Scare of a lifetime!

Just thought I'd share a picture of what or who I saw in my bathroom at 6:30 am on Friday morning:

Matt just laid in bed when my alarm went off that morning, just waiting (the anticipation nearly killing him) for my scream. And scream I did, a very loud, a very 'i'm having a hear attack' kind of scream. 

Visitor

Tonight Billy Mays made a visit....?????

Matt's off to a costume party tonight.  The theme was TV characters.  No, he didn't grow that beard overnight, that's corn syrup and coffee grounds!

School parties

Jack's class and party pictures:  Don't you just love the angel in the back casting her blessings upon her class!

 

 

 

 

 

 

During Jack's party we bowled with pumpkins, tossed candy corn into pumpkins, made a bat craft, made jello jack-o-lanterns, face painted and shared spooky apple cider (which turned out awesome by the way, I love dry ice!)and donut holes.  We even managed to sing Happy Birthday to his teacher and serve her a big donut with a candle!  So much fun!

Now on to Dylan's party:

First there was a big parade around the playground:

 

That's Grant loving on his brother.  His friends can't get enough of Grant and he just eats it up.

 

Back in the room they had a snack and played the mummy wrap game.  The room mom had them wrap one partner, then un-wrap them, and wrap the other partner.  The first partner worked out great, the second one was virtually impossible.   One team was able to complete both mummies without ripping or wadding up the paper.  Then they received their goody bags which contained a very loud, but pretty cool, whistle which was heard for the rest of the day at the Winger house.  Today it has been 'misplaced' ;-)

Fun times that are well worth all the work!

Halloween well wishes

May your buckets always overflow with candy!

 

Happy Halloween

Here's our gang: Indiana Jones, Ladybug, Ninja, Pirate, and Curious George!

 

Ladybug Lena's first Halloween.

Sooooo cute!

Candy collection in progress.

Taking a break.

The sweet reward!

Ready, Set, Boo!

Just getting set for Halloween around here:  mending torn costumes, finding clothes to wear underneath costumes for beggar's night, explaining to Grant that pirates don't carry around dart guns during trick-or-treat, worrying about Dylan's costume looking cool enough for 4th grade, calling around to find dry ice for a classroom party punch bowl, looking for gloves to handle the dry ice so as not to get burned (?), finding recipes for orange popcorn, scheduling a trip to the grocery to buy corn syrup for the orange popcorn recipe, buying books for teachers who are celebrating birthdays on the same day as the Halloween parties, finding a candle and matches (am I allowed to bring matches into school?) to lite a birthday candle for that teacher, buying apple cider and cups and spoons, decorating water bottles for games, deciding whether to toss candy corn or candy pumpkins into buckets for a game,  ditching the pin-the-nose on the pumpkin game due to fear of spreading HINI germs,  making name tags for goody bags, stuffing goody bags, and just generally driving myself crazy trying to make sure 3 little boys have a great Halloween. What we wouldn't do for our kids.

Happy Birthday Matt

What could be better for a birthday than playing flag football with your 3 favorite guys in the backyard!

 

Happy birthday Matt!  We love you!

Message to Grandparents...

Please take all lego sets off of our Christmas lists :o)

Season's over

Jack's last game was this morning. Great season Smashers!

(Jack has the gray hoodie )

Rain, rain go away

Even Lilly is longing for the nice weather we had earlier this week:

 

She's been staring out the windows all afternoon with her 'baby' in her mouth, sorry Lil.

One thing that always makes a day better, especially a rainy one...Amish cinnamon bread:

Dylan wouldn't let me take his picture, but that boy loves bread and this one is his favorite.  It is a starter that you have to mush and 'feed' over 10 days.  Every morning he asks what day we are on for the bread and today was his lucky day even if it is pouring rain outside.

