Happy

My three boys have been over-the-moon-happy for the past few days. You see, we've been doing a lot of work and a bit of rearranging in our house lately.

Gene's dad offered to give Gene his beautiful old desk and we finally got around to getting it moved in to Gene's office yesterday. The desk and credenza are huge, and even though Gene's office is very large, we were all petrified that it wouldn't fit! It was no problem, though. We just had to remove one door and the pieces were in! Gene is so happy with his new office, and the goofy boys are pretty excited too.

Of course, Gene's new desk meant that we needed to do something with the old oak library table he's used for a desk for the past eight years. Will has been begging for a desk in his room, so when the boys were enjoying an overnight visit with Nana and Pop, we decided to move the library table in, completely rearrange his room, and surprise him! Fortunately, Will was thrilled with his new desk, which is good because we also had to remove a door to get it into his room and neither of us wanted to move it back out. I am happy to report that homework is going much faster now that Will has a quiet place to concentrate.

Henry doesn't need a desk just yet (though Gramma and Grampa have one for him when he's ready), but Henry was super excited to read Bear Says Thanks by Karma Wilson and recreate the animals' feast. We made apple muffins and a berry crisp, and munched on honey nuts, pears and fish (goldfish, in our case) while sipping herbal tea.

We have so much to be happy and thankful for this year!

Pumpkins, Art and Will's Library

It is fall and we are still obsessed with pumpkins at our house! Henry's class "planted" seeds in an old jack-o'-lantern and set it in an empty spot near the school to grow. We'll see what happens.

Henry drew this pumpkin family last week and labeled everyone. Dad is the biggest pumpkin and Weezie is the smallest. Henry is bigger than Will because he's tired of being the littlest. All the grandparents are represented too.

Meanwhile, Will has been busy doing art at school. They made handprint turkeys and wrote about a special Thanksgiving guest for their latest published hallway work. If you're wondering who Will would like to invite to Thanksgiving dinner, it's Bad Kitty from the book series.

Willl also went to Hands-on Art last week. They learned all about John James Audubon and made their very own bird art using oil pastels and water colors.

Will painted a robin!

When Gramma and Grampa came back from Maine, they brought back a huge box full of chapter books they had picked up at a garage sale. Will was so excited!  He immediately sorted the books and set up his very own library. Can you see the labeled tags between the series of books? He also wrote down his library rules.

And because he is so thrilled about his library, he's even been writing notes reminding us that we can check out library books.

I've got Junie B., First Grader: Aloha-ha-ha! on request and can't wait to read it!

Photo Shoot

We had our annual family photo shoot on Saturday morning at Mercer Arboretum.  Our good friend and fabulous photographer, Candice of Four Memories Photography, took our pictures this year and they turned out amazing!  Candice is incredibly talented and it doesn't hurt that she has known the boys since the days they were born.

Without spoiling our Christmas cards, here are some of my favorites of the four of us.  

She really captured the boys' personalities.

She took a lot of pictures of them jumping.  They loved it!

We never have good pictures of the two of us, but I love this one!

More sweet photos:

And this one is hilarious because Will was sticking pine needles in Henry's ear. It was the end of the session, Henry had a blister, and Will was a goofball.

My sweet boys.

I am so happy with our family pictures this year!

Halloween

Halloween was such a busy day for my big boys. From class parties and pumpkin decorating to face painting and trick-or-treating, it was non-stop fun!

Will's class earned their first "marble jar" party for good behavior. The kids watched movies, did crafts, decorated pumpkins and came outside for fun class photos.

 

Henry's Halloween party started with a parade around the school. Henry was a sweet dragon.

Then it was back to the classroom for a story, craft and snacks.  These are the pumpkins the class carved on Tuesday. Henry's group did the one on the left.  Notice that it has one square eye and one round eye.

Another mom and I were in charge of the Halloween party. We read Go Away, Big Green Monster by Ed Emberly and then the kids made their own big green monsters. Henry's does not look scary at all!

We figured that the kids would load up on sugar later in the day, so we opted for healthy treats:  pumpkin muffins, fruit skewers and cheese and crackers.  It was such a fun party!

Daddy came home early to help the boys carve pumpkins.  First, though, they had to draw their jack-o'-lantern faces on paper.

Will loved scooping out the pumpkin.  

Henry preferred watching the action and keeping his hands clean.

Weezie the Halloween cat was very curious about the pumpkin carving and especially the big bowl of gooey pumpkin innards.

These are our finished pumpkins!  Henry's is on the left.  Notice that it has one triangle eye and one square eye and no nose.

Gene is the master pumpkin carver.

My boys posed with their pumpkins.

All ready for trick-or-treaters!

After dinner, it was time to get in costume. It turns out that Gene is not only good at carving pumpkins, but he is also very good at face painting!

Both boys wanted to be something scary this year, so Will was Darth Vader and Henry was a dragon.

Gene was Obi-Dad Kenobi again.

I hope you had a spook-tacular Halloween!