Happy Halloween Everyone!

For "Trick-or-Treating" this evening we met up with Callie & Jack in Baytown. We knocked on the houses on a couple of streets, then once we had a sufficient supply of candy to keep the kids up all night, we headed back to the house. Callie was dressed as a beautiful Tinkerbell, Jack was a pirate, Zeke was Batman (I decided mid-evening that this was a poor costume choice for Trick-or-Treating in the dark...he was almost impossible to see), & K was an Autumn fairy (costume provided from MeMe...thank you MeMe). We had a great time!


Much to Zeke's delight, his daddy dressed as Superman. I felt so safe the whole evening knowing that I was surrounded by super-heros!





This is a picture of Zeke & Gavin just before they headed off to school this morning. Zeke as Batman & Gavin as his arch nemasis, The Joker. I thought Gavin's costume was hysterical!

Tonight

The Hanna's came over this evening to see us off before we leave in the morning for Disney. Lisa and I were playing "Olan Mills" as my Aunt Pam calls it. We walked around with our cameras plastered to our faces, taking bunches of pictures. The kids were all in great moods...really enjoying being outside tonight in the fabulous weather. We decided before they left tonight that Callie & Jack definately needed to come with us again next year...it won't be the same without them!

These two were laughing hysterically at each other...their sweet giggles were really making me laugh...so cute.




I don't know what the weight limit is on this scooter but I think we maxed it out tonight!

Diaper Houdini

Thursday evening, 5pm
Bri (our babysitter) came over to keep the kids so that I could go to "Girls Night Out." Before I had a chance to leave, Kaelyn came into my room while I was dressing annoucing, "MOMMA! Guck, MOMMA! Guck" (translation: Guck=Yuck) She walks into the room with arms raised. I look down to see she has fully undressed herself and she has smeared poop from her bottom all over her hand.

I took her into the bathroom, stuck her in the tub, cleaned her and dressed her. Then I went back into my room to finish getting ready. Ten minutes hadn't passed before she came back into my room..."Momma! Guck, Guck"....I'm sure that you can guess the rest. (This child really needs to be potty-trained)

Friday morning, 7am
I am feeling like the most wonderful mom in the world. Zeke is off to Pre-school, everyone has eaten breakfast, I am fully dressed, Kaelyn is fully dressed and I am walking around, making the beds & picking up the house. At one point, I looked around the house and thought, "wow..I am really having a productive morning!" Then Lisa called. She made plans to come over to take Kaelyn to a playdate that morning. In the middle of the conversation. Kaelyn walks into the room, completely naked, every article removed (no socks, no shoes...she even thought to take out the bow). My reaction, "Kaelyn! Where are all your clothes?" She motions to the den and says, "Here, here" We walk into the living area. Her clothes are all in one pile on the left and to the right is a large puddle of pee.

I really don't know what I am going to do with this child. In the next 30 minutes that we waited for Lisa to arrive, Kaelyn got undressed 3 times. By the 3rd time she took her clothes off, I left them off. When Lisa rang the doorbell, I handed her a stack of clothes and the naked child and said, "Good luck with this one."

Aggie Game

On Saturday Brad, Bryan, Lisa & I drove to College Station for the A&M/Tech game. I hadn't been to an Aggie game in more than 6 seasons...it was so fun! I had forgotten how exciting the games can be. Stephen met up with us just before kickoff so he was able to join us for the game.

I think this is a funny picture because with the way we are standing it looks like Brad is at the game with his 2 girlfriends and then there are these 2 other guys. ;)

Late October Swim

Zeke looked at the pool yesterday and asked, "Hey Mom...can I go swimming?" Assuming that he would put one toe in and change his mind...I enthusiastically said, "Sure!" (thinking..this I have to see.) The pool temp is about 70 degrees....and it was about the same temp outside with a little breeze...burr! Zeke stuck his toes in and said, "it's kinda cool but kinda warm." Then he dove in....burr! He swam around for a few minutes and decided he had enough. Burr!

Zeke told me yesterday, "Hey Mom...take a picture of me & Kaelyn." Well, just twist my arm! "Ok, if you really want me too....I guess I will" :)

If you look in Zeke's front pocket you can see the writing pad and marker that he likes to carry around with him. Zeke has really taken an interest in writing. He leaves me notes now and I just love it!

