Pumpkin Patch

The last couple of years I have been taking the girls to a pumpkin patch back in my hometown. So when we were there to meet Micah, we all took a trip to the patch. Usually when we go it is just with Nonny & Papa so this year it was extra fun with uncles, aunts and cousins too. We all rode the wagon out to the patch to pick our pumpkins. The temps were a little chilly but the sun was shining so it turned out to be an OK day.

They have a little patch separate from the big one with small pumpkins the school kids pick when they come on class trips. That is what they are all looking at over the side of the wagon.

As you can see, Micah is the only one of the kids not wearing a hat or coat. He is still adjusting to layering. He's not a big fan. Hopefully he will quickly learn before his first winter in northwestern Wisconsin!

I'm not sure how many times the girls fell down in the patch but it's a given to happen at least once. After a lot of searching, they each found the perfect pumpkin.

The picture of the two girls together was from last year. I was hoping I could see how much they have grown but I'm not sure how accurate it is.

Meeting Micah

My oldest brother Jeremy and his wife Sarah recently were blessed with adding Micah Mihretu to their family. In early September, their adoption was finalized and they made the long trip to Ethiopia to bring him home. Mihretu is his Ethiopian name which they kept as his middle name and chose Micah for a new first name. A few weeks ago the girls and I traveled back home to my parents so we could meet him. Micah is shy at first but once he gets comfortable he smiles and giggles a lot and has fun. He has big brown eyes and dimples and lots of curls in his dark hair. Micah will turn 5 in November. We will see him again to celebrate Thanksgiving and his birthday with Noah and Caleb (Shelby and Morgan's other cousins). Welcome to the family Micah!

Mouse and Cookies

The Normal Public Library had family story hour today. They were doing the book If You Give a Mouse a Cookie with a guest appearance by Mouse himself. Since Nate was going to be home we decided to go. The girls had a good time and really loved watching Mouse act out the story.

American Girls

Shelby had a day off of school on Friday, so Nate and I took the girls up to Chicago for our first trip to the American Girl store. I had been planning to take this trip since the spring. My original plan was to ride the train with my mom and sister. Time has just gotten away from us and I also couldn't decide if I was ready to try the train. When we had this free day I felt we should take the opportunity and go. The girls were excited once we got there. As we were approaching the city neither one of them seemed very excited to be there. Shelby felt since we had already been to Chicago, we didn't need to go back. I told her there was a lot of stuff to do in Chicago and the first time we went we only did 2 things. They were disappointed we were not going to spend the night in a hotel. With everything available to do, I truly believe they are just as content to spend a night at a hotel. We spent a couple hours in the store and then headed back to the car. On our way to the parking garage, we passed the pizza place Ginos East. That is where we ate on our first trip. We decided to stop there for early supper and let some of the traffic get out. I think we could have spent hours there and the traffic would have been just as bad. It probably took us 3.5 hours to get home. Someone told me driving would be faster than the train, but in this case I think the train would have been faster and less stressful! I took my camera and regret not getting any pictures in the store but the girls rarely stood still long enough for me to take one! Even though Shelby would have taken one of everything, she was ok with buying 2 things. She picked out a book and a miniature version of her doll Emily. Morgan had a gift certificate from her birthday she used to buy a bouncy seat for her Bitty Baby. She also got the mini doll like her Ruthie. Overall not a bad trip but I think if we had been staying over it would have been more enjoyable. Just seemed like a lot of time in the car for the 2 hours in the store! But who can afford it? With the Chicago over 10% sales tax, the parking and cost to eat, good grief. I did pick up some Christmas stuff but in reality, the shipping costs from the catalog can't be any worse than that sales tax. The only pictures I took where on the way home. Fun but exhausting time. Both girls told me at bedtime and the next morning how much fun they had.

A Few Days in the Life of Queen Klutz

For anyone who really knows Morgan, it is clear why I named her "Queen Klutz". She is so klutzy she is the Queen, not the Princess. A brief summary of her accidents this week will explain.
Monday: Fell down a few of the basement steps when I sent her to open the dryer door before running errands.
Monday: Turned around to head to the playroom to get her baby doll and hit her head on the corner of the cupboard.
Monday: Doing something with dad and slipped and hit her eye on the wall. Daddy is unsure if the bruise that has appeared next to her eyebrow was from the cupboard or the wall.
Tuesday: Followed me down to the basement and on the way back upstairs she lost her balance. Although I caught her and kept her from falling, she bit her upper lip. I did not realize this until we got upstairs and she came to me with a bloody mouth. Sore lip made it difficult to eat.
Wednesday: After taking Shelby to school, I was opening the back gate of the van to get some things out we had bought a few days earlier. She walked around the corner just in time to run the other side of her head into the edge of the gate. That left a small bruise on her forehead.

