Trick-or-Treating

Kyrie had a bunch of her friends over to go trick-or-treating this evening.  It was lots of fun, although this Mommy stayed home - with the excuse of needing to hand out the candy, but really she just needed to not walk the neighborhood for an hour 28-weeks pregnant the day after being up all night with a little Lari throwing up constantly.  Ughhhh...  Lari recovered enough to go out for about 45-minutes, but we brought her home early to get to bed on-time, along with Declan.  Kyrie got to stay out a bit later and collected a full bag of candy.  It was disgusting and exciting all at the same time!

Kyrie, Amy, Breanna, Seth, Declan, and Joe

Here is our little Garden Gnome. I am not sure why we only got a photo of him.  I think the girls were too anxious to get out and about?!



What?!

Look closely.  Notice anything missing?!  Kyrie has lost her first tooth - on Halloween!  I guess it didn't want to stick around to deal with all of the candy she was about to eat.  Her tooth had been loose for a little while, most noticeably when she went to the dentist last week Thursday.  But, over the weekend she kept wiggling and wiggling and it was getting very loose.  I think she wanted to lose it at school and don't think she could've planned it any better.  It sounds like she walked in off the bus, showed some friends how wiggly it was, and out it popped.  She got to go to the health room where they gave her a tooth treasure box!  Too cool!  Personally, I was slightly relieved she lost it at school...while I am truly not a very squeamish person, there is something about tooth loss that I am not completely keen on.  My first Mommy experience with losing a tooth was way too easy!  Good job, Kyrie.  Of course, her favorite part was waking up the next morning to a silver dollar under her pillow - and the tooth fairy was even kind enough to let her keep her tooth.  Yay!

Excavator!

Building has begun on my parent's new home!  Declan and I, of course, had to go and check it out on the first day in order to see the digger that was there.  While Declan thought the excavator was pretty neat, he thought it was more fun to take his own trucks and have them dig in the dirt.  Lesson learned: wear boots, bring wet wipes!

Preparations

The kids must have been preparing for Halloween before dinner at Grandma and Grandpa's tonight.  Here are the costumes they came up with.

Pumpkin Carving

We had the Schambow family over to carve pumpkins while J.J. had to work.  The kids really enjoyed it - can you believe this was the first time carving a pumpkin for all of them?!  I know, how sad that I have never carved pumpkins with my kids!  But, they seemed to enjoy their first experience.  And, they did a really great job.  The faces were designed on their own and then my mom and I helped them to make it a reality.



Third Trimester

I have no photo to go with this post, but wanted to mark it down as the first day of my last trimester of the last pregnancy of my life.  This pregnancy has gone remarkably well and am hoping that can continue for three more months.  Even if it doesn't, we are on the home stretch now and a very busy home stretch it is.  I just wish I could capture this jumping tummy to remember for always.  Another active baby.  Though, I did not expect anything else!

Blog Updated!

The blog has been updated and caught up from September till the present.  Woo hoo!  I still have second-half of the summer photos to add, but hey, it's getting there!!!

Berrall Family Photos

And, today we took a Berrall Family photo for my parent's Christmas card.  I highly doubt they will be using these, but they sure are funny!

Outtakes

My Dad took photos of our family this weekend, and although I really like all of these photos these are some that we will not be using for our annual Thanksgiving card:

End of the Season

Kyrie's soccer team poses after the last game of the Fall season.  I do believe they did not lose a single game this season...although, they may have tied one.

27 Weeks...

...and getting really huge.  Ughhhhh...

Mommy's Rascal

Wrestling with Grandpa

Grandma and Grandpa babysat this evening while Mommy and Daddy went to teacher conferences.  Before we left, there were some shennanigans with Grandpa in the family room.  These kids sure do have fun with their grandparents and are so blessed to be surrounded by people who care about them so much!

Surprise Birthday Party

My friend, Jenny, turned 34 this week and her husband surprised her with a birthday party at Sips N Strokes in Sussex.  The Book Club ladies and a few others enjoyed food and drinks while following directions to create a painting of an owl.  It was so much fun!

Here are Carrie and Linda at the beginning of the evening:

 My canvas from the beginning of the night:

 And, the finished product:

 All of our owls together.  Happy Birthday, Jenny!  A really fun night!

Kyrie

Costume Party

Harry Potter, a Hogwarts student, and a garden gnome, heading off to the Burleigh Costume Party.

 Kyrie Potter, Amy mouse, and Breanna cat having fun at the party.

Tiger Amelia and Giraffe Elizabeth came with us as well!

Puppy Love

 (I am not sure who took this picture, but despite its bluriness, I thought it was somewhat cute.)

