Halloween is a busy holiday for us.  We have the school party, then there’s the church party, and then we have actual trick-or-treating.  The week leading up to Halloween always keeps us busy, but the best part about all these parties is the chance to wear our costumes multiple times or having the chance to wear multiple costumes each time, depending on who you are.

For the party at school, Justin stayed home with Archer and I took the older two kids.  It was a nice “test run” for their costumes and we figured out a few things that needed tweaking for the real deal.

Sophie looks good, but as a rock star needs a bit more bling added to her costume.

Truman was a scary skeleton, but I noticed I need some practice on my face painting skills!

A few nights later it was off to our church party.  For some reason that I can’t think of now, I thought it would be fun for all of us to go to this party together.  Meaning, let’s take Archer to a party that goes until 8pm, when he usually goes to bed by 7pm.  Sounds fun, right?

In reality, he wasn’t too bad, but he didn’t sit still for a moment.  His costume was fitting for his ability to move like a speeding bullet and easily break out of our hold with his super hero strength, even if he wouldn’t actually wear the cape.

The "I'm a super hero and I can do what I want" face.

Super Archie was off again. Criminals and evil-doers beware!

Sophie channeled her alter ego this night to become a witch.

Truman sported the same skeleton costume, minus the face paint.

(Face paint in the picture was compliments of the party.)

The kids also got to dress up during a school day too.  We were pros at our costumes by the time trick-or-treating came around! (As you’ll see for yourself on the next post. =)

We had a great time visiting family in Ohio this month.  A highlight spot was this apple orchard near my sister’s house. Well at least we were told it was an apple orchard.  Mostly we ate doughnuts, admired the farm animals, played in the sandbox, and picked out pumpkins.

Chowing down doughnuts before getting too close to the animals.

Hello Mr. Goat!

Someone has been eating the sand...

Sandbox fun with cousin Josh.

Sophie, Truman, and Graham had so much fun feeding the donkeys that we had to drag them away when it was time to go. As we walked away, the donkeys yelled a loud "hee-haw" in protest of us leaving! I guess they enjoyed getting fed as much as we enjoyed feeding them.

We were happy that Grandma Kathy (and flat Stanley) could come to the orchard with us too. (Although Truman doesn't look very happy in this picture!)

I got this card and free gift (reusable lunch pack) in the mail today.  The fact that the MSU Federal Credit Union sent this gift simply as a gesture of gratitude for being a long time customer isn’t what really stuck out to me. It was the bolded “15 years“. Is it seriously possible that it was 15 years ago that I started college?  Scary!

Earlier this month Justin had a conference to attend in Grand Rapids, Michigan. We couldn’t pass up the opportunity to go with him and stop along the way to visit family in Ohio.

It was a whirlwind of a trip, making several stops in just the few days we were in town.

Don’t blink, you might miss us…

Our first stop was to Grandpa Jeff and Grandma Cindy’s house.  We stayed for one night before moving on to our next stop.

The kids always have fun at Grandpa Jeff’s playing with Justin’s old toys from his childhood – Lincoln Logs,  Star Wars knock-offs, various Matchbox cars, and other miscellaneous toys. During this visit, we even found a Barbie Doll mixed in with his toys.  Justin is still denying that it was his though!

Truman said his favorite moment at Grandpa Jeff’s was playing checkers with Grandpa.

When Justin went off to Grand Rapids, the kids and I stopped for two nights at my sister’s house.

We had tons of fun hanging out with my sister and her two boys and were so glad that Grandma Kathy came down to spend the day with us as well.  We also enjoyed seeing my Aunt, Uncle, and cousin Beth with her family when they stopped by briefly one day.

Sophie’s favorite moment at Aunt Deb’s was when they picked inedible apples and pears from her trees and threw them into the field.

Justin made his way back from Grand Rapids and then we spent our final night at Grandma Sue and Grandpa Bob’s house (unfortunately no pictures though). By the time we got to Grandma Sue’s I was pretty beat, so I ended up taking a few extra zzz’s where I could get them, hence the lack of pictures.

The kids were excited to see the spooky house down the street up close and personal and had a great time shopping and eating out with Grandma Sue.  It was a special treat!

However, Sophie and Truman both said their favorite thing to do at Grandma Sue’s is exercise in her basement. This is consistently their favorite thing to do at Grandma’s house, hands down.  They love the “tread-meal” (as Sophie calls it) and other exercise equipment.

