Cold legs!

These are the pajama pants that I made for Hannah last Christmas. I can't believe how much she has grown! I hope she can wait another month for some new ones. (She just might have some new socks on her list, too!)

#1

Nikki had a gymnastics meet last Saturday and did such a great job. Robin and Mike were able to come, which was so nice. Her Sunday School teachers even came to watch her. Mike took some videos for me, so I'll post those when he gets them to me. She ended up taking 1st place in two of the four events as well as 1st overall. We are so proud of you, Nikki! Great job!

As we were walking out of the gym, everyone was looking at her medals and her trophy. This meet was called the Thanksgiving Invite, so her trophy is a turkey! We got a good laugh out of that.

Funnies

A couple of weeks ago Ryan was watching Mary Poppins, and Hannah mentioned at dinnertime that she didn't understand one of the jokes on the movie. It goes something like this: A friend of mine ran over his neighbor's cat the other day. He knocked on her door and said, "I'm really sorry about your cat. I would like to replace it." "That's fine," she said, "but how are you at catching mice?"
As I was explaining it to Hannah, all of a sudden the lights came on in Nate's eyes. He had never gotten it before, either!

One night Nate and I got home to find a note on the counter from the girls with a lollipop wrapped in aluminum foil beside it. It read: For Mom or Dad, We thought since we didn't like this succor that you might. Caution: it has already been sucked on but only by us, don't worry. Love, Hannah and Nikki P.S. It's banana flavored. Rotten banana!

Finishing October

Okay, so I'm finally posting the last of our October pictures.

 Pasta skeletons

 Window paint

 Orange jack-o-lanterns

 Spooky glowing eyes to place in the bushes at night

 Ryan and Hannah with some of his super-hero friends at the church trunk-or-treat party. Hannah was a mermaid this night.

 Painting pumpkins at the local grocery store

 Miracles do happen! Hannah was excited to go play in our backyard! She is always afraid of spiders and ticks, so she doesn't even like going on our back porch. But when I told her it was too cold for ticks anymore, the idea of raking a maze through the leaves in the backyard was too much for her to resist. Here they are posing at the finish line. 

 Carving pumpkins -- I wasn't home when Nate initiated this activity and looking at this picture of my girls with those huge knives makes me kind of glad I wasn't there.

 Halloween dinner -- Ghost Shepherd's pie with Apple/marshmallow teeth

And finally, getting ready for trick-or-treating on Halloween. Nikki missed the church party a few days earlier because she and I went to Charlotte to see the US Olympic gymnastics teams perform -- amazing! But here she is as Dorothy, Ryan opted for Superman this time, and Hannah decided to go back to her tried and true witch costume. The mermaid scales were hard to walk in, but I think this is funny because the witch's dress would probably fit a 4-year-old and she just uses it as a shirt now.

So, we ended up with tons of candy and lots of activities accomplished through October. Whew!