National Kellen Day (aka Halloween)

I don't think it is any secret that Kellen loves candy. Now, don't get me wrong, I know almost all kids love candy. But Kellen's love for the sweets goes far above and beyond your typical adoration for such deliciousness. So, around here, Halloween is know as Kellen Day. :)

We did what has become our tradition and went to a small neighborhood downtown. No one is really home in our neighborhood, so the trick-or-treating stinks here. Before heading out, though, we had a fun-filled afternoon. We finally carved two of the three pumpkins.


It took Coble and Kellen a little time to warm up to the idea of sticking their hands in the guts.
I was so proud of Timmy! This was the first year that I didn't have to do anything other than cutting the bottom out (we carve from the bottom and leave the top intact -- that is why the pumpkin is laying the way it is on the floor). Timmy made his own pattern (you can see it in the foreground of the pic below), scooped out the guts and then carved it all by himself. Then he helped Coble with his well. My little boys are getting so big!


After we carved, KK and Baboo came over and we all went to see Daddy's show, "Bunnicula", one more time. From there we had some delicious mexican for dinner and headed over to our fave trick-or-treating spot that I already mentioned. So, here are my top favorite pics.

Who's that in the Jango Fett costume?

Oh, it's just my sweet little Kelly. :)

Believe it or not, both of my Jedi's left their light sabers at home. Really. It's probably a good thing since they would have ended up being two more things me and Daddy were carrying. So here they are posing with their invisible light sabers.

And apparently all Jedis have to kneel a lot. For some reason both Coble and Timmy struck this pose with no direction. Too funny.

My little Ani.
Hey, Mommy's got the camera. Let's jump! Why not?

The king on his special day inspecting his treasure...


This place does it up big. Full-on decorations everywhere.

I don't really think I need to say anything here.

And one of the spookiest houses with that witch hangin' out on the balcony.

Summer Fun

Part of my plan for the summer was to hang with my boys as much as possible since all three would be in school this year. :( The end of the days of having boys home during the day. So, every Friday I knocked off early and we did something fun! I even told my regular clients about it and had their support.

One of the things we did a lot was go to the pool. We have wonderful friends that live just around the corner from us and allowed us full access to their pool whenever we had free time. Here's some fun shots from one of our last pool trips of the summer.

Kellen didn't mess around with his foe, the water. He just like to chill in his tube.

Timmy was a big fan of jumping from the steps onto hi boogey board.

For two boys who hate it when I rinse their face in the tub, they sure liked to have a non-stop water fight.

This is one of my all-time favorites. Kellen pitched a fit every time he got caught in the middle of the water fight. Then, he discovers the water gun. Oh, it's on.

Here is a link to the full album if you want to see more.

Where did the summer go?

Holy cow! Has it really been that many months since I wrote anything here? I feel like I haven't had any downtime in just as long. Although we did have quite a fun summer. I tried very hard to knock off of work after lunchtime on Fridays and do something fun with the boys since EVERYONE went off to school this year. That will be a separate post, though.

I want to first catch you up on the months I have missed. First, and super-great, Coble got his cast off! I feel like I have to say that since one of the last posts is his new clean cast. So here are some pics of his marked-upon cast the day he got it off.



The day he got it off, his arm was rather stiff and sore. He was very ginger with it and didn't try to use it all that much. He thought he would never want to try using it again! It was very dramatic. Then, the next day, there he was -- hanging from the money bars at a park... with both hands. :)

Live from the Justice Center

My butt has been sitting on this hard wooden bench all freakin' day and I am so ready to not be sitting here anymore. Why? Jury Duty. I am in day 3 and we still have not been interviewed by attorneys. This has been the longest day yet as we have been here since 9:15. Yesterday and Monday they let us go home early. Although, my entry title does make me feel like a member of the Justice League. hehe

For all of those reading, please say a prayer for Mr. Hicks. He is a fellow juror that stopped breathing this morning during role call. We still are not fully sure what happened, but without the CPR administered by two other jurors he would surely be dead. When they began compressions he was not breathing and did not have a pulse. We have been told he is in ICU and has no family in the area.

Blessings to all and I will get some more pics of the boys up soon!

The end of the cast

Wow! It has been a crazy few months. I think maybe I got two posts up in my new effort to post every few days and then nothing for quite a while. Yep. I am a slacker. :(

So, I have been hanging onto this picture thinking I would share it with you all. Since most of you never got to see Cobie's cast clean (and some of you not at all), here you go. I love Timmy waiting rather impatiently in the background to show me his papers from school.

He was very proud of it. Although it looks pretty much white and boring in the picture, it is, in fact, a glow-in-the-dark cast. It is very neat.

We are almost to the end of the 6 weeks. May 20 is the end of the cast and the beginning of re-strengthening those unused muscles.

Happy May all and I will TRY very hard to update more often.

Visit from the Street

Every so often Grover comes to visit my boys. It has been a really funny thing to watch. At first the twins (and Timmy when he was younger) were both terrified and enthralled at the same time. If Grover got too close there were shrieks of terror and tears. Now it is hard to keep their hands off of him, though. All they want to do is honk his nose and hug him.
They all sit, quietly giggling, for the first 5 minutes or so. They answer all of Grover's questions and ask him some. Then someone gets brave enough to try to stick their hand in his mouth. It's all downhill from there. :)

Birthdays

I officially feel like the world's worst mom. I kept promising to get pics and details of Timmy's birthday up here and I never did. So, here is a general birthday update with pictures!

Timmy:
He wanted (can anyone guess???) a Star Wars party. Big surprise, I know. We used a space at the church, ran the Clone Wars movie, invited the guests to bring light sabers (brought extras just in case) and had a 2 hour light saber battle. I kid you not. I thought for sure they would get bored with that after a while, but not so. The best part - no one got hurt!

I somehow managed to get no pictures of Timmy in the Jedi Battle, but one of the funniest things was the frequent "dead bodies" you would find in the midst of the battle. This is one of Timmy's friends from school.

What is so cool that everyone has to see?

The most awesome Darth Vader card ever! :)

Twins:
We have had one family party for them with Jeff's family and will be celebrating with my family tomorrow. At some point I have promised them a pirate party, but there are really only 4 kids they want to invite. So, what we plan to do is have an afternoon at the park when it warms up again and just give everyone pirate swords (the boys already have theirs). We will do cake and stuff, but a little lower key. Here are some pics from the Hartman family celebration.

It seems as though I have mentioned Kellen's love of candy here. Well, that love extends to cake as well. Check out this series of his excited faces.


The flash didn't fire on the best pic of Cobie blowing out the candles, but here is payoff. Mmmmm