood.

ghost yogurt bananas,

and bell pepper jack o'lanterns.

we had to wrap things up pretty quickly. sam and i still had to pack for our big trip tomorrow. so much to do, but still some time to cuddle the wee ones before we sent them off to bed.

i love my super bunch. :) i'm a lucky gal.

the day after friends leave.

we had to keep ourselves busy after our friends left. the house felt empty and lonely.

no more chit chatting, no more laughing and playing, or mildly scary movies to scream about.

our bean sensory activity.

mimzy spooned beans into various sized containers with various sized spoons.

she did quite a magnificent job keeping all the beans in the bowls and spoons.

good job, mimz!

lets not forget mo. happy nap time. he's still pretty easy.

tickle, cuddle, feed, change, nap. repeat.

we finally rifled through the box of halloween decorations and put up our paper bats after we flew them around the room once or twice.

thank goodness for leftover pizza. i wasn't in the mood for cooking.

we also found these priceless wigs in the halloween box.

hilarious.

at least we thought so. mosiah - not so much.

the end.

james and emily

i know sam took more pictures, but these were all i could find.
in any case, this weekend we were expecting our very first visitors to sparta!
james and emily are our good friends from law school.
we absolutely love them.

last october, we spent our autumn days at the dairy farm, on a hay ride, and running through a corn maze. we decided we'd try to keep up the tradition.
we got to the corn maze a little late, just before closing time.
it was really dark out, but only 6:00 in the evening.
we bundled up the babies and took along our stroller and a free rental stroller from the corn maze people, and headed into the maze. there were several other kids just starting, so i didn't feel too bad.

however, i soon realized our crew was at a huge disadvantage trying to push the strollers through the sticky mud. we did our best to keep on the fallen corn husks, but mostly we were slipping and sliding and utterly lost. we didn't make it through all the check points, but we did make it out of the maze - which had quickly become our goal after 10 minutes. i don't think we made it out until around 7.
our shoes were caked with mud, and our fingers were red with cold, but we had laughed and scared each other all the way through, and that made it all worth it. ;)



we stopped for pizza, and went home and watched a scary movie after the kids had gone to bed - another tradition we had to keep up. ;) last year, we watched red riding hood. this year we watched mothman something or other.

one of the nights, the guys went out and emily and i just hung out and talked. it was so fun talking with someone older than 10. ;)

the next morning, they had to go on their way - they were getting ready for their big move to their new jobs, in their new town.
we all went to lunch after the kids went to school.

huck finn was closed, so we settled for tom sawyer's cafe just off the mississippi.

these are the only pictures i managed to take.



i really should've taken pictures of emily chasing down mimzy. ;) thank em.



thank you both for coming to visit. we had so much fun with you here. we'll have to make corn mazes and scary movies a tradition every year. we'll miss you guys.

mo's trim and the rubber egg

mo had some long straggling hair around his neck and ears. 

it was finally time for a little trim. i'm always so scared to trim babies, even with the blunt end baby nail trimmers. it turned out pretty decent.

after school today, isaiah and i checked out our science experiment.

it had something to do with vinegar breaking down the hard parts of an egg shell, a raw egg.

it was so weird! we all poked and prodded, but still careful not to puncture the raw egg. this was really fun to do. we can't wait to try another experiment.

pretty mo pretty mimz

it's always so fun to unpack the hand-me-downs. today he fits into a sweater given to us by my SIL and BIL. 

thumbsucker. it's so darn cute, but i don't know how i'm going to rid him of the habit. i'm afraid it'll push his teeth around. oh well.

i told mimzy she was so pretty and she got embarrassed.

and instead of batting her eyelashes and saying "thank you," she tried to bulldoze me over.

mimzy.

fun friday chocolate chip pancakes. the food pics are becoming a little overwhelming for me, too. but, isaiah and makayah insist on me taking pictures of the incredible meals they want to remember. seriously, "don't eat yet, mom take a picture and put it in the blog!"

done, and done.

crazy hair day, teething mo, and curious mimz

today was spirit week/drug free week at school. and one of the fun activities for spirit week was crazy hair day.

bye. have fun without me. :(

mo loves playing airplane for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

and she just loves marching to the beat of her own drum. she put the bib on all by herself once she snatched it away from mo.

one minute he's happy, the next, he's teary eyed and teething. all he wants to do is chew on wooden blocks.

yes, that kind of day for a curious mimz. poor mimzy. luckily, daddy was here to save the day and she popped right out.

the week in a nutshell...minus a couple days

saturday:

makayah dressed mimzy for bed. apparently, it's just like dance class.

sunday:

mimzy is the only one in her nursery class.

monday:

meatless creation of kale, leek, and chickpea stir fry. the kids tried it, not too fond of it, but ate it all anyway. good sports.

tuesday:

who knew learning how to clap would be so thrilling?

friday:

fun friday chicken bbq pizza, made by sam.

delicious.

random rainy day pics.

daddy's morning drive.

playing beauty shop with mo.

carrots for an afternoon snack.

i was too lazy to cut them up into sticks, but the kids liked this anyway.

just hanging out and winding down with pbs - most likely wild kratts or the electric company.

rainy days = one muddy mimzy. a shower immediately followed.

the life of mo

baby mo will wake up around 6:30 or 7 along with everyone else. but after the chaos of getting people off to school and work, and a good feeding, he's out again.

baby mo instructions: feed and cuddle.

while he's out for his morning nap (usually between 10-11:30), samiyah loves to have quiet time with ALL her books.

as soon as mo is up - she likes to get all in his business. he's not fond of "horse" play. he'd rather just sit on my lap all day, suck his thumb, and cuddle.

someone's gotta make him tough, might as well be mimzy.

he's not too fond of giving out kisses, either.

too bad kiddo.