Hello, October

Bittersweet October. The mellow, messy, leaf-kicking perfect pause between the opposing miseries of summer and winter. --Carol Bishop Hipps

This has been a very mild, and might I say, absolutely perfect autumn. I am not a fan of winter so I don't mind if mother nature takes awhile getting around to releasing the snow.
We've been enjoying just spending our time at home:

 Evelyn turned 8 months old:

She gets around quickly. Some days I have a hard time keeping up with her. I went around and put in outlet protector covers. She followed right behind me and pulled them out.

and then one day ... she started pulling herself up standing.

she likes to be with someone at all times. Has been especially clingy toward me lately. I can't fold laundry or spread anything on the floor because she will be right there plopping herself in the middle of whatever I am trying to do.

this is proof that occasionally the boys do share nicely and really do like each other. They have very different personalities so some days all we here is a lot of bickering. And them telling each other what to say.

We got pumpkins at a local grocery store this year. It was less expensive and less time consuming. The kids still had fun going to the "pumpkin patch" and picking out some pumpkins

I made caramel popcorn. Alexander was being so funny. He wanted to eat it but didn't like how sticky it was so he was trying to eat it with a spoon ... which didn't work so well. He tried every way he could think of to eat that popcorn without touching it. Even asked me to hold it in my hand and he would eat it out of my hand.

I took this picture to send to a friend who's a beautician asking for her to help Breahna see again. This girls hair grows so fast.

We took a day trip to visit grandma and grandpa. 
Grandpa went with me and the boys to a local farm where they had a lot of fun activities going on:

We carved the pumpkins for family night ... well, Jake carved them. Maybe someday the kids will want to decorate their own pumpkins. We really don't want them using a knife anyway. The kids always choose what design they want then me and Jake go from there.

Breahna wanted nothing to do with the pumpkins. She was completely disgusted when I suggested she scoop the seeds out.

I forgot to take a picture of Kaleb's before it started getting old and wrinkly:

The week of Haloween was full of parties, makeup, and fun:
Our first activity was trunk-or-treating at our church building. There was good food to eat and of course, lot of treats.

it's quite difficult to pain tiger stripes on a wiggly 2 year old:

The next activity was a 1st grade program at Kaleb's school.
There are 3 first grade classes. They sang songs, and each class had a special poem they shared:

About 9 or 10:00 on the night of the 29th I suddenly remembered Kaleb was supposed to take a decorated pumpkin to school in the morning. I was sad I forgot and we didn't get to decorate it together but I knew he would be more sad if he didn't have anything to bring. Jake and I got to work. After teeth and an eyeball we both realized ... this looks like Mike Wachowski from the movie Monsters Inc. We then proceeded to figure out a way to turn the pumpkin green and give Mike some arms. We melted a bunch of green crayons. Jake painted on the melted wax and I grabbed some Mr. Potato Head arms to complete it.
In the morning Kaleb was very pleased with it and knew right away who it was supposed to be.

Then came the day of Halloween:

Alexander doesn't have school on Friday's so we got to spend the day together. We first went to a parade at Kaleb's school. The school has the kids walk around the block. I loved not having to fight for space inside.
We did some more pumpkin decorating after nap time:
I had the kids melt crayons all over a small pumpkin

Then they got busy sticking googly eyes all over it:

The boys really wanted me to be a spider so this is what I came up with. My idea didn't quite work but the boys were satisfied:

it was a very pleasant evening. The weather couldn't have been more perfect! I wish it could be this nice every year.

and then our month ended up a yucky note. Evelyn was being so quiet. It was rather unusual, but I was enjoying the quiet time. But I guess I should go investigate. And there she was sitting in the kitchen with no diaper on eating something that was not chocolate. Yuck! Babies are so much fun.