Pumpkin carving underway the day before Halloween! This year, all 3 kiddos went to town on their own design.
Drew's next phase of clothes preference... Pants with shorts over and tall "baseball" socks over the top. Good thing he's so cute!
I was able to surprise Luke and Elle at their class Halloween parties this year! My own school had a half day on Halloween, so I was able to get to McGregor in time for their parties and the school parade. This was my first time and I was so excited to make it!
Here Luke is at his party and he is completing his "STEM" activity. Each group had to shop, buy, and construct a tower with the supplies they had bought. Then each group had to put a small pumpkin on top of their constructed tower and see if their tower could hold it for 20 seconds. Luke's group's did! It was such a cool activity!
Then, I surprised Ellie at her party! We played Bingo!
Luke's class...Can you spy Harry Potter in the back?
The weather was rainy and kind of crummy so our school had their parade inside this year. Here is Hermione!
And Harry!
Here is our Ninja Turtle, Leonardo, at his preschool.
After school, this Sesame Troop came over with Ryan and Melanie! How cute is this family?!
Happy Halloween!!
Off we go...
It was cold, rainy and REALLY cold. These 3 were troopers. Megs and Chad picked Ellie, Drew and me up about an hour in. Ben, best dad ever, stayed out the entire 2 hours with Luke to get to all of the houses!
We all thawed out, changed into some warm jams, and then started counting and sorting all of the candy. Drew is just a little excited! He for sure has a sweet tooth!
The kiddos like to combine all of their candy and categorize it! The total was something like 350 with Snickers being the most popular.
School for our kiddos the day after Halloween...Halloween should always be on the weekend!
Ellie was selected to be on the All-Star team! Each team selects 3 players, and she was selected! Wahoo!! Great job, Elle! We are so proud of you!
Here is her All-Star team. She is the furthest one on the right.
The first goalie got pulled after just a few minutes of playtime. Then coach put Ellie in as goalie and she played in that position for the rest of the game! It was SO cold and windy. Yet Ellie hung in there and used Papa's hand warmers when the team was on the other side of the field.
Great job, Ellie!
Leave, leaves, and more leaves. Good thing we have these helpers!
Birthday boy! We dropped the kids off at Megs and Chad's and I took Ben downtown Detroit for the most scrumptious dinner at Texas de Brazil Steakhouse. Campus Martius was bopping and they were decorating the big tree by the ice rink. Happy Birthday, Ben! We all love you so, SO very much.
From leaves to snow! So much snow that all 5 of us had a snow day!! Crazy!
Snow day fun!
Papa Cooley picked the perfect day to come see us while he was here for hunting because we were all off! Pizza and basketball evaluations that night for Luke and Elle's upcoming season.
Life is always better with Papa around.
I walked into the kitchen and found Drew practicing his letters. He is getting just so big!!
Ben was asked to judge a county-wide robotics competition at Oxford High School He invited Ellie to go too and she had so much fun! They had a judge name tag and a t-shirt ready for her and she got to walk around as a judge too. So great!
The next day, we were able to head over to Grand Rapids to hang out with the Brangs and the Bonofiglios! SO much fun hanging out with our besties and having our kids all together! It really is just the BEST! Laney and Ellie are now at the same age that Bing and I were when we first became best friends.
A sleepover, with great friends, in sleeping bags is the best. Here are where 4 out of the 8 landed. Luke fell asleep with Carson watching a movie in the basement and the 2 sweet Bono boys in a bed somewhere. :)
The next day the guys headed over to Founder's for Founder's Breakfast Stout Breakfast for the day.
Us girls had so much fun with the kids! We got to see Laney dominate on the basketball court, a walk to the park, and a visit with Siri and Maeve!
Lunch!
Go Blue AND Go Green! Our boys proving that you can still be buddies and cheer for opposite teams. By the end, they were sick of just watching the game and headed outside to play football instead. Perfect!
To end a great weekend, Ellie wrote this sweet note to her teacher all by herself. She just walked out and showed us when she was done. Check out that word choice...appreciate, determined, engaged, gentle, pride include, problem solve. Gee whiz, sweet Elle. You blow us away!!
