November

I can't believe it is the end of November already. We have had a busy month and I am finally taking a minute to record some of our adventures. This has been the 2nd warmest November on record in upstate NY. We have taken advantage of that and been outside as often as mom can deal with the mud that results. Here is Emma on one of her favorite ride on toys.

Emma is walking well but sometime resorts to her knees to get there in a hurry.

Benjamin has been building a road in our garden. He works hard and makes me call him boss when I come to drive the trucks at his request.

Benjamin and Daddy tilling the garden.

My parents let us borrow their tiller this year and we were lucky enough to have some fertilizer here. Between the 10-10-10 and the leaves that we tilled in our garden should be well fertilized.
The proof will be in next year's yield.

This seems to be the children's activity of choice lately (emptying the cupboards). So far it has been harmless and resulted in no injuries.

We went to the dinosaur museum exhibit at the MOST. Afterward we stopped at BurgerKing. Benjamin has loved his crown. Here he is trying to convince Joseph to wrestle with him. The boxes are perminent in the living room as the are either spaceships or packages.

My couch cushions rarely get to stay in place. The have become floating islands that the children bounce between.

When we learned that we wouldn't have Emma on Thanksgiving we decided to do something we have wanted to do for years -- go to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. We left early Wednesday morning so that we could go to the Natural History Museum in NYC. It is the Museum featured in Night at the Museum. Benjamin loves that movie and we scouted out most of the characters in the movie as we wandered the halls of the museum. Here we are pictured with Dumb Dumb.

This guy is affectionately known as Rexxy in our home.

One other nice thing about being in Manhattan on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving is that Macy's has all the balloons that will be in the parade inflated and on display on 81st and 77th. Families are at liberty to view the balloons up close which was pretty cool.

Here are Benjamin and I at the Time Square subway stop. We were lucky enough to find a hotel room reasonably priced at a comfort inn two blocks from Time Square.

It's hard to see but this was the turkey float at the start of the Parade.

Here comes Buzz Lightyear. Benjamin was pretty excited.

Daddy deserves a gold star. He held a wiggly Benjamin on his shoulders for hours.

The pillsbury dough boy.

Mr. Kool-aid on a skate board. (He did a dance in front of us.)

Sponge Bob. (I'm not a fan but the balloon was huge.)

Captain Mickey

Kung fu Panda

This was the new float in the parade this year.

Snoopy

Neil Diamond on the Mount Rushmore float. (Marie this is for you.)

Ronald McDonald

This float was home to Scooby Doo, Barney, Yogi Bear etc.

I have to admit, it was really neat to be there and see the balloons comming down the street. There was a fair amount of anticipation as we waited to see who would appear next. It was one of the neatest things we have done ---and while the crowds were crazy it was fun to be in the Big Apple.

SpiderMan - one of the highlights of the parade.

Smurf

Kermit

An Elf at the end of the Parade.

Santa marks the end of the Parade.

We went to FAO Schwartz after the parade. Here was the doorman. I couldn't resist the photo-op.

This is Ben and I on the Big Piano. For only $250,000 we could have taken it home.



When all was said and done, we had a great trip and feel really Thankful for all our blessings.

Halloween

It's not Halloween yet but we have had our costumes on a couple of times. Our ward had trunk-or-treat on Wednesday evening and Joseph's work had a costume party / family lunch hour on Friday. Check out our little bugs. Benjamin is a caterpillar and Emma a bumble bee. If Emma looks unhappy it's because she did a faceplant onto the tile floor just before leaving for the trunk or treat. We ended up holding her down to keep ice on her forehead. She is strong. She fought the ice the whole time. Luckily the next day you couldn't even see the bruise.


Speaking of Emma, she's been sporting pig tails lately. I think she looks adorable in them

It's been raining and cold the last few days, we've had to entertain ourselves creatively.

Check out the motorcycle parking stall. (That's quality construction.)

Tonight we finally got around to carving pumpkins. We actually just bought them this afternoon. There is a little farm stand not to far from us that has pumpkins for sale. The have the pumpkins ranging from $1 to $5. We choose the little $1 ones. Ben especially like the lighting of the pumpkins.



Bytheway....if you think that you see the BYU cougar shirt alot, you do. He insists on wearing it whenever it comes out of the dryer. It is too small (it's an 18month shirt). I have ordered another for his birthday. It is long sleve. It will probably appear in many of the posts to come.

Turkey's, Apple picking and more

I have lots to cronicle. Today we made these little Turkeys. Benjamin loves to help in the kitchen....especially if it involves marshmellows. We took two turkeys to the neighbors. They seemed impressed with our creations.

Late last week we went Apple picking with Benjamin's class. The orchard was beautiful and I was surprised at the number of apples still on the trees. The kids loved it. We even got a a hayride to and from the picking. It is really starting to feel like late fall. The weather is cooler and the trees have changed colors and have dropped their leaves. It still hasn't frozen overnight but it will happen soon enough.

Benjamin and Jacob on the wagon.

Changing gears.....We went to Boston two weeks ago. Here we are pictured at the