November 11, 2007 - A Birthday Party!

After Sam's baptism we headed back to our house to celebrate Gabrielle's birthday with the family. We had a great time.

Gabrielle is ready to open gifts.

A princess hopscotch set from Grandma
One of Gabrielle's gifts from her aunts, uncles and cousins was a trunk full of dress up clothes. Little did we know when she opened it, how much fun would be had by all. All of the kids got in on the action of playing dress-up.

Nicholas shows off this stunning blue gown.
Allison thinks it looks better on her.
Joshua in his flowing pink dress, princess crown and a set of diamond studded pumps top off the ensemble.
Owen is going to the chapel and going to get married. He has opted not to wear white, but loves the fullness of his lace veil which is a headband style.
Sam tries on the princess hat.

Gabrielle had been calling Grandma for weeks asking for a snow white dress. She called her at work, at home and even had to call her once to tell her that she saw the dress at "Grandma's Meijers, so she better go get it".
The long awaited Snow White Dress
Blowing out the candles on the birthday cake.
Sam stood at Aunt Melissa's side waiting for more and more and more bites of cake.

November 11, 2007 - Part of the Family of God!

We finally had Sam's baptism. We had hoped to have him baptized last May, but there was conflicting schedules which prevented that from happening. Then, we were gone so much over the summer camping, that we finally coordinated with the church for him to be baptized. All went well, and Sam found the entire experience rather boring. We have 2 pastors at our church, and we think it is quite neat that all of our children were actually baptized by Pastor Jerry.

Allison, however, found the stage an excellent place to dance. I started off trying to keep her calm, and finally resided myself to the fact that everyone in the church knows she is only 2 so what am I worried about? I finally just sort of let her do her own thing. It made less of a scene than trying to get her to stop.

November 10, 2007 - Sam gets his feet under him!

Here is a short clip of Sam trying out our push walker. He seems to be having fun. I have a feeling he'll be walking before we know it.

November 7, 2007 - Happy 4th Birthday Gabrielle!

Today was Gabrielle's 4th birthday. I can't believe how time flies. Gabrielle loves your approval and is seriously wounded if she disappoints you. However, don't cross her or you'll get stopping of feet and a serious temper tantrum going on. She is loving preschool and catching on to things so much more quickly than I anticipated that she would. What a blessing she is in our family! Here are some snapshots of her special day:

Gabrielle on her way home from preschool with her birthday crown and sucker.

Baking her birthday cake with mama.

She picked McDonald's for her birthday dinner.

Tinkerbell tea set....her first present.

Ready to open the rest of her gifts.

Strawberry Shortcake Beauty Salon

Disney Princess Karaoke radio

Giving the microphone a try.

Tinkerbell Dress

Blowing out the candles

Happy Birthday Gabrielle!!!

November 2, 2007 - I Can Read!

Nicholas came home from school the other day with a book. A book for him to read. Yes, you read that right. Apparently, there are 4 boys in Nicholas' class that are ahead of the rest of the class. In order to keep those boys challenged his teacher has begun giving them books to bring home and practice reading. I was amazed. He is only in Kindergarten.

After he practiced reading his book a few times, I decided to record the experience for posterity. Here is a clip of Nicholas reading his first book. Max the Cat.

November 2, 2007 - A vacuum cleaner fedish??

Sam loves the vacuum cleaner, he thinks it is so funny when it comes toward him - it's like he's daring us to get as close as possible. If he hears the vacuum in the other room, he'll take off immediately to find it.

October 31, 2007 - Halloween

Prior to their Halloween Party - Nicholas' school has a Halloween Parade. The kids get to walk from the school, down through downtown Ravenna. The stores and businesses hand out candy to all the kids. They walk to the end of the block, cross the street, walk back up the hill and back to school for their party.

Nicholas walking in the parade.

Getting some candy from Guiseppe's Pizza

Nicholas finds us along the parade route
The girls loved seeing all of the different costumes and were able to recognize some of our neighborhood friends.

My bottle is gone mom....here you go!

Ready to go trick or treating that night

Sam is all bundled up and ready to hand out candy with Grandma

Trick or Treat

When we got home the kids dumped their candy out on the floor to see what they got. With his snowsuit on Sam couldn't get to the candy. So he resorted to going after the candy like he was bobbing for apples - using his mouth.

Allison checks out her candy
I'm free of that snowsuit - now where did that candy go!
I got the candy, but the only thing I taste is a funny wrapper.
Maybe there is something better in this bucket.

October 29, 2007 - Preschool Halloween Party

Gabrielle and Allison pose for a picture before we leave.

Sam has to get involved. Lookin' good in his bat shirt as his costume.
Wow, where did that show of affection come from.

We'll be back in 30 minutes for the party, Allison.

Gabrielle reaches into the witch's brew to collect rubber worms. She came in first place and won a prize for grabbing the most worms.
Sam appears to be a chick magnet already.
Concentrating on throwing the hula hoop at the pumpkins.She did it!
Making a ghost sucker.
Decorating her fun foam pumpkin.
A group picture

Cookie timeTreat time
Allison gave up on trying to pick up the messy cookie and decided to dive right in.

October 28, 2007 - Carving Pumpkins

With Halloween approaching we got out our carving knives and proceeding to undertake the task of carving out 3 our of 4 pumpkins. Funny thing, Sam didn't really seem to care that we didn't carve his pumpkin. Here a few snapshots of our evening.

Papa works on Allison's pumpkin with Allison looking on, she had already decided which shapes she wanted for the eyes and nose and mouth. Gabrielle works on de-seeding her pumpkin.
Sam finished his snack of cheerios and decided to check out his pumpkin.
The finished products.

October 28, 2007 - Mmmmm, pasta!!!

Sam has decided that it is much more fun to feed himself, that to be spoonfed. He loves to shovel it in, sometimes double-fisted. We have discovered that we need to spread his food out the entire width on the high chair tray, and as far away from him as possible. This makes him need to work a little harder to get the pieces, it slows him down a bit and he usually can keep his fistful at a portion size that he can manage a little better. So far, we haven't found any food that he has refused to eat either. From past experience, we realize that the chances of this eating habit lasting throughout toddlerhood is doubtful, but we'll take it while it lasts.