Kaelyn's hair is s-l-o-w-l-y getting blonder with each day. In this picture her hair color doesn't look much darker than Zeke's. She has really run the gammot on hair color, texture and length. Birth-lots of dark curly hair. 6months-almost all fell out. Came back in as a brunette and straighter. Currently at 18 months-blonder, finer and straight as can be.

Pumpkin Carving

Yesterday we spent part of the afternoon carving our pumpkins for Halloween. Because we are leaving Tuesday (and then returning on the 31st) we realized that our carving time window was getting pretty small so we needed to get crackin'. Daddy carved a Mickey face on his pumkin while Zeke & I carved a silly face on ours. We decided that Zeke is actually a really good carver...I think he did a better job then I did cutting out the face.

As you can see in the second picture, Zeke said that he did not like the way the inside of the pumpkin felt! YUCK!

Our finished product!

Zeke, Gavin & Stevee in the sandbox under the playhouse. This is Zeke's new favorite place to "hang out."

1st Pigtails!

I looked down at Kaelyn's hair today and though...."hey...I think I can make pigtails out of that hair now!" Yippee! K's hair is getting long enough to do something with....now the real fun begins! Girls are so much fun!

Miss Independent

Kaelyn has decided that she can do everything by herself.
She can empty the crayon container...all by herself.

She can get her own snack & put it on her own tray.

She can feed herself.

"No, I don't think this is too much! I like these crackers!"

She can take herself to the potty (I know, she is sitting on the rim...it's gross). It doesn't matter if we close the door or leave the lid down every time. She finds her way in and climbs on top..yuck!

And, at 9:45 at night she can take off her own pants and diaper when it is wet. She just needs to find a way to put on a new one so that her sheets don't get so wet! When I walked in to check on her she bent over, pointed to the wet spot and said, "K pee-pee!" Yuck!

Weekend Fun

Aunt Krista, Kendall, & Ashton came for a visit today...we hung out around the house...Kendall & Zeke braved a swim in the freezing pool...we made a trip out to Gardenridge to look at yard lighting....all in all, it was a fun day.

On the way to Garden Ridge I realized that my gas tank was running really low...that is unusual because I hate having it below half a tank (tonight it was below a fifth of a tank when we started.) Krista spotted a $2.89 per gallon price as we were leaving Deer Park. After we drove into Clear Lake we couldn't find anything under $3.09. Determined to get the better price, we waited to get gas until we got back to Deer Park, joking the entire way about what we would have to do if we ran out of gas. Ashton & Kendall were groaning in the backseat about a time they ran out of gas in San Antonio...Krista was driving Mimi's car and the low fuel light never came on. After they ran out of gas the kids ran 1 mile one way, back & forth to a gas station (twice=4 miles of running) to get enough gas to restart the engine of Mimi's car. Tonight when I filled up at the station, the meter stopped at 31.3 gallons. I have a 32 gallon tank. Kendall & Ashton were not amused. I got a lot of dirty looks from them.

While I was rocking Kaelyn tonight before bed, she looked up at me and said, "ere's Daddy?"
J: He's in the den
K: Ere's Bubba?
J: He's in the den too..reading stories with Daddy.
K: K den
(meaning she wanted to go into the den too)
J: Ok, we'll go in the den but it is night-night time. We'll give Daddy a kiss and then it is time for bed.
(We walked down the hall into the living area)
K: Daddy! (very enthusiastically with arms reaching out to him)

This little girl is such a stinker...she knew that he wouldn't be able to resist that welcoming announcement so of course she got to snuggle with her Daddy and brother. They were so cute, I had to take their picture.

Crazy Zeke & Silly Kaelyn

This evening I took the kids out in the front yard to play with my camera to take some pictures. Zeke, the ever-posing child that he is...did a great job. K was pretty grumpy so her pictures were a little more "forced."

I just love his sweet smile..

Zeke is such a jewelry guy. Anything falls into his catagory of acceptable jewelry and he never takes it off. There is often something adorning every limb. He is always wearing something....usually some of Kendall's woven artwork, plus the dolphin necklace we found him in Germany. The new additions are some plastic bracelets he got from National Night out on Tuesday. When he starts to look like Mr. T, I will sometimes remove a few items during his bath and "forget" to put them back on.

Zeke loves his bike. He especially enjoys riding it inside the house...around the big loop that connects the bedrooms, living area and kitchen.