We are only half way through the week and I didn't even take the time to type all the little things that happen to her in a days time. Most of the time it is pretty comical because it is border line ridiculous. We are approaching the one year anniversary of her first visit to the ER when she fell backwards and landed on her back and head on my parents hardwood stairs. And just shy of 5 months for the second ER trip for the staples in the head. Heaven only knows of what is yet to come in the life of Queen Klutz! I guess it wouldn't hurt to start praying daily for physical safety, in reality from herself.

Moments With Morgan

Although it is a lot of work and at times frustrating, I am enjoying my time as a stay-at-home mom. An 8 hour day at home goes by way faster than a day in the office ever did. Morgan and her sweet personality is a big reason I am enjoying myself. As I have mentioned before, she spends most of her playtime being a mom to her dolls. She still changes their names everyday or so and takes them "shopping" a lot. Here is a short conversation I had with her the other day and one of the reasons I often tell her she is funny. Morgan returns to me after she and her baby went shopping-
Morgan: "We saw the clock and came back".
Me: "What did the clock say"?
Morgan: "The clock doesn't talk".
Even though she was very serious when she said that I couldn't help but laugh.
And I appreciate her this past week for going with the flow and really taking care of herself as I have felt like poo and rarely have gotten off the couch.

I'm..... Oh No You're Not!

Yesterday I heard it. The dreaded 3 words. "I'm in love". Imagine that said with a dreamy voice and you will hear what I heard from Shelby on the way home from school. I burst her bubble with "Oh no you're not, and that is not appropriate"! She fought back with, "I am in kindergarten, not preschool!" I said, "Preschool or kindergarten, there is no such thing as love!" She has her eye set on a boy in her class named Carter. I probably have blogged about him before. Well I don't know what his mom did to his hair yesterday, but whatever she did put my daughter head over heels. All over a hairdo! That is what dream girl was talking about - his hair!

The Cook Is In..... Again

Morgan is still having fun playing cook in the toy room. I got a few pictures of her in her apron the other day. One of these times I will have to try to set up the video camera while she is in action. It is rather entertaining. In one of the pictures she is taking a break talking to my mom on the phone. My mom was trying to convince her to let me take her picture wearing the apron.

Correction

I must make a correction to my last post about the coloring. Shortly after posting that I got a text message from my sister. It said, "I hate to burst your bubble but I colored that tree". What?! It is clear that not only is my daughter good at coloring pictures, she has a colorful imagination for making up stories. In this case a fib. Not such a good quality!
However, everything else in that post should be correct. She did do the other 2 pages herself, still impressive.

Impressive Improvements

I used to say Shelby's personality came out in her coloring. She really didn't care and would just scribble away throwing colors all over the paper. It probably wasn't until last year in preschool that she started to get serious about coloring. She has really gotten pretty good at it. If she's not outside riding her bike she is in the house coloring or drawing. I took a few pictures of some of her more impressive work. Hopefully the detail will come through.

I picked these 3 pictures because of her creativity. She added all the colorful stripes on Strawberry Shortcake's hat herself. There was not a pattern marked out for her. The tree on the page with the 2 men is what caught my eye. She colored it with 2 shades of green. She told me Kaila taught her that. She is my cousin's daughter from back home that babysits for me once in awhile.

Morgan does a pretty good job for her age I think. I guess probably because she does so much better than Shelby did at that age. Shelby tells her she scribbles and I have to remind her it wasn't all that long ago she did the same thing. Here are a few of her masterpieces. The most impressive thing about Morgan's scarecrow is she colored that while riding in the car!

Homecoming 2009

Shelby's school participated in the Normal Community West Homecoming last week. On Thursday evening I was lucky to find an orange shirt at the kids used clothing store. Nothing like last minute. They had early dismissal for the parade on Friday afternoon. It was not exactly parade weather but I pulled out the earmuffs and gloves to go along with the winter coats. I have sat through worse weather for baseball games out there at Normal West so this was doable. Her school does a drawing for participants to walk in the parade. She really didn't have a chance because the forms came home while she was sick. She didn't bring hers home until they day after they were due back to school. I wasn't too disappointed since a parent has to walk along with them. She was disappointed at the parade because I wouldn't walk around to find people she knew to sit by. Her friend Jack from her class sat across the street and down aways. After the parade I talked to his mom and she said he was sad because he didn't get much candy. So when we got home Shelby put some of her candy in a baggie to take to Jack on Monday. I was sort of amazed by that.

I hadn't been to a homecoming parade in over 15 years but I guess I expected more for a big school. Coming from a small town that is all I am used to. The West band did not wear uniforms and I know my High School marching band wears the uniform for every parade. Even the 100 degree ones in the summer. And we made some impressive floats when I was in school. We did have a competition so maybe that was the incentive. Every class always wanted to beat the seniors. Maybe one of these years we will venture out to the homecoming football game but not this year. I feel sorry for anyone who sat out in that weather for Friday nights game!