Mosey-ism

Mosey and Brigham were playing in the play room while I was on the computer.  I was listening in as Mosey began telling Brigham a story.  It started like this: "One of Leonardo da Vinci’s camera obscuras was taking a whole bunch of pictures every 50 milliseconds…"
Classic Mosey.  We may have to review again what a camera obscura is, as the whole "taking pictures" thing doesn't quite apply...  :-)
Mosey recently found one of my old digital cameras, and has become enamored with taking pictures and video.  So much so that he wore out a 2 gig memory card.  :-/  Maybe I'll have an apprentice one day?

spells

Last night, after coming home from Harry Potter, I sent the boys in to get ready for bed.  20 minutes later I went in the bedroom to find Joseph and Mosey sitting on the bed, practicing spells.  They both made wands, and Joseph has been writing spells in his little spell notebook.  He started this several months ago, but the movie inspired him to get it out again.  Ever since, I've had two little wizards running around the house casting spells.  Mosey is especially good at the deluminate spell when I'm right in the middle of something requiring light.  :-)
Mosey even brought his wand (made from a straw, a wooden skewer, and black and silver duct tape) to church with him today.  Now *that* would horrify those Southern Baptist anti-Harry Potter nuts out there!

Thanksgiving

Somehow I managed to get through this Thanksgiving holiday without taking a single picture!  I guess I wasn't much in the picture-taking mood.
Ben's mom and dad came to visit, flying in during the wee hours of the morning on Wednesday.  I had a neurologist appointment Wednesday morning--just my usual yearly checkup for medication refills.  Everything's fine.  I'm trying a new spasticity medication which I hope will help.  My doctor also increased my Baclofen dosage-- I'm at the maximum dosage now, so I hope the added medication, Zanaflex, will help.  Spasticity is my biggest MS-related physical complaint right now.  I brought the boys with me so Ben's parents could sleep in, and we got smoothies in the hospital cafeteria, just like we did in the old days when I was coming in every other week for bloodwork after my transplant.  I do not miss hospitals.
Back home, I attempted to do a half-day of school lessons.  After hearing the news about my friend, though, my heart really was not in it.  I've kind of felt that way about this whole holiday.  The boys all played the piano for Grandma and Grandpa, and I got great delight in listening to Grandpa Kent teach Brigham some fun little piano duets.  Jackee and I started baking some things for Thanksgiving dinner while the men-folk watched Mythbusters.  We had breakfast for dinner (pancakes and bacon and eggs), and then tried to get everyone in bed early.
On Thursday I got up early and continued my baking projects.  I made sausage, cranberry, and apple stuffing, pecan-topped sweet potatoes, jello salad, pumpkin pie, apple pie, and blueberry cream pie.  The boys worked on giant block buildings, and I enjoyed listening to Mosey read "Dragon Rider" to Grandma Jackee.  We ate dinner with our friends, the Taylors, so I only had to worry about half the meal.  Kristen made the turkey, mashed potatoes, and rolls.  Ben isn't much of a turkey-eater, so I bought half a ham at HEB and we brought that, too, which ended up being a big hit.
A cold front blew in on Thursday, and it was downright cold by the time we drove out to Steiner Ranch.  The boys brought their scooters, thinking they might ride around in the street after eating, but it was too cold for that.  Instead they ran around with the Taylors' 3 little boys, playing guns and other boys games.  I'm glad we went to the Taylors'.  It got my mind off things, and I think everyone had fun.
Yesterday morning we drove down to San Antonio, stopping at the Temple to look around a bit and visit the distribution center there.  Then we went downtown and took a boat ride through the river-walk.  The boat tours start off at the mall, and it was absurdly crowded.  I despise shopping malls, and the day after Thanksgiving is the worst time to be at one.  Plus, that evening there was the annual San Antonio Riverwalk Christmas boat parade, so half of Texas was trying to get there at the same time.  The river boat was fun, though, and worth doing again when we have visitors.  The Riverwalk is the #1 tourist attraction in Texas-- above the Alamo which is #2!  We ate a late lunch/early dinner at Rio Rio, an extremely slow (although delicious) Mexican restaurant overlooking the river.  Then we hurried over to the Alamo, taking an unintentional detour completely around the shopping mall (oops), and making it to the Alamo a whole 5 minutes before closing...  We made it safely back to Austin in time for Ben to take Kent and Jackee to Half-Price Books.  Jackee loves that store (who doesn't?!), and filled a suitcase full of books to take home.
This morning Brigham and Mosey serenaded Grandma on their violins.  We took Kent and Jackee to eat at Rudy's to complete their Texas vacation, and then dropped them off at the airport.  We're going to leave in 15 minutes to go downtown and watch Harry Potter at the Imax theater. 
I've spent the holiday feeling extremely grateful, so that is good.  Too bad it sometimes takes tragedy to really hone my gratitude.

