Do they celebrate Halloween at Boarding School?

Ah, Jacob is 3 years old and just completed his first "homework assignement" yesterday. He had to sort objects and we had to note how he did it. Well he was apparently not in the mood to sort or comply with instructions. It was a battle that lasted about 2 hours (including time-outs, being sent to his room, threatening not to go to "Holyween") and finally the assignment got completed. So, I have been researching boarding schools today. I cannot do 12 years of real homework if its going to be like that! I hope the next assignment goes better or I may get serious about this boarding school stuff. I did have conferences with Jacob's teacher today and he said he is doing well with most things, listening pretty well, has lots of friends, just needs to work on writing and cutting mostly.

Even though we threatened not to go to "Holyween" (our church's Halloween celebration), we did end up going last night. We took our Spiderman and Chunky Monkey to church for the cupcake walk, crafts, bingo and then "Trunk or Treating". People decorate their trunks or back ends of their SUVs and Vans and hand out candy. Jacob had a great time and did a great job trunk or treating. He said "so, at Holyween I say 'trunk or treat' and at Halloween I'll say "trick or treat' ", so smart when it comes to getting candy. Jacob gets to dress up for school on Wednesday and then we have a MOMS Club Halloween party on Thursday. I don't know where or if we'll go trick or treating on Friday night yet, we may have had enough Halloween by then and we can just hand out candy here.

This is the costume Drea bought Jacob for last year, but it didn't quite fit him.

On Saturday, Jacob and Fred carved pumpkins.

Gavin is fast these days. He is crawling all over. He loves to crawl into the bathrooms by the toilets. Gross! Then he stands up and gets toilet paper and, of course, puts it in his mouth. Yuk! He is also showing other boy traits, such as "driving" cars and playing with balls - even scoring some points on the basketball "court". He also started ECFE (Early Childhood and Family Education) classes last week. I was hoping we would seperate in the class, so he would get more used to doing that, but we haven't yet and I don't think we will. So I am paying money to go play with my kid, which I could do at home. Jacob does get to go to sibling care and play with out kids, so he likes that and I am meeting more moms with kids Gavin's age. Dylan in Gavin's class is just a little older than him and they enjoy hanging out near each other. Dylan's mom thinks I am a rock star for having 2 kids, I won't be introducing her to my friends with 4 or 6 kids:)

He shoots, he scores!

Yes, I'll eat anything.

Fred was in Alabama last week with work. Adrea came down to help out on Monday night and my mom came on Tuesday and stayed until Thursday. So really, it was a pretty easy week. Fred got home on Friday and I went out on a girls night to PF Changs - yum! Then on Saturday night we had our church card club here. We had a good turn out and had lots of fun playing 500 and enjoying all the appetizers.

9-Month Old Gavin

I forgot to mention in my last post, that Gavin is now 9 months old (was on the 8th anyway). He had his check-up. Weighed in at 25 lbs 13 oz (95th percentile) and was 29 inches long (80th percentile). He was a very brave boy when he got his shots and then only wimpered a little when they pricked his finger to do the hemoglobin and lead testing.

We made a trek back to Melrose for the weekend. It had been a while. Jacob got to play with Maddie and Isaac and the twins (Logan and Riley, Corey's boys) were up at Grandma and Grandpa Middendorf's. Jacob also got to go to the farm, play with the kitties there, ride in the tractor with Fred and then "farm" with Jordan (Joel and Julie's youngest). It made for a tired boy.

The Middendorf adults all went out for supper at Gerard's in Sauk Centre on Saturday night to celebrate Joel & Julie's 15th anniversary. Then over to the farm for cards and smart talk.

Fred is in Alabama this week for work. Pray for me:)

Mid-October Update

We've been enjoying the fall season. We've been to the Apple Orchard with Grandma Jeske. Took a scary trailer ride out to pick some apples, fed some goats and were done in under an hour. Perfect outing for a 3 yr old and 9 month old. To point out what a city boy we are raising, as we turned onto the gravel road to the orchard, Jacob says "why are we driving on this trail?" He's been on gravel roads before, but obviously not enough.

Gavin & Jacob at the Orchard

Jacob with Grandma Jeske on the trailer at the orchard.

We've also make a trip to a pumpkin patch. We have pumpkins from Joe & Alyssa's patch, but Jacob and his friend Kyle have such a good time running through the pumpkin patch and picking their own pumpkins, we made the trip over to one in Shakopee and Jacob got to pick one pumpkin. He did have so much fun, so much in fact he had a potty accident at the far end of the field. Arg. With boys its so easy to go potty where ever needed, so I was a little irritated at by the "accident". So alas the road of potty training does not run smooth.

Jacob and Gavin at the pumpkin patch.

We saw a couple performances over the weekend. Jacob and I went to St Cloud for Peter Pan at the Paramount on Saturday with Alyssa, Maddie, Isaac and Grandma J. That was a fun show with many of the characters flying around the stage. Then, Fred got free tickets from work to Playhouse Disney Live. So we got to go see that on Sunday. Jacob loved it. We got to see the Little Einsteins, Mickey, Minnie, Pooh, Tigger and Handy Manny. It was a nice short show and Jacob managed to eat 2 hot dogs in the midst of singing, dancing and clapping. The kid who never has an interest in eating begs for a second hot dog when they run $3.50, go figure.

Jacob has been doing well in school. Just one playground fight so far. He gives me no info about his days, hopefully the teacher will fill me in at conferences in a couple weeks. They do say he shares well and listens well. Not such a good listener at home, so its good to hear he's better at school, I guess. He does have a special friend, Maggie, apparently they are inseperable and they like to play Wonder Pets on the playground. Jacob went on his first field trip today. They went to a farm and saw cows, chicken and a cat. Wow!

Fred returned from Vegas none the richer this year. He came back even last year and paid for his trip, so he had high hopes, but no luck this year. Next week he is off to Alabama for work, all week! I am not looking forward to that. He had the option to go to Canada, but they won't let him in for a couple years due to his accident back in '99.

I got to go to the season opener of the Wild. They won and it was a fun night out with the girls. I have another girls night tomorrow night. With Fred taking classes 2 nights a week, I need all the nights out I can get. Adrea does come take Jacob on Tuesday nights for gymnastics and then helps me with bed time, so that is nice.

Gavin is a great baby at this time. He's sleeping better, usually through the night. He loves to crawl around and explore. He'll sit and play with different toys for a while and is just easy to entertain. He makes kissing sounds and was waving the other day, but I can't get him to do it again. He loves the dogs and hugs and kisses them when they let him get close.

Gavin thinks he's very clever cruising around furniture.

As a final thought, today in the car I told Jacob something was a "good idea" and he said "you mean a quesidilla".