Declan's carseat is currently not seat-belted in, and so he has been sitting in Lari's carseat (which is really now his carseat, since she is sitting in the booster seat...but that is another story).  Today, he tried to climb into his old carseat, but I told him he could not.  I then explained that he should just start thinking of Lari's carseat as his carseat and his old carseat as the baby's carseat.  I decided to go for broke on the subject, but the result was total cuteness.  It went something like this:

Me: Declan, that is where the baby will sit.  Won't that be fun when there's a baby there?
Declan:  Yes.
Me:  When your little brother sits there will you teach him all about all of the trucks you see?
Declan:  Yes.
Me:  Will you sing him a song if he cries?
Declan:  Yes.  I will give him toys.
Me:  Oh, how ni-ice!  Will you pretend you are puppies with him?
Declan:  Yes.  I share.  I have Buddy.  He have Mac.

This is where my heart melted...  Declan sleeps with three puppies; one he couldn't care too much about, but the other two are named "Buddy" and "Mac" after my parent's dog, and his Uncle Tim's dog and he has loved those things up so much that they have no nose and have been sewed up countless times by this Mommy.  For him to say he will share one of his puppies with the baby is sweet beyond belief.  Sure, he may not really understand, but who cares.  What a good boy.

Safety Town Graduate

After two weeks of learning all about different kinds of safety (crossing streets, riding bikes, fire safety, poisons, safety around animals, etc.), Lariska's class was ready to graduate from Safety Town.  They put on a little ceremony where the kids sang some songs and we watched a cute video of their two weeks.  But the most fun was watching the kids get on their tricycles and stop at the lights and wave the other kids through the crosswalk.  Too cute.

On the Prairie

If this photo was taken at the time these girls are dressed to look like, they would currently be somewhere around 130 years old!  Amy, Lariska, and Kyrie were thrilled to attend "Days Gone By" at the Dousman Stagecoach Inn Museum, here in Brookfield last Sunday.  This is the second year in a row that we have attended the event put on by the Elmbrook Historical Society and we once again had a ton of fun!  For a "small" donation, the girls got to dress up in an outfit of their choosing and sit on the stage coach together to pose for a professional photographer.  They were looking so longingly at the clothes that I couldn't resist.  The above photograph has been doctored by myself, but I thought it looked more authentic to the times of Laura Ingalls Wilder, which is what the event is all about.  The girls also enjoyed, amongst other things, doing some laundry by hand, a sack race, churning their own ice cream, and finding items in a scavenger hunt.  We are so glad the Brandels reminded us of this awesome event and maybe next year we will remember in time to enter the costume contest!

Original, pre-doctored photo:

Laura's little sister, Baby Carrie?

Awww...back to modern times.

Soccer Gals

Two sisters.  Two soccer games.  Two fourth quarters.  Two goals.  Two points.  Two wins!

Matt was away for the weekend and I was quite dismayed when both my daughters woke me up (separately) in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and then again at 6am, when they decided it would be a good time to wake up (normally they get up between 6:45am and 7am).  So...I took their desserts away for the day.  They don't like that so much.

On the other hand, taking the dessert away offered an opportunity for them to "earn" it back.  I bribed both girls - if they got a goal, they could have their dessert back.  If they both got a goal, we would stop and get ice cream to take to everyone at Nana's house.  Need I say more?

I didn't get to see Lari's goal, but it sounds like she shot the ball and then the ref blew the whistle to signal the end of the game.  How exciting!

I did get to see Kyrie's - they were a good half-way into the fourth quarter (so maybe six minutes left to the game) and the other team was up 1-0.  The ball was bouncing back and forth between our team and the other team when Kyrie got her foot on the ball and the ball into the net.  I am not sure I have ever heard the spectators cheer so loud, and I personally had tears in my eyes.  It was so exciting!  With that goal, you could just see the whole team re-energize and work towards one more for the win.  Unfortunately, the other team got another goal, then Seth scored one from our team, and the game ended 2-2.  Still, Kyrie's goal was very significant there in the fourth quarter and so very awesome!  I am a proud Mommy.

Way to go soccer gals!

Go Air Force

Matt's cousin, Jason, plays football for the Air Force and Matt was fortunate enough to be able to travel to Notre Dame this weekend along with his Mom, Dad, brother, and various aunts and uncles to see the game.  Unfortunately, Air Force did not win, but they did have a really great time, anyway.

Fun Run

The Burleigh Elementary PTO holds an Annual Fun Run.  The kids really love it and always have a great time.  This Mommy couldn't make it this year to watch, since both girls ran during Declan's naptime, so Grandma and Grandpa Kons went to cheer them on.  Here are some photos they took of the girls running their hearts out.