on stage

Grant was front and center for the Christmas play "preview" at church a few Sundays ago.  He was looking quite dapper in his Christmas outfit Grandma R made him this year!  The only thing he was missing was his guitar which is what he would practice with at home, haha!

Here he is doing the motions to Go Tell It On The Mountain

Of course, it's always a highlight to see yourself on the jumbotron screen too!

november

Wow, November, I'm not quite sure where you went but we are full steam ahead into December and all things Christmas around here!

We ended the month of November with Frank having ear surgery, celebrating his birthday, Thanksgiving and a wonderful weekend at the Great Wolf Lodge!

Part of Frank's birthday gift from his brother and family was a Christmas tree from their own little farm!  We had a grand time hiking through them, with the cousins, until we found "the" one!  It fits perfectly in our family room and has only fallen over once....seriously, colossal mess and traumatized the boys but, thankfully, only one ornament suffered any damage!

Jake and Grant tromping through the woods, Grant always following his older cousin!

texas

We were blessed to visit Grandpa and Grandma O in Texas, the beginning of this month, and had a grand time as always, thanks Mom and Dad for all of the fun!

We were fortunate enough to spend some quality time with extended family too, here Grant is on the walkie talkies with my cousin's son, Nash.  And as always, the golf cart was a hugely popular "toy!"

We snuck away for an afternoon round of golf, what fun, rusty but fun!

Grant and Parker with Nash in their NYC taxi shirts from Grandma O

I love this picture, it just makes me laugh looking at those two :+)

Good night books and snuggles with Grandma, love it!

family of robots

Before Thanksgiving arrives I thought it was necessary to post our robot family photos from Halloween!  The boys had a blast, Parker took a LOT of coaxing and a bag of popcorn to even put his little costume on but once we rang the bell at the first house and he got candy he got his GAME ON!

Grant was a robot last year and has insisted, everyday since, that we be an entire family of robots this year, silly boy!  We did the best we could, a few extra feet of dryer vents and even more colored duct tape and viola, Frank and I were Mom and Dad robot, haha!

By the end of the night neither of the boys could carry their own pumpkins, they were filled to the brim with candy, that's trick or treat success in our book!  

b is for brother

Grant took Parker as his show-and-tell for "B" week.  Each week we walk around the house and talk about items that start with the appropriate letter for school that week, he was soooo excited when he discovered he could take his brother!

It was really funny to hear Grant's classmates ask him questions about his brother, "Does he do any tricks?"  Grant told them he could do somersaults and jump but Parker wasn't very cooperative! 

"Where did you get it?" Haha, Grant didn't have an answer for that one!

We had some fun in the Fall leaves in our yard together later that day....

 Rowing the boat with Daddy and neighbor Jack!

the great pumpkins ~ round 2

Early October Grant insisted we carve at least one pumpkin so, we finally caved after days of relentless begging!  We explained to him it would mold and get yucky but he, of course, didn't care one bit!  Well, after everything got setup in the garage Frank, Grant and Parker got started while I cleaned up after dinner.  Quickly there were yells from the garage, poor little Parker got sick alllllllll over everything in the garage while sitting in Frank's lap starting the carving process.  Needless to say there were no photographs of pumpkin #1 but this is round two this year and I must say we had a grand time the second go at it!

the park

Last month, in the mad rush of an afternoon, post-naps, a friend and I took a few photos of our families at a local park.  Here are a few of my favorites from our brief little time together!

Parker wouldn't let go of me so this obviously wasn't quite what we were hoping for!

Enough with the camera already, Mom!

 There were ducks swimming around in the pond which proved quite the entertainment.

Yes, Parker, I will finally pick you up and carry you!