Warm playground day with Leah

Last Tuesday was Election Day, a paid holiday at my office and a beautiful, 60 degree day. The sun went down close to 5pm, which reminded us that winter is upon us, but we (and about 100 other kids and parents) enjoyed a fantastic visit to Onondaga Lake Park.

More fun with Halloween costumes

We are getting a lot of use out of this 6-9 mo Robin costume. I think it looks pretty good on Theo. But much to his disappointment, Beck has a hard time getting it up over his legs and hips.

More fall fun

 A couple weeks ago when Grandpa Stu and Grandma Joanie were here for the day we had some fun raking the leaves and jumping in them, and also piling Reed in the leaves on top of the big boys, as well as putting Jeff on the roof to assist with installation of the eavestrough.

Book fair

Last week was the boys' Scholastic book fair at school. I volunteered for the PTO Tuesday when Theo's class happened to come in. The boys think it is very cool to pick out new books for themselves. This is them upon arriving home, when they opened Theo's backpack to look at the books. You can see they literally just threw their backpacks on the ground, threw off their coats, and just sat down to pore over the books.

Leaf jumping

On Halloween morning we went to Canastota for a party with my friend Heidi and lots of kids and parents. The boys had a great time playing with the kids' toys and ignoring the Halloween festivities and games. This is my friend Trista with her son Finnegan, along with me and Reed.

On Halloween night Theo went back to his Raphael costume after doing Olaf at school. Luckily he didn't remember that he used to have a turtle shell on the back (we left it at Heidi's). Reed and I stayed home to greet trick-or-treaters, a smaller bunch than in years past. Grandma Joanie and Grandpa Stu went trick-or-treating with the boys and Jeff, and brought dinner to enjoy after the children went to sleep.

Eating the first pieces of Halloween candy after they returned home.

Tonight is the eve of my first day back at work, Reed's first day at childcare, and the big boys' first day at afterschool at their school. We went over to Reed's teacher's house today to show Reed (and Jeff, and the big boys) around. The big boys enjoyed all the great toys and wanted to stay more than the hour we were there. Reed got a chance to spend some time with Rachel and we got to talk about routines and sort out logistics. I have certainly spent a lot of time in the last many months thinking and planning for this, and I feel very good about what we have lined up. I had originally thought of having a neighborhood teenager pick up the big boys from their classrooms and bring them back home to play for two hours before we got home, but after interviewing a couple it seemed like a risky and complicated choice, what with their afterschool sports and activities, plus factoring in possible sick days or vacations or teenage whimsy/flakiness. So the boys are going to the school afterschool program managed by the local Y, just for two days a week at least for now. Jeff's going to be able to take the big boys to school most days and I will take Reed to Rachel most of the time. Please wish us luck!