I was glad I also got the chance to stop by and visit my 95 year old Grandpa too.  I always enjoy seeing him and despite challenges in his life, he was in good spirits.

We had a great time seeing everyone for the short time we were in town.  Hopefully we can visit all the others we missed seeing next time we’re back!

Back in September, my brother stopped in for a short visit before heading to a business trip in Maryland.

Dave let me know that since his visit was so short that he was happy just hanging out with us at the house.
The kids couldn’t wait for Uncle Dave to visit and since we did a lot of hanging at home, they loved showing him their new XBOX and Kinect games.

However, once I realized he had never ever been to DC, I decided to take him on an ultra-accelerated 1-hour tour of DC.

Our first (and only) stop was the Iwo Jima Memorial.  This is a great site to see since it’s easily accessable by car and has parking right at the memorial. As an added bonus, you can even see the Washington Monument and Capitol Building from a distance too.

After our stop at the Iwo Jima Memorial, I thought a quick drive past the National Mall would suffice as a “complete” 1-hour tour of DC.

Of course I’m not the most experienced when it comes to driving in DC.  So instead of crossing the bridge directly to the National Mall, I ended up on the bridge to Georgetown instead.  It was a nice detour though and I kept reminding my brother of all the things he would have missed seeing (like lots of cars, lots of people, and lots of store fronts) if I would have taken the correct route.

We finally made it to the National Mall only to be met with even more cars and more people.  It was a busy weekend downtown.  We slowly crept down Constitution Ave. as I described what he would be looking at if we actually got out of the car and walked the Mall.  Needless to say, I kind of forgot that you can’t really see much of the memorials from the street, in a moving car none-the-less.

“And there’s the Lincoln Memorial.  Uh, you can’t really see Lincoln from here, but believe me, he’s in there.”

“Oh, and behind those trees is where the Vietnam and Korean Memorials are.  They are really cool.”

“Well at least you can see the Washington Monument.”

And so it went as we continued on and then looped around the other side on Independence Ave.  If there was actually hope of finding a parking spot I would have stopped for him to get a closer look, but alas it was not to be.

Since he couldn’t really see much, I thought it might be nice to drive towards the tidal basin and even sneak a peak at the new MLK Jr. Memorial.  However, after already being stuck in endless traffic for over an hour we decided to just head home.

The 1-hour ultra-accelerated tour turned into more of a 3-hour creeping-traffic tour, but at least he can say he saw part of DC (kind of).  Hopefully all the people and traffic won’t deter him from coming back again for a proper visit to DC.

Come back again anytime, Dave.  We loved having you!

The kids love to cuddle and watch T.V. with Justin.  In this instance Sophie and Truman were already snuggled up and Archer didn’t want to be left out, so he crawled up there too.
He didn’t stay long.  I barely had time to snap a picture before he was back down on the floor pushing his wagon around and yelling (one of his favorite activities), but Sophie and Truman didn’t mind sticking around for the extra snuggles.

Since I know this is not a phase that will last forever, I thought I should record this lovely poem that Sophie wrote for me.

I love you mom.
I love you lots.
I love the way you act.
I love the way you smile.

It doesn’t get much sweeter than that! Now if only I could bottle up that sweetness and use it on those not-so-sweet mommy-daughter moments…

This new background and color scheme on my blog just makes me happy. And it seems to even be motivating me to write on my blog again.

Some of you more avid readers may have noticed my blog posts have trickled off lately.  I can blame it on two things – my LASIK surgery that has left my eye sight blurry for 3 weeks (but is finally improving enough that I can work at the computer a little more) and this trouble maker.

Archer...no,no.

Archer does not like me sitting at the desk.  He either pulls at my arms and legs, spins the chair around, or he’ll just push a chair right up along side of me and start doing his own work.
In any case, he doesn’t leave me much time to do the stuff I want…but this too shall pass (I hope).

You know what else surprisingly made me happy this week?  The new Super Walmart that just opened about 6 miles from where we live.

I went shopping there on Friday (only the 3rd day it was open) and was so pleased with the bright lighting, wide aisles, and friendly and helpful staff that I practically forgot I was in Walmart.

Hooray for the simple pleasures in life!