Lately...

Asher has still been cute, 

 Ethan found out Nana and Papa are coming for Christmas,

 Ethan got to dress up like someone from another era for school,

 we had an FHE about missionaries,

 Ethan decided he doesn't want to go on a mission because he wants to stay a kid and stay with his family (notice the crying missionary),

 I got to volunteer at the Phoenix Temple open house and visit with Rebekah (before leaving early because I was sick),

and Benton went to Halloween story time where he got to do a Halloween parade and trick or treat.

Halloweens Past

One of my Fall break crafts that we didn't get to do used old Halloween pictures, so instead, I quickly cut them into bats and ghosts and put them on the wall. The boys enjoy looking at their costumes when they were younger.

Sweet Asher

I sure love this little guy.  He is a great third baby: so patient as we run all over getting to activities for his brothers and for me.  It is also very convenient that he drinks from a bottle and that my carpool friends love feeding him when he doesn't get to eat before we leave in the morning.  He has been sleeping 12+ hours, so he is usually just waking up when we are running out for our morning drop offs.

Arizona Kinda Day

Here we are at the end if October, and it is finally cool enough (high 80s at noon) for the kids to enjoy  the newer outdoor exhibit at the children's museum in downtown Phoenix.  I get to hang out in the shade with the baby while the older kids play in a maze of cacti planted in garbage and recycling containers.

Check Ups

All three boys had check ups today.

Ethan: 25th percentile on height and weight, always hyper/silly at the doctor's office.  He, of course, showed off the quality that his teacher pointed out at parent teacher conferences this week too: expressing himself orally, providing details.  He is definitely a story teller.  Speaking of conferences, Ethan got all good reports from his teacher (yay!).  He is already done with the sight words for Kindergarten and is "definitely at the top of his class."  She commented several times on his artsy side (turning his name into stairs, coloring a lot), which is so funny considering he was almost 5 before he would voluntarily color.  So far being almost 6 when starting Kindergarten has definitely worked out well for him.

Benton: 50th percentile on height and weight.  He no longer has a tube in his ear.  He was the only one to get a shot (both boys got flu spray and thought it was tickly/funny).  I tried to distract him and as soon as he got poked he said, "Ouch, that hurts me!"  Ethan had picked from his Halloween bucket and had a secret candy in his pocket that he pulled out for Benton at that time, and that was distraction enough that Benton didn't even want the band-aid on his arm (he wanted it on an old owie on his finger).  Benton's last shot he got made at the lady and said, "Hey, you poked me!" several times until I told him that was it and we could go.

Asher: 25th percentile.  When he was laying on the scale he grabbed the little paper liner they put on it and didn't want to let go, so they let him keep it.  When he was on the exam table I would crinkle it as I moved it down towards his face and he was laughing harder than he ever has, so hard that he would start to get quiet.  All of us were circled around him laughing hard with him.  There was so much laughing going on that the doctor stopped in to play for a minute and then left because it wasn't time for him to see us yet.

The boys are healthy and happy, yay!

Pumpkin Fun

Today we read a few books about pumpkins and learned about the life cycle of pumpkins.

Sensory activity: playing with pumpkin gooblek, complete with seeds and strings.

 We washed off the seeds and used them as part of our life cycle pictures (seeds, sprouts, flowers, green pumpkins, orange pumpkins).  We sang a song and acted out the pumpkin life cycle.

 We found shapes and matched them to the pumpkins on the wall.

 We weighed and measured our pumpkins.

 Made cereal pumpkins.

 And saw who could roll their pumpkins the farthest.

 We ate a pumpkin lunch and made a simple pumpkin bread.

 And played outside and in the basement.

Fall Break Week 2, Costumes

The second week of Fall Break was spent on chores, Ethan's birthday, book club, story time, playing with birthday presents, etc.

Friday was the children's museum's members only extended hours night.  It is usually our monthly family date night.  I probably would have skipped it, but it was a Halloween night, so the boys got all dressed up and we went to play.

Ethan: "Do you know why we are holding hands?  Because Mario and Luigi are a team!"

 There was a lot of, "Mama Mia!" as we got ready to go.

 Benton: "I'm LuEEEgi, I'm LuEEEgi."  Ethan says, "la-lee-gee".

 And little toad really adds to the cuteness.

 Cutest mushroom ever, in my opinion.

 I was blowing raspberries to get Asher to look at me, so the boys joined in.

 Grandpa Joe got Ethan baseball gear for his birthday, including a pitching machine.  The boys had a lot of fun with it.  If I ever need to wear them out, I think I'll take them out and just have them retrieve balls for awhile.

I looked in Ethan's backpack while they were playing (it hangs in the garage) and found out Ethan had Fall Break homework, oops!  It was just reading and sight word logs 4 days/week, so hopefully his teacher will give him credit since I did make him read and do workbook pages every day.

 This afternoon we went to lunch with Grammy.  Ethan was very excited to use his student of the month certificate at Macayo's.

 All three crashed on the way home.

 Everyone but Ethan slept when we got home, and then I made some chili real fast and got us ready for our ward Halloween party.

 I joined in on the costume fun, because someone in this family has to be the princess.

Book Club

In August I organized a group of moms to do a book club co-op.  Basically, I wanted something with a little structure for Benton because he got used to preschool last year, but, considering he has 3 years until Kindergarten, I still want him to have plenty of time to play.

The idea with this is that we meet once each week at a different person's house.  That person chooses a book, or several books on a theme, and does games, crafts, and snacks centered on that theme.  We were only planning on doing one rotation, but it worked out really well, so round 2 starts next week.

Shout out to Janssen over at everyday-reading.com for providing many of our ideas in her Summer Unplugged series.

Frog and Toad week.

 Going on a Bear Hunt

 Under the Sea

 Camping

 (Soda bottle fireflies)

Snow Day