I think it is safe to say that Zeke is not always the most attentive child in the world. Details are not Zeke's strength. Brad & I are forever asking about his day, asking what he did, who did he play with. Typical Zeke response, "I don't know." Argh!

Today Zeke and I spent about 20 minutes walking around the house to find items that started with the letter "M" to fill his homework bag. We went through a lengthy discussion about beginning M sounds, what items started with M, which did not. After we found 4, we decided to sit and write cards for the names of the 4 items. When we sat down, we started with the first item...monkey. I said, "ok, first is the monkey." He asked, "how do you spell that?" I said, "what does it sound like, Mmmmm-onkey."
Z: I don't know
J: What do all these items have in common?
Z: I don't know
J: (starting to get a little annoyed) What was the homework? What have we been walking around the house looking for?
Z: I don't know
J: Zeke! Mmmmmonkey, Mmmmmouse, Mmmmmagnet, Mmmmmmommy....what do those words start with????
Z: Oh yeah, "M"
SHEESH! It's like pulling teeth with this one! This one has the attention of a 6 month old...really.

It is difficult to see in the picture, but I am very proud of Zeke's homework (once we finished). Zeke has not previously shown a lot of interest in writing, but today he did a very nice job making cards to identify the "M" items that he put in his homework bag. Of course, when I had him take the picture with his cards, he had to make a super-silly face. He has to support that "tough guy" image he is creating for himself.

Just when I thought that Kaelyn had forgotten everything from her ISR (her water survival training course that she took when she was 6 months old), she laid down in the bathtub tonight, trying to float on her back in the water. I am going to have to fill it more tomorrow night to see if she can still do it.

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year.....

Well, it's October...time for the Wims to start putting up the Christmas decorations! Ok, so the first part of October is even a litte early for us, but we are leaving to go out of town soon..so we had to do it this week (in order to be ready for my MK Open House.) It has been a long-standing tradition for Brad & I to start putting out the X-mas decor while we hand out the Halloween candy on the 31st. This year, however, we are headed to Disneyworld the last part of October. Plus, my open house is just 3 days after we get back from WDW,...plus we leave for Germany just 3 days after my open house is over. Needless to say, "Ho, Ho, Here we go"...time to hang the lights. You may ask yourself, how many people does it take for us to put up our decorations? We had 8 adults for 2 full days decorating in our house...it was a record! We are about 95% done with the decorations...we have never completed the job so quickly. Thank you Mimi, Dan, Sherri, Ronnie, Nonnie & Gwanddad....we would have never finished this year without all of your help.

New Friends

In July, our street was blessed by the arrival of a new family (w/ kids!) This wonderful family came complete with one 5 year-old boy named Gavin & one 6 year-old girl named Stevie. Up until this point, the numbers of children on our street has been really limited. Gavin and Stevie are both super-sweet...we have really enjoyed having them over and they have graciously had Zeke over to play a number of times. Alicia (the mom) also teaches at the school that Gavin & Zeke attend so, she very kindly drives Zeke to and from school each day. What an answer to prayers...really. Thank you Lord for bringing such a sweet family to move in next door. We feel so blessed.

Pictures from Germany

I wasn't able to post any of our pictures from this last trip while we were there, so I thought I would share them with everyone today. I had specific requests for a picture of Dr. Thaller, so here you go!

Tanya, one of the nurses on staff.

Micah, Brad's Physical Therapist/Nurse, spends the most time caring for Brad during his fever therapies.

Head Nurse Christine & Georgia's mother discussing at-home treatment

Brad "under cover" during one of his fever therapies. Poor guy gets so cold he even has to cover his face & nose to stay warm.

My butterfly bed (right next to Brad's)....I have slept here next to Brad on many occasions. I think this bed is so pretty.

The Famous Dr. Thaller

Georgia & her boyfriend Nikol.

Our home for this visit...the Kafferlein House.

Brad doing his new favorite activity...Sudoko...just before they took him back for his tumor resection.

I had to share the beauty of the leaves. The tree leaves were transforming right before our very eyes during this visit. We would travel down one road on one day and 3 days later we would use the same route to find the very same trees were different colors than just days before. It was a spectacular sight. This picture captures my favorite beauty...a mixture of red, orange, yellow and green....so gorgeous!

It seemed that every house has a beautiful garden in front...I love it.


I also love the window boxes.