new foods

we decided recently to try some new foods. it's been a lot of fun, the girls have been in the kitchen a lot helping mom cook, and generally enjoying the outcomes. some of our recent experiments have included:


green cauliflower (which we ate with an amazingly rich hollandaise sauce),

 fried rice (sorry, mostly i don't have pictures),

dragon fruit (soft texture (like kiwi), earthy flavor (like jicama)),

green pepper casserole (with lots of cool veggies, this isn't exactly new, but the girls helped a lot with it, so i thought it deserved mention),

schnitzel, which afton called snitch-el, she LOVED it btw.



butternut squash soup (again, just new to the girls, it was a HUGE hit too)

 and cereal:

malachi sure loves being a big kid!!! he's a great eater, and always wants whatever the big people are eating (good luck!)

bon appetit!

ps, we had borscht for dinner after writing this post, again, not new, but really, who eats beets?

some recent pictures

playing at the park

having a little lunch, gotta love peanut butter!

and not even allowed to eat the bark!?

silly rayna, she loves popping the lenses out of her sunglasses, she can wear them for hours this way! i think her eyelashes get in the way of the lenses.

don't wake daddy :)

sleepy day! we like to go walking.

halloween (hey, no comments, i'm not even 3 weeks late!)

a few of our favorite halloween things, first, as said before, i'm not really good at decorating for the season/holiday (except for christmas!), so afton's decided to be the cheif decorator around our house (hooray!!!) this is one of her halloween decorations: (my other favorite was a fabulous ghost)

i LOVED the pumpkin vine, unfortunately, some of it was sacrificed as she cut it out and taped it to the wall

our amazing halloween costumes:

R's a fairy princess,A's a ballerina

M's Tigger, he LOVED playing with the little tigger-heads on his toes!!!
dad was going to be a scarecrow, but he was recovering from pneumonia, so he decided not to dress up, he told everyone (mostly kids) that asked he was a convalescent (nodded sagely and walked away confused)

and in case you were wondering, i'm poison ivy. i'd bought some crepe paper to be the ivy, but i forgot it at home, so i was just leaves... oh well

we did have fun at halloween, though we did it a lot smaller than last year, we dressed up for story time at the library on wednesday, and then we went to the church party on saturday night. it was a little carneval, and i think the kids really enjoyed it. we didn't get a ton of candy, but we don't need a lot either. sunday we weren't planning on trick-or-treating, but i did have a littel candy on hand in case anyone came here... i totally forgot it was halloween though, cause no one was out and about!

and i couldn't decide if this picture was hilarious or disgusting, can it be both?

ps, that's one of those toy spider rings, no 'real' spiders were harmed/eaten in the making of this picture ;)

and for mom, you asked to see a picture of the pretzles i made for the activity :) aren't they cute?!

rayna

rayna LOVES playing with my camera, almost every time i take a picture she asks for a turn. this one cracked me up (most get deleted, digital camera's are brilliant), it's her knees and toes in her "dragon" jammies. they look like green christmas pjs with santas and snowmen on them, but she insists she's a dragon when she wears them. a few weeks ago paul scooped her up and snuggled her saying something along the lines of "who's my precious little girl?" and she immediately shouted, "NO, i a dragon. a BIG scary dragon!!!" now every time she wears them this has become the game... and lately i asked her what a dragon says (expecting her to roar, silly me) she thought about it for a few seconds and started singing: "3 little monkeys jumping on the bed..."

anyways, she's a hoot, and we sure love having her around, she's always singing and "being silly." she's a total sweetheart!



speaking of pictures, i thought i'd better include one of her more posed-looking shots,
i thought she did a pretty good job :)



camping (oct 22)

a couple weeks ago we went camping with some great friends! we had a blast, and as a result, it seems we don't have nearly as many pictures as there "ought" to be :)



some of our friends roasting hot dogs



we got the girls a new air mattress for the occasion, they're testing it out, pretending to sleep

most of our pictures are from the lake, i guess that's the only time i remembered my camera :)

rayna was in heaven, despite the rather chilly water



everyone seemed to enjoy playing in the water!

some other highlights, lots of yummy food (chili and chowder for dinner, plenty of s'mores, killer breakfast burritos, and roasted hot dogs to name a few), tons of sand for the kids to play in, it was warm (we didn't even really need sleeping bags, despite the rain. just enough rain for the kids to get soaked, the grown-ups were more boring, and mostly stayed under the pavillion or the tarp that paul strung up to shield the cooking area), sand volleyball, and most important of all, good friends to share it all with! i think we'll do it again in the spring! hooray!

arboretum pics, 11th oct

more pumpkins :)

Chi likes pumpkins too!

fun with family, and waterfalls

rayna LOVES hanging out in the covered wagon!



this is always a favorite fountain too...
hmmm... just realized almost all these pics are by water features




sitting down in the misters by the creek because it was so dang hot!



we had a blast at the arboretum last month with grandma, nicki, and naomi. thanks for coming with us!