Halloween!

It's not often that we get Jacob and Hannah for Halloween and when we do, we just love it!!! Hannah was the Queen of Hearts and she really loved her dress. It was actually a dress for a vampiress, but we modified it to be a more suitable costume. Jacobwas the gorilla and Joel was taking a walk on the dark side as Darth Vader. Mark, being the theatre buff that he is, loves the dress up and character acting that comes with Halloween. He did have a DJ gig and wasn't able to join us for trick-or treating, but was able to see the kids dressed up and Isabella on her first Halloween ever.

It amazed me how difficult it was to find a princess outfit for an infant. Bumblebees, fairies, ballerinas, even devils (like I want to dress my baby as satan) abound, but no princesses. A friend offered to lend us a Belle costume, which we thought was fitting, because she's our princess Bella. But when we put it on, it didn't quite have the poof factor I had hoped for. One of her party dresses worked better.

Me getting kisses from my little princess.

The kids made bank on the candy. We had a late night and we all ate way to much sugar. That's what you're supposed to do, right?

New Hairdo!

My fall colors.

Pumpkin Patch - AGAIN!

We went back to the pumpkin patch with Joel and Daddy this time. Jacob and Hannah were at Susan's so we had to go without them. Joel is lookin' like such a big boy. That's him above acting cool on the haystacks. He IS a very cool kid. You can see my new hair color below, but this is still the work in progress. It's been a tradition since Joel was a baby that he and I take a special photo together a the pumpkin patch. This year he REALLY wanted Isabella to be in the shot with us.

Mark has a special relationship with each of his kids. Truly. It's very sweet to watch him with Isabella. They really have a soft spot for each other.

Our little sunflower was much more rested for this trip and generous with the smiles. Look at those huge teeth!

Crazy Hair Day!

Our church has a mid-week discipleship kids program called Kids Quest. This is a shot of Joel on crazy hair night. Pretty whack, huh?

11 mo. Photos at the Pumkin Patch

Isabella was way past her nap and a good sport about the pumpkin patch, but she wasn't going to grace us with smiles for the 11 month photo shoot. So, you get to see a more serene side of our baby. She's learning animal noises now, so the petting zoo was good practice in animal identification. She's a smart little thing (and I do mean little for my DNA - she may be a petite one). She loves "na na" (bananas) and is intense in her pursuit of her favorite breakfast food. Daily she is adding to her vocabulary and is actively studying language. Some of her newest words are: "apple," "boon" (balloon), "Doel" (Joel), "Hannah," "Duh" (Jacob), "mo" (more), "kitt" (kitty), "Buh" (book), "baf" (bath), "fffffff" (flower). These are all in addition to the typical dada, mama, ball that she's been babbling for a few months now. She'll try about any word you are williing to work on with her. One more month and she's 1!!!! (sigh)

Isabella at 10 months

Here's our little cutie at 10 months. Notice she's showing off her new teeth in a couple of these shots. She's picking up on a lot of words and standing up with the aid of the furniture.

Joel turns 7!

Can you believe it? He's so tall for his age (still ABOVE the 95th percentile) and skinny. He tolerates school, but, really, school is a bother because it gets in the way of his playtime. He still has a soft spot in his heart for Thomas the Tank Engine, but Pokemon and Star Wars Legos have taken over his interests. He loves computer games, too.

On September 11, his actual birthday, we allowed him to bring some friends with him to Chuck E. Cheese. It was a good time to go, since it was a Thursday and not too crowded. He had a blast. Then, on Friday when Jacob and Hannah came home, we had a family party at home. He LOVED being king of the day and perhaps took it a bit too far when he wanted to boot Daddy from his seat at the head of the table.