errands

Paul came home early from his rotations and we got to run errands together. Maybe not your favorite thing to do... but being a single parent for all but 30 minutes of your kids' awake parts of the day, 6 days a week, makes doing things like going to the Bass Pro Shop a highlight of the day, or week, or month... :) Silly, I know, but we had a great time. The boys loved going around discovering everything, and using these big crocodile pillows to fake bite each other, who knew? :)

miss you grandma Stacy!

Here are the boys on their way to the park with grandma Stacy. Excited?! :)

Stacy left a little over a week or so, and we miss her already. We all have a great time when she comes to visit. We went to the beach, and Seaquarium, and shopping, and the playgrounds all over Miami... We had a great time. Thanks for coming out Stacy! (There are tons more pics from her visit here that I have yet to post... coming soon, I promise!)

preview

Here is a little preview of one of the Halloween costumes for the kids this year... Well, part of it... Can you tell what it will be? Now, if only we could get him to wear it. :) Paul, Stacy and I had a little too much fun one night.

toy phone

Matix found this toy phone when we were at Seaquarium last time. It was a "Cars" one too, perfect. He walked around shushing everyone and telling me, "Be quiet mommy! I'm making an important call! I'm on the PHONE!" :) Hopefully I don't sound as intense when I am on the phone as he does, but where else do you think he gets it from... :)

After making all his important calls, Matix used the camera feature and took pictures. It made a little noise that sounded like a camera and took pictures of everything. Strangers, fish, bushes, trees, flowers, me, but mostly Lullaby. Cute.

Sunday

Another lazy Sunday picture. :) This was last Sunday. Today we went to the UM campus and walked around. It was a beautiful day. Happy Sunday.

pumpkin babies

Pumpkin photo shoot #1... Well, this is it. Not what I had in my mind, but I really like these pictures... They totally show the kids personalities. :) This first picture is my favorite.

And again, our little lady decides when the photo shoot is finished. :) Such a princess already.

Hopefully Paul will come home soon from studying so we can go to the pumpkin patch today and get some more pics and some more pumpkins!! Hooray for fall, and Halloween, and pumpkins, and chills in the air (sometimes), and cute kids. Well, the kids are cute all the time. :)

boys date with mommy

While Stacy was here, she stayed home with Lullaby one morning so I could have some mommy-sons time. It was really nice. We walked to the park. This is Matix's new favorite pose for the camera, he says, "take a brudder picture!" (brother) I love it. So sweet.

Hawken picked lots of flowers for me. I love that he does this without any prompting. He is such a romancer. Look out Ellie, he'll sweep you off your feet. :)

The boys had so much fun. They climbed mountains (landscaped rocks along the sidewalk),

and protected their castle (a group of trees),

and fed sharks (small fish),

and made swords (sticks),

and raced ships (again, sticks)...

It was a good day. :)

good bye Barbara

Barbara, our neighbor, fellow muffin eater, and friend has moved to a nursing home. She is very old, and apparently fell down in her bath tub and was there, alone, for 2 days before someone found her. I still don't know how anyone found her, she lives alone, and we were pretty much her only visitors. So, I am thankful that she was found, and taken care of.

The boys colored her a good-bye picture and gave it to some of her church friends who were cleaning out her house, so they could bring it to Barbara at her new house. Hopefully they will come by again so we can get her information and go visit her. We will miss you Barbara.

Jolie's costume

So this is the story of the $150 baby costume. No, I did not buy a $150 costume, but they do exist. What? Who pays that much for a costume anyway, let alone one that is made from less than 1 yard of fabric TOTAL... Anyway, when my little sister's daughter, Alexandra, was a newborn, she found this pink and green fairy costume in size newborn for, get this, $150!!! Gorgeous right? But NOT worth that money.

Anyway, she bought it. Brought it home. Bought the same fabric and made her own. She also made all the little accessories, the little ankle bracelets, the tights, and my mom made the little headband. Super impressive right? Then she returned the store bought costume and enjoyed trick or treating with her homemade, less than $10 costume for her baby girl and an extra $140 in her pocket. Perfect. She even made a few Wisconsin Halloween necessary improvements, like long sleeves and tights. The costume is spot on. The little wings on the back are the best (sadly no pictures of the back though). And... since we have inherited most of Alexandra's wardrobe for Lullaby, we got the fairy costume too. BUT, little miss Lullaby isn't as little as Alexandra was, and she is already way too big for it. But I did a little photo shoot with it while she still fit. :)

As you can see, the costume is adorable, but the baby was NOT having it. She looked so sweet in person, yet every picture I have, Lullaby looks scared. She is still not a fan of the picture taking madness that seems to follow her everywhere. :) Sorry baby, you're just too cute. And, as usual, the shoot ended like this.

She needed a grandma snuggle and then passed out from all the excitement. Thanks Jolie for the adorable costume. I wish we could have used it for something other than a failed photo shoot! :)

Matix can write his name

Matix has been interested in knowing and saying and now writing the letters in his name. It isn't very pretty, but I am super impressed that he is wanting to do this stuff on his own. Good job big boy! You have to use some imagination to really see it, but here it is: M - a - t - i - x.

His lower case 'a' and 'i' look similar, but he draws them using different techniques, so I know that he knows the difference. He recites this as he writes, "Letter 'm' is up down up down. Letter 'a' is a circle and a line. Letter 't' is up and cross. Letter 'i' up with a little circle. Letter 'x' crisscross!!"