Now Grant on the other hand, his day isn't so lucky.  He is very grumpy, he screamed the entire time I was checking out at the grocery this morning.  He was standing in the cart and screaming for Recees cup, he almost fell out and then when I told him he couldn't ride 'Sandy' the penny horse because he wasn't behaving, well that pushed him over the edge.  I was sweating and trying to keep my cool but not doing a very good job.  The cashier was sooo nice  (I'm pretty sure she felt sorry for me) she offered to have a bagger stand with my 2! grocery carts so I could pull up and load without getting drenched in the rain.  I took her up on her offer which pleased me but infuriated Grant because he thought for sure that the bagger was going to steal our groceries! I was thinking on the way home about how as a parent you get it all, the very best moments and the very worst moments with your kids.  But I'll take it all; the good, the bad, and the Grant- oh I mean the grumpy :o)

Leggo Wars

Dylan is playing at a friend's house, Grant is sleeping, and Jack...

well he's ready for an ultimate Lego battle!  The lines are drawn.  It's good guys versus bad guys.

 

He let me play for awhile during the underwater boat battle.  I tried, I really did, but after about 45 minutes of preparation in finding the right heads for the guys and 10 minutes of my lame vehicle and shooting noises,  he decided  to do both sides of the battle on his own.  He thought maybe Grant or Dylan (or anyone) would do better than me.  Now give me some Barbies and a Barbie Dream house and I can't be stopped :o)

Lions and Tigers and ...Swine!

Swine Flu to be exact (although Dylan told me that they weren't allowed to call it 'swine flu' they have to call it H1N1).  Matt was diagnosed Tuesday and his fever left that day as well.  He is feeling better, still tired.  Grant has a fever and red burning eyes and just miserable, but not the dreaded H1N1. Dylan and Jack have colds and Dylan's eyes are red this morning.....I just had him at the doctor yesterday for his 10 year check up and were his eyes red yesterday???? NOOOOO.  They will probably send him home from school today assuming he has pink eye which will send us back to the doctor. Oh well, I'll do whatever it takes to make sure everyone is healthy. 
On a good, no great, note Jack is hanging tough.  We had bloodwork done Monday and it came back great!  We don't have to see his hematologist for 3 months.  Still no diagnosis, but we are fine with that as long as he is healthy.
For now, we'll keep washing our hands and popping vitamins until we feel better.

Belated Party Post

We had Grant's birthday party Friday night.  It was a horse themed party, Grant has a little obsession with 'Dustys'.  We made a couple of horse crafts, held a sugar cube relay, played pin the tail on the horse and beat the heck out of a horse pinata.  This is the first birthday party I have ever had inside, but it worked out fine, we had the basement all decked out.  Grant was so excited opening up his presents, he kept yelling, "this is mine, this is for me!"  We had a lot of fun, enjoy the pictures.

 

 

 

I love fall foliage!

I have inherited my Grandmother's love of fall foliage.  My grandparents and my Great Aunt and Uncle used to take these fall trips to look at the trees.  They have so many pictures of trees, but they were beautiful trees.   A few of the pictures have my Grandma and my Aunt posing with their famous 'waves.'  This one's for you Grandma, we found this little gem at the park today.

And here is just a cute picture of the boys on a hike today:

God's House

We went to my parents' church today for a service to commemorate the 10 year anniversary of their church being set on fire.  It was a nice service. We saw a lot of old friends and the pastor that married Matt and I returned to preach.  The service was 2 hours long and the boys were troopers (we fed Grant his weight in fruit snacks and suckers to make it through).
I had to post a funny story about Grant.  Grant and I were taking a potty break at church and he started kicking the door of the bathroom stall.  I told him that this was God's house and we should not kick the door.  His response, "Jesus does not live in here, he does not go pee here!" 

Three years ago today...

Happy 3rd Birthday Grant!  We love you and your loud voice! 

Day 1-part 2

Grant took his nap and the boys watched Indiana Jones in the afternoon.  After a quick supper we hollowed out 3 pumpkins and headed over to boy scouts for a pumpkin carving contest.

 

Grant's pumpkin was awarded 'the cutest'.

Jack's pumpkin won for the 'Boo-y-est'.

Dylan won the 'Tweet-y-est'.  He was going for a bat...the pumpkin judger made Dylan stand up and flap his wings like a bird to make sure this pumpkin was his creation.

We survived the day and no boy scouts were injured in the making of this post :o)

Look at all those boys:

You should have seen them all stand up and salute to say the pledge of alligence (apparently I'm taking after Dylan because I cannot figure out how to spell alligence, allegence, oh forget it), it made me proud.