Books Galore!

We need to start writing some thank you notes for all the awesome books the little dude got for his birthday. We are already enjoying them!

He was brushing his teeth during the first reading of this one, but was there for the two nightly Captain Underpants chapters.

Happy 6th Birthday and Durham Bulls Part II

My little guy turned 6 today. The first thing he said this morning?

"I can't wait to be 7!"

What?!?  Don't wish it away too fast there little man. You'll be 36 before you know it.

Here are some pictures from today and some more pictures from the Bulls Fan Fest.

Somebody is $6 old!

I'm a mean dad. I made him read all his cards himself!

Before school with his favorite new book. "Captain Underpants"

Having a nice game of catch with his daddy and Pops.

Getting ready to bat.

 

No funny quips tonight. Just feeling lots of love for my little guy, who is growing up so fast. He's getting so big, but he's still so little. I love you little man. Thanks for expanding my world and enlarging my heart. You will be something amazing one day. I take that back... you already are.

Durham Bulls, Part I

On Saturday we went to the Durham Bulls fall fan-fest. It was AWESOME and we will definitely go again. The little dude got to pose with Wool E. Bull as soon as we arrived.

 And here's a picture of the baby enjoying her Nana while waiting in line for batting practice.

I'll post more photos from this tomorrow.

Pumpkin Carving

Pumpkins and carving kits were on sale at the grocery store this morning, so we bought three pumpkins and two kits. Nana and Pops spent the weekend with us and helped the kids carve this afternoon. It was really fun! The little guy cut the tops off and scooped, and the baby helped pick out the stencils. And we have pumpkin seeds in the oven right now.

 

Autumn Mornings

A few weeks ago, the little guy told me that he likes cold weather because he can play on the heating vent and it keeps him warm. Well, it's been chilly in the mornings all week and we've had the heat on!

He's right-- there isn't much better than sitting on a heating vent!

Old Stand-by

Between traffic and swimming lessons, I needed a quick dinner that the kids would eat happily. Pizza toast to the rescue!

Delicious.

Ice Cream!

We took dinner to some friends who just had an adorable little baby, and while we were out that way we stopped and got some delicious ice cream.

It's nice to kick back and let everyone have ice cream for dinner on occasion.

Style Icon II

The little guy used to wear the best outfits (still does, sometimes), and now the baby is interested in accessorizing. Like her necklace? This started out as an acoustic rendition of Shut Up and Dance, but ended up like this:
Brava!!

Hack, Cough, Snore

Sorry for the lack of posts this week-- my cold turned into bronchitis and I spent most of the week coughing and/or sleeping. One of the things we did do this week was start swimming lessons with the little guy. He actually jumped into the pool Thursday night-- he hasn't done that in a long time.

I'm hoping this is the winter he learns to swim.

Outsourcing

A few years ago, some of my friends were making fun of me for outsourcing everything-- they even said that my CSA was me outsourcing farming. It was pretty funny.

This is relevant because Eric and I have successfully outsourced bedtime stories!
Awwwwwww.

Captain Underpants!

We bought the little guy the first Captain Underpants book at his school book fair Friday. He loves it! We've been reading two chapters a night.

Even the baby thinks it's funny!

New Photographer!

The little guy has taken pictures for years (where did the time go?), but the baby picked up the camera this weekend and took a few shots of her daddy, me, and some furniture.

What talent!

Painting!

Eric HATES it when the kids paint (or do art, generally) because it's so messy. I love it when they paint because they have so much fun! And it's all washable! Anyway, the kids painted today. I even put the baby in a smock!

Of course, I let them squeeze out their own paint. The baby ended up with a "painting" that was an inch-thick puddle of purple and blue paint half on and half off her paper. Yay for creativity!

Super Heroes

We went to Target the other night to get the kids Halloween costumes because they were having a buy-one-get-one free sale. They had a lot of cool costumes for the little guy so he picked out an Iron Man costume with a mask and built in muscles. Pretty awesome.

The selection for my little Sweet Pea was disappointingly less than stellar. There was a ton of Disney Princess stuff, not that there's anything wrong with that if that's your thing, but we just don't want to get into that. And a lot of the costumes were a hinting at being just a touch inappropriate for an almost 3 year old girl. (See this. A little bad language, sorry, but hilarious.) So we asked her what she wanted to be and she proceeded to swing her arms in front of her with a sing-songy, "Su-per Hero!!!" It was adorable. We eventually found an awesome Wonder Woman costume in her size with a cape and everything. She just beamed and continued her little "flying" act while all the other shoppers' hearts melted.

Here we are watching TV (which produced this) and you can see she's wearing it. What a cutie!

She watched the entire movie with her leg resting on mine. It was great.

This and That

On Sundays, the little guy likes me to read him some of the comics. The ones he likes best are Baby Blues, Rhymes with Orange, and F Minus. This week's F Minus strip struck him as particularly funny. He actually drew it himself in after school today!

Meanwhile, the little one continues to dress herself. Both of these items are "twirly" which apparently means they match.

Nutella-face

I was a phenomenal wife Saturday. I let Eric sleep in and then made biscuits, eggs, and bacon for breakfast. (We'll pretend I didn't burn the bacon, ok?) The baby had half a biscuit with nutella on it for second breakfast. Look at her little mustache!

Chicken Run!

To cap off yet another rainy day (soooooo ready for some sunshine), we watched Chicken Run after dinner. I love the way the little guy laughs when something strikes him as funny, and I managed to catch it on video!
My second favorite part of this is the baby's reaction to her brother's laughter... or lack of reaction.

Sweetness

Now that the little dude is in kindergarten, he and I get home before Eric and the baby. He spends a lot of his time home with me playing by the front door and keeping an eye out for his sister.

What a sweet boy.