Heavy heart

Got news today that a dear friend just lost her husband, mother, and uncle in a private plane crash.
It's hard to feel very enthusiastic about the holiday.

Life is awfully hard to understand, sometimes.  Some people coast through with nothing more difficult than the normal ups and downs of life.  Other people get hammered with the most awful tragedies that mortality has to offer.  And there is absolutely no rhyme or reason to it.  
We all want to know why, so we can reassure ourselves that it can't happen to us.  But it can, and for some of us, some of the most undeserving, it does.
There is some comfort to be found in the plan of salvation, but it feels hollow, sometimes, compared to the extremity of the loss and pain to be endured in this life.  My friend, only in her 40's, will be a widow for the rest of her life.  She has lost her mother, the person she would probably otherwise have leaned on the most to help her through this, and the loss of whom by itself is awful.  Her uncle's family has lost a husband and father.  Stephanie's three sons, one still in high school, will not have their father to guide them through their lives. This good family, in an instant, has been dropped into the whirlwind.
It's Thanksgiving tomorrow, and I sure have a lot to be thankful for; among the top of my list is my husband and my mom.  My friend has just lost these, and that leaves me with an extremely heavy heart...

Mister, Mister, Mister

Mister is the Houdini of dogs.  I don't know how he does it, or why, but he manages to escape our house and yard despite all of our best efforts.  He never goes far-- he just takes himself on a walk around our neighborhood.  I've never had to go out driving looking for him for longer than about 5 minutes.  I'll find him just loping along the sidewalk sniffing around and doing doggy stuff.  He escaped a couple of weeks ago during a torrential downpour.  We got in the van looking for him, and found him walking cheerfully down the street utterly soaking wet. 
Well, yesterday he managed to escape again.  I have no idea how.  Both backyard gates were closed tight.  I think he must have squeezed out when Mosey went out the front door to get the mail, or maybe when we opened the garage door backing out on our way to the dentist.  Either way, he got out.  We finished up at the dentist office (pretty uneventful in spite of Joseph's fears-- he was very nervous for some reason.  He was sure he had a cavity and that the dentist would yell at him.  Well, he didn't, and the dentist didn't yell.  He's never been reprimanded at the dentist's, so I'm not sure where this fear comes from.  Maybe underlying guilt about not brushing enough?  Mosey does have one little cavity which doesn't surprise me since he is a sugar fiend-- he's finished almost all his Halloween candy while his brothers have most of their still left.), and went to the Bank (very aggravating-- someone got my debit card number somehow and tried to make several hundred dollars of online purchases last weekend.  Luckily Bank of America spotted the unusual activity and suspended the transactions.  Now I have to get a new debit card and change every single one of my automatic payments.  Grr.  The BofA person on the phone told me I could go to any bank to get a temporary replacement card.  Turns out, though, that Texas is in a different region than Florida, where we opened the account, and temporary cards can only be issued in the region of origin.  The only way to get our accounts transferred to Texas accounts is to close them all down and open new accounts.  Ridiculous.  So I went all the way into the bank, waited for 25 minutes to talk to the person (why there was only ONE person working in the bank full of at least 6 offices is beyond me), only to find out that they couldn't help me and I have to wait the 2 weeks for my new card, which hadn't even been ordered yet.  You wouldn't think this is a big deal, but for me, it is.  The simple act of getting gas, for example, is made many times more difficult if I have to walk all the way into the gas station to pay cash, and then back to pump the gas, and then back and forth again to get change...), where I got a frantic call from Ben.  Animal Control had picked up our wandering dog, and were taking him all the way downtown to the animal center.  They could take him back home, but only if I were right there.  Well, I wasn't, and couldn't get back in time, and we ended up not being able to contact the animal control people in their van anyway.  I was very annoyed and not looking forward to the fee for springing him from doggy jail.  I was sure it would be at least $100.  So after horseback riding we drove down and picked up Ben from work and went to the Animal Center.  To our surprise and delight, we discovered that they 1) gave Mister his yearly shots (which he hadn't had yet), 2) microchipped him, 3) gave him a flea and tick treatment (Frontline is expensive!), 4) gave him new tags and a new collar (although only because they lost his), and 5) released him back to us for only $20.  What a deal!  That is WAY less than I would have paid at our vet's office.  Next time I need to take Mister in for his yearly vet visit, I'm going to have someone drop off a "stray" Mister at the Animal Center, and then we'll go pick him up in the evening with everything all done!  (Just kidding, but it's still tempting.)
So, an annoying event turned out well after all. 
We celebrated by going out to eat at Marie Callenders (Brigham's favorite restaurant), because, you know, 5 days before Thanksgiving is a GREAT time to get pie.  :-)

Better!

Mosey had a really excellent day yesterday, after just a bit of a hiccup of a start.
The boys have morning chores before we start lessons.  Yesterday it was Mosey's turn to clear off the table, put away the breakfast things, and wipe down the countertops an table.  A really hard job, to be sure.  :-)  When I announced chore time, Mosey immediately went into a pout and said, "I'm NOT going to do it!"  This time I didn't give him any chances and he went directly to the hall closet for 10 minutes.  (Side note: having the big boys here to help me is crucial in my disciplinary abilities-- when I have to pick up a screaming, thrashing almost-7-year-old for a time-out, I can't very well wheel my wheelchair.  So I hold Mosey and one of the twins pushes us.  And Monday when Mosey ran away around block again, Joseph and Brigham both circled opposite ways around the block and man-handled him back to the van-- a very interesting sight to the neighbors, I am sure...)
However, when he came out of the closet, he was as nice and as sweet as could be and was delight all day long.  Phew!  At the end of the day I gave him a little toy airplane I've been saving in my closet for the right occasion.  He was really surprised and really happy, so I hope it will be a good positive-reinforcement for good behavior.  We'll see today!

trying to catch up...

I've been wanting to write for several days now, but haven't found the time.  Here's what's been happening the past few days.
We're very slowly getting back into lessons after our vacation last week.  Very slowly.  I always like to think that after a vacation we'll all be nicely rested up and eager and ready to jump back into things.  Not so.  It seems more difficult!  Why is that?
Last Thursday morning the big boys got a pass from lessons while they marched in a Veterans' Day parade in downtown Austin.  I wish I could have gone down to see them!  Their Den leader took pictures, though.  Joseph got to carry the flag!  Not that easy for the 1.3 miles of the parade course up Congress Street to the Capitol.

After the parade, one of the veterans there gave the boys donuts.  So nice!

The boys got Burger King happy meals on the way home (lucky boys!), and got back just on time to get ready for piano lessons and violin lessons.  I had a Relief Society activity in the evening (putting together care packages for soldiers-- a good activity for Veterans' Day, huh?), which made for a bit of a late night for me.
On Friday we were supposed to have a full docket of lessons.  Normally Fridays are easy days-- 1/2 lessons, but since the boys didn't do any lessons to speak of the day before, I wanted them to make up for it on Friday.  I was met with huge resistance.  I tried to explain to them how public school kids are expected to make up the work they miss on days they are absence, but I don't think they were convinced.  As it was, I ended up having to do some errands in the afternoon, so they got off easier than I would have liked.
Ben and I were asked to play some music for a wedding Friday night at the church.  So I drove to the music store to find some wedding-appropriate violin music.  Then we dropped by the violin shop to get a new bridge for Brigham's violin.  Brigham just moved up to a half-size violin-- the same one I learned on!  It's still a very nice instrument.
The wedding in the evening was nice.  It was such a good example of the power of Mormon women!  The wedding was of a sweet couple who have been investigating the church.  They have 3 little girls, but never got married.  So on Tuesday they decided to get married so they could get baptized.  And on Friday there was a beautiful wedding with the cultural hall all decked out and a wedding cake and flowers and a photographer and live music.  It was really amazing.  Who needs a year or more to plan a wedding?  Ask some Mormon women and they'll throw something awesome together in 3 days!  :-)  It helps that we have some really talented women in our ward, though.  I know the plans for the wedding were greatly expanded from something simple in the relief society room, to a much more formal event, and I know it was a lot of work for everyone involved.  And there may have been some who wondered if it was really worth it.  But, with the seriousness of wedding vows, and the focus of our church on family, I thought it was entirely appropriate that a big deal was made.  And I hope it was worth it to everyone involved when they saw the faces of the newly formed family.
There was one sour point in the evening, however.  Toward the very end of the reception, Ben had finished playing the piano, and I had put my violin away.  Brigham came to the piano and started playing.  He opened up one of the piano books Ben brought and played "Melody" by Schumann.  Then I told him to play the Mozart Twinkle variations he's been working on.  He has it memorized, which surprised both of us!  (Just variations 1-3, not the whole thing!)  A number of people came by to compliment Brigham on his piano playing.  As we were getting ready to leave, I noticed that Joseph was extremely grumpy.  I was surprised because I had thought he was having an OK time.  As we were getting our stuff out to the car, he finally came out with it-- Brigham got to play the piano, but he didn't, and now everyone would think that Brigham was better at the piano than Joseph was.  That broke my heart a little.  I told him that Brigham isn't better at the piano, he just happened to have one song ready for performing, and another that he had the music for!  Joseph is working on his Christmas recital piece, but it's not performance ready yet, and the Hedwig's Theme that he perfected a couple of weeks ago wasn't exactly appropriate for a wedding.  Joseph really is a good piano player.  He and Brigham, like with everything else, both have their strengths and weaknesses with piano, and they are different from each other.  Brigham is a good sight-reader, and has a real knack for improvising.  But Joseph is much more intuitive with rhythms and has great hands for powerful chords.  His teacher just a couple of weeks ago told me that she could see him playing one of the Rachmaninoff piano concertos when he's a teenager, because he is so good with that style of music.  Anyway, I told him that I was really sorry, and that it really wasn't fair that everyone got to hear Brigham, but not Joseph.  I promised him that I'd figure out a way for him to get to play the piano at the ward Christmas party so everyone in the ward would have a chance to hear him play, too.
Having twins is hard!  It's difficult to praise one twin without the other feeling like he is not praiseworthy, at least not in that particular way...  I have to be careful about how I handle that with other people around.  Instead of saying, "Yes, Brigham is really talented at the piano-- he loves playing," I need to say, "Yes, Brigham is really talented.  Joseph is also an amazing piano player-- they both love playing."  Ah, well.  By the time we got home, Joseph was in good spirits, and I think no lasting damage was done.
Saturday was a tag-team day for Ben and I.  Both of us were scheduled to go to a Stake leadership training in the morning, but of course the boys were home and it was Mosey's last soccer game, so I went and left Ben with the boys. 

 Mosey's team ended up tying the last three games, which was a mercy.  Their team actually got a lot better as the season went on, and with the majority of his little 6-8 year old team being 6 years old, I think they did pretty darn good.  And Mosey had fun and wants to play again, so it was a success.
In the evening, we were both supposed to go to the adult session of Stake Conference, so Ben went to that and I stayed home with the boys.  Between times the boys all worked hard in cleaning the cars and straightening up the house. 
Yesterday was Stake Conference, which is always nice because it means 2 hours of church instead of 3 (not that I mind 3 hours, it's just nice once in a while to have only 2!), and in the afternoon we drove out to a park in Georgetown that has several acres of pecan trees. 

 It got cold on Sunday!  Well, cold for Austin.  Time to get warmer clothes out.
The boys collected a big pile of pecans which we've been working on all day.  Yum.  In the evening I had a Relief Society committee meeting at our house which lasted 3 hours (!!). 
Today I was determined to have a very good, efficient, effective day of lessons.  Mosey, however, was not.  He had a pretty terrible, rotten, no good, very bad day.  He only actually completed one lesson (math), and that was after 3 1/2 hours, much of it spent in the closet.  I don't know what came over him.  I think I handled everything right.  I gave him lots of choices.  I never lost my cool.  I think my expectations were entirely reasonable, and I followed through with the consequences I set forth for him.  But for whatever reason, he was bound and determined not to cooperate.  Finally, at about 5:15, he got himself banished to his room for the rest of the night.  I went upstairs with him and lay with him in his bed.  He struggled and yelled for about an hour, and then finally settled down.  Eventually he lay cuddled next to me and planted kisses on my cheek, so I guess I was forgiven.  He fell asleep at 8:00, which meant that I was up there with him for almost 3 hours.  I really hope tomorrow is a better day.  I was reminded of some of what we went through with Joseph a couple of years ago.  Joseph has almost entirely grown out of all that, for which I am extremely grateful.

The day was pretty good for the other two boys, though.  I just wish I were better at keeping to our schedule.  The problem, I think, is that I've only scheduled 30 minutes for piano practicing, when in reality they each take about 45 minutes.  And we never get through with breakfast and dressing and chores until 8:15 or sometimes 8:30, so by the time the big boys are done with piano (their first lesson), we're already 45 minutes or an hour behind "schedule," and I get stressed out.  I think I just need to accept that their practicing is going to take an hour and a half, and rearrange our schedule to reflect that.
Oh, one more thing.  The boys and I finally finished the wall art project for our front entryway wall.  I printed a bunch of 5x7s and mounted them on pieces of foam board that I cut to size, and then put them up on the wall with mounting tape.  I love it!  It's a big wall, and I can add more as time goes on.

Surprise!

Ben and I pulled the greatest trick ever on the boys.
Last Wednesday I told them we needed to meet Ben to go eat dinner with someone who was coming to interview with his company.  He was only staying for an hour or so between flights, so we needed to go down to the airport to eat with him in one of the airport restaurants.  Also, Ben's company needed to send several suitcases of papers back with this guy, so before we could go into the airport, we had to check the bags.  The boys thought this was odd, but sometimes there's no understanding some of the strange decisions of corporations.  Inside the airport, we went through security so that we could get to the restaurant.  But, unfortunately, when we got in, we found out the guy's flight had been delayed, and he hadn't arrived yet.  We ate anyway, and then sat at the gate where the guy would be coming in.  Finally, his plane came to the gate.  We didn't know what he looked like, but he knew Ben would be waiting for him with his family, so he would recognize us when he came off the plane.  Well, the passengers came out of the plane one by one, but he wasn't there!  So, we needed to go down into the plane to see if he was there!  The airline gate agent, led us down to the plane.  Once in the plane, Ben said, "Why don't we just sit in these seats and see if this plane is going anywhere good?"
At this point, the boys were totally baffled.  "What's going on?  Mom, what's going on?"
Ben sat by Mosey and asked him if he thought the flight attendants would notice we were on the plane.  "Don't tell them, Dad!"
But, finally, we let the cat out of the bag.  We were on our way to Florida!
Several months ago, we found great tickets to Orlando, so we decided to surprise the boys.  Boy, was it a surprise!  I kept thinking the boys would see through our extremely flimsy ruse, but I guess they trust their parents, or something...  :-)
We flew into Orlando, arriving very early Thursday morning (like, 12:05 AM).  We stayed the night in a hotel, and then drove down to South Florida the next day.  We stayed 5 days, until Monday night, then drove back up to Orlando, and flew back home yesterday.
It was such a great trip.  I have a bunch of pictures which I will try to get posted in the next few days.  We went to Butterfly World, out to the Everglades, we took a glass-bottom boat tour out to the coral reef off of Key Largo, toured Coral Castle (Brigham loved this place), went to church at our old ward, spent some time with some dear friends, went to all our old haunts in Rock Creek (the area of Cooper City where we lived), went to the beach on Key Biscayne, went on a bike ride through the Hugh Taylor Birch State Park, and finally back to the beach one last time.
It was so much fun and such a needed break for all of us.
Now we're home, suitcases are unpacked, laundry is started, and it's back to real life.  :-)

Halloween

Halloween is over and gone for another year.  The boys were all very happy with their costumes, and I spent a *little* less time on them this year than last, which is a good thing. 
Saturday night was the church Trunk-or-Treat.  I sent Ben and the boys on ahead while I attempted to finish a costume for myself.  It was a sad failure, and I ended up just wearing a black dress and witch's hat.  But I made it in time to see some of the reaction to Ben's costume.  He dressed up as Joe Dirt and was quite the sight.  The costume works a little too well on him-- he didn't look like himself, but he didn't really look like he was dressed up in a costume, either!  The wig is exactly the same color as his real hair, which I think helped to make it more real.  After, we went to a Halloween party at the home of a fellow homeschooling family.  I made cupcakes to bring, just like the ones I made last week.  The edible ink markers are fun!
Yesterday was church as usual, and then the festivities began.  I made dinner while Ben helped the boys cut the tops off their pumpkins and begin scooping out the insides.  The pumpkin carving took a while, but I believe each boy actually cut almost all of their pumpkins themselves (I think Ben helped Mosey with the knife insertions).  We made our traditional pineapple and watermelon jack-o-lanterns, too.  The result of all of this was a great big, huge, gigantic mess in the kitchen.  Ben moved some of the pumpkin scooping and carving to the floor so the boys could reach better, but that also served to expand the mess as well...  I was up until 2:00 AM this morning cleaning everything up, mopping the floor, sorting the seeds from the guts for roasted pumpkin seeds, and generally trying to get ready for the start of this week...
But anyway, the boys went off trick-or-treating at about 7:30.  They went by themselves this year!  Brigham and Mosey were done by about 8:30, but Joseph wanted to keep going, so Ben went off with him and he stayed out another 20 minutes or so.  He really cleaned up, I can tell you!
I didn't get very good pictures of their costumes.  I really wanted to take some pictures before it got dark, but we were finishing pumpkin carving, and it just didn't happen. 
I tried to let everyone (including myself) sleep in this morning, but the boys were all up by 7:30 anyway.  It ended up being a slow lesson day, anyway, because Joseph woke up sick.  This kid can't catch a break-- he just got over a stomach virus a couple of weeks ago!  This one appears to have been pretty short-lived, though (knock on wood), and he was feeling better by this afternoon.  He wasn't sick from too much candy, either-- he's pretty disciplined. 
OK, it's way too late and I'm very tired, so I'm just uploading all my Halloween pictures because it takes too much energy to decide which ones to post and which to leave out.   Also, I am too lazy to put them in any kind of order.

Ben as Joe Dirt at the church Trunk-or-Treat.  I think he caused a scandal!  :-)

Brigham as a zombie at the Trunk-or-Treat

The cupcakes I made.

Mosey the pirate!  He has a problem with maintaining eye contact when I have the camera out, and I was about out of battery, so here's what you get.  He was SO excited about this costume, and has worn it about 15 times since it was finished.  I made the shirt and vest and belt.  

This is Joseph just after Trick-or-Treating last night.  This is a recycled black cloak from his grim reaper costume a couple of years ago.  I added the silver trim to make it more alien-y.

It was Joseph's idea to use a swim cap under the hood so his hair wouldn't show.

Joseph's bat pumpkin.

Ben striking some poses on our front porch Halloween night, as we greeted trick-or-treaters.  Do you like his ball-point-pen barbed wire tattoo?  Maybe I should be a tattoo artist.  :-)

Brigham was my most enthusiastic pumpkin-guts cleaner-outer.

Brigham the zombie after coming home from trick-or-treating.

Brigham's cat pumpkin.  Good design, huh?

Joseph was at first not excited about carving pumpkins.  I think he doesn't like to compete with Brigham (and everything turns into a competition with twins) when it comes to things artistic, and he's a bit of a pessimist anyway.  He kept drawing faces made of squares and rectangles, saying that was all he would be able to do.  I encouraged him to try something else anyway, and I'd help him if he needed help.  As it was, he did the entire thing himself!  I think he surprised himself and I'm so glad he did it!

Mosey working on his pumpkin with Dad.  Ben helped him begin the cuts, but I think he did most of the actual cutting himself.

And here is the final result of Mosey's first jack-o-lantern!  Good job, baby!

Pineapple man.  His mouth was better when I cut it, but it got kind of squished down by its own weight.

Pirate Mosey coming back from Trick-or-Treating.  He weighed his candy bag this morning-- 3.8 lbs!!!  Oh, my.

This is my skull jack-o-lantern.

The trick-or-treaters, about to head out.

Here's watermelon face.  I like this one this year.  Carving watermelons and pineapples is a tradition in our family since the time a few years ago when we waited until Halloween day to buy pumpkins.  The grocery store was sold out, so instead Ben bought a pineapple and watermelon.  I love this tradition!  You get to eat the guts and all the parts you cut out!  (Although the juice it generates is pretty spectacular and exceedingly sticky...)

Here is Joseph this evening, after he was finally feeling better.  He dumped all his candy out on the kitchen floor and organized it by type.  We have dentist appointments coming up later this month, and looking at this, I'm thinking the boys better start brushing their teeth 5 times a day!

So, that was the Halloween weekend. On to Thanksgiving!