Happy Halloween

This post's mostly pictures, so I think I can handle it :)  Happy Halloween! 

Ethan is sick, so he didn't get to go to the parade/trick-or-treating with us, but he gladly dressed up in his costume for some pictures beforehand.

Tigger, Clifford, and Peter Pan

Courtney very quickly embraced the whole trick-or-treating thing... and nobody could resist this adorable face coming back for seconds!

Kaeden and Atticus were trick-or-treating buddies, as Ryan kept up with some of his faster-moving friends.

The whole crew, being tortured with pictures between parading and trick-or-treating :)

Enjoying their loot and cookies at Ms. Kristen's house!

Soccer

It's been a long time.  I've spent the last 4+ months trying to get over mono.  Not a lot of fun, and with a lot of extra sleep/rest required, not a lot of time for blogging.  I'd like to say I'll catch up eventually, but realistically, I probably won't get back to it.  We'll see.  

In any case, it's time to move forward.  I've missed this! 

Ryan's been playing soccer this fall... his first time on a team.  Last night was the first time we made it to a game as a family, and it was way more fun than I imagined.  I was pretty impressed with how much it operated as a real soccer game.  I don't think of Ryan as much of a sports kid in general, but he stayed pretty well focused and active the whole time he was playing.  And with only 5 on 5, he got a few chances to actually interact with the ball too :)

He started out as goalie.  He seems to really like it:

On the field, he seemed hesitant to get too close to the ball at first, but by the end, he was getting in the mix a bit more.  

The fans :)

Taking the ball down the field.  Go Ryan!

Kaeden wanted to play too, so he brought his own ball and played on the sidelines.

After the game, Kaeden was thrilled to get out on the field himself.

A game well played, and lots of fun for all :)

kindergarten complete

 

 

 As you can see, this is a book Ryan wrote back in January about school.  Ever since Christmas break, they've had to write one book a week, and then they invited the parents to come in for a breakfast a few weeks ago, and our children shared their books with us.  It was really neat, and I loved reading what Ryan has written and seeing how his writing has improved the last few months.  It also warms my heart to see how much of his writing has to do with our family.  In any case, I thought that was a fitting one to share this week.

Ryan finished kindergarten on Friday.  I cried.  He did this:

 But then he tells me every day that he's sad school is over because he won't get to see his teacher anymore.  Have I mentioned that he had the most wonderful kindergarten teacher imagineable?

 Ryan adores her, as do we.  She made this year such a positive experience for Ryan and for us as first time grade school parents.  I felt completely confident sending my baby to her every day.  SO thankful.

Here's the official final day of school photo:

And the first to last day comparison.  The camera angle was different, so he hasn't grown quite as much as it appears, but still... can you just tell how much confidence he gained?

 I'm looking forward to a packed summer with all three of my boys at home.  Before I know it, he'll be starting 1st grade.  Crazy.

Birthday Celebrations

Ryan's been saying for a year now that he wanted a Lego birthday when he turned six, which I was thrilled about.  Ryan's actual birthday fell on a Wednesday this year (same as the year he was born, which made reliving the events all the more fun) - it was a full day of school, plus his kindergarten performance that night, but we tried to fit in a little celebrating with some birthday pancakes in the morning.

His performance that night was so much fun for all of us that I don't think he minded giving up his birthday evening for it!

 

The next day, we finally got around to opening presents:

 

He loved playing with his snap circuits set from Uncle Dain!

Reading to Daddy from "Now we are Six"

 Saturday was the big party day.  It was a new experience for me, inviting school friends that we don't know that well and having to plan actual activities rather than just letting them run around and play and then feeding them cake :)  All in all, it seemed to go pretty well.

The first game was a duplo toss, where they had to try to throw a duplo into the smallest possible ring.

Then we did a relay race where they had to run down to a bucket of legos, get a spoonful and carry it back to their team's bucket at the other end.  After everybody had a turn, the team had to try to build the tallest tower with their legos.  We were pretty lenient on rules (especially since we had younger siblings and cousins), and I'm not sure there even ended up being a winner, but the kids seemed to have fun.

 

 

Then came Ryan's big request, the pinata.

 

Uncle Bret and Courtney watching on the sidelines :)

And, finally, lunchtime!

 

 

Ethan, trying to drink the last of the cake crumbs off his plate

 

During the down time, we had legos and duplos out for the kids to play with. 

Kaeden and Caroline were best buds for the morning :)

And apparently polar bear ears as well!

It was a lot of work, but very rewarding, and we've only had a tiny bit of birthday withdrawal since :)