Halloween 2013

The schools down here in Texas don't celebrate Halloween. Kind of a bummer!!! I remember it was always fun dressing up and having a party on Halloween. Doesn't happen here. Although the preschools celebrate Halloween, so my girls have always had fun with that. And Rachel's school tries to please us by having "Career Day" on Halloween. So, Rachel dressed up as a dentist for school that day, which she's done the past couple of years. Audrey, however, got to wear her Halloween costume to school and she was Winx the Fairy. I don't know if she had ever heard of this particular fairy, but she loved the costume when she saw it, so that's what she chose.

In the car pool line at school:

 

Winx in her school parade (It was raining that morning, so the parade was inside. Luckily the rain had cleared out by the evening.):

After dinner that evening we set out do some trick or treating. Rachel was Rapunzel and Ian was Super Man. Here are some pictures before we headed out:

 Rapunzel:

Winx:

 

 The Mackay family joined us:

Ian wasn't very cooperative for pictures before trick or treating, so we snapped a few after we got home and he was happily enjoying some skittles:

 

Our neighborhood is kind of spotty when it comes to trick or treating. You're lucky if 1 out of 5 houses is participating. So, it makes for a lot of walking. But the kids have fun. Ian started really enjoying it once he realized people would give him candy. He enjoyed getting out of the stroller and heading up to the doors, just like everyone else. It was fun to have the Mackays with us. And even though there weren't many  houses participating, the kids still got plenty of candy. As a matter of fact, we still have some Halloween candy up in the cupboard. It may be time to just toss it...

Carving Pumpkins

We didn't get around to carving our pumpkins until October 30th. The month just slipped by! I got the kids started on cleaning out their pumpkins and then had to go to mutual. So, Andy took over and did a great job. He's much more creative than I am, so it worked out well. I was sad to miss this tradition, but Andy was good about taking pictures and I enjoyed them once I got home later that evening. Here are some pictures of the kids busy at work and definitely having a good time:

Silly girls!

 

Gotta save the seeds!

Ian was quite into carving his pumpkin and helped quite a bit:

The finished jack-o'-lanterns:

Scary faces:

Love the poses:

CHEESE!!!

Cutest 3 kids I know:

The kids were asleep by the time I got home, but they had left their pumpkins out for me to see. They were very excited and proud to show me what they had done the next morning.

Moments in Time

As I was getting my act together this morning I looked out my bedroom window and saw this:

I had to grab the camera and take some pictures through the window without them noticing. The girls have already been busy this Saturday morning. They're both in dress-ups. And Ian's in his pajamas, which he loves and would keep on all day if we let him. :)

After watching them for awhile, I knocked on the window and got their attention:

I'm so blessed to have these 3...

Homework Time

Today was one of those days when homework needed to be attacked right away. Ian was really cute as he insisted on having his own "homework" to do:

Andy's Birthday Weekend

On Sunday, we finished off our trip to San Antonio by going downtown to El Mercado to experience some of the Hispanic culture that exists there. There's lots of shops and restaurants and on this particular day there was some type of event going on, so there were a lot of booths and activities set up. We did enjoy some freebies and also enjoyed a performance by some dancers:

We were hoping to find some yummy Mexican food. What we found was okay... I'm sure there's better if we had taken the time to eat in one of the restaurants. After lunch we then headed back to Houston. We got stuck in some crazy traffic once we got closer to Houston due to I-10 being shut down. Fun times! But luckily Ian slept almost the entire way home. Once we got home we enjoyed some grilled cheese sandwiches and then had the Mackay family over to celebrate Andy's birthday. Andy opened a few presents with lots of helpers:

 

Then we all enjoyed some mint chocolate chip ice cream pie (something that could be made ahead of time and it's also a favorite of Andy's):

 

Andy turned 36 years old this year, so we put 9 candles on his cake, each candle representing 4 years. We definitely enjoyed celebrating Andy this weekend. It was fun to do something a bit different and get out of our normal routine. Happy Birthday and thanks for the fun weekend!

San Antonio - Sea World

On Saturday, Andy's birthday, we headed to Sea World. Unfortunately they didn't open until noon, but we were still able to get in our favorite shows and enjoy exploring the park as well. We went on a few big roller coasters and quite a few of the little kid rides. Since we'd been last (back in 2010) they'd added a whole new section of kid rides and playgrounds called Sesame Street Bay of Play. So, when we weren't enjoying a show, the kids had fun in that area.

For some reason Audrey and Ian were being grumpy right as we entered, so we grabbed a picture of Rachel and then Jace and Weston joined her as well:

 

We went to check out the dolphins first:

 

 

The kids had fun watching them swim and jump around and luckily no one ended up in the water! :) Next were the sharks...

 

At 2:00 we headed to our first show, called Azul. This is always a fun show with acrobats and dolphins. The kids were definitely excited and entertained throughout the show.

Ian really enjoyed his first show. He humored us for one quick picture and then was off to watching again:

 

 

We then walked through Sesame Street Bay of Play and rode some of the rides, including the carousel:

Rachel was the only one brave enough and willing to get a picture with Zoe and Abby:

There was trick or treating throughout the park. We didn't make an effort to go to all the different stations, but if we happened to run into them we got some candy:

Ian is a really good stroller toddler. He doesn't mind his stroller at all and actually welcomes it most times. Here's some fun pictures I took while we were waiting for everyone else to go on a water ride:

Andy was able to convince Audrey and Rachel to go on the Journey to Atlantis roller coaster ride. I was quite impressed they actually got through the line and no one backed out. Here's a video of what the ride is like at the end:

After the ride both the girls said it was fun, but neither of them wanted to go on it again. Here's a pretty entertaining video of the kids watching others go down after their ride:

I love the pictures showing the same thing, but at a better angle:

 

 

 

 

I was glad Audrey was all giggles after this happened. We took off her tights and shirt and laid them out on the stroller to dry for a bit. Luckily we had brought jackets into the park and she just wore that for awhile. 

Love this picture of Weston helping Ian stay hydrated: 

 

We then went to watch Clyde and Seymour. They had a Halloween themed show going on and we didn't enjoy it as much as their classic show. Ian wasn't as entertained this time, but luckily snacks were able to keep him occupied (and I guess the people behind us):

 

Our last show of the day was going to see Shamu, which is always a favorite. By this time though Ian was spent. He hadn't napped and didn't really want to sit. So, I took him out after the first few minutes of the show. Here's Andy trying to take a picture of these cuties by himself:

Then I grabbed the camera:

 

We then had some dinner and headed back to Sesame Street Bay of Play. The kids had fun playing on the playground and riding some more rides. Around 8:00 I got to take the kids on one last ride, their favorite, the kid Shamu roller coaster. So here we are waiting in line:

We definitely enjoyed our day in Sea World celebrating Andy's birthday! We thought for sure at least two of our kids would crash on the way back to the hotel. It was a quick drive, but we thought they would be exhausted. Not so, they were all still wide awake and got baths that night. Sea World is definitely one of our favorites and we're glad we got to enjoy it with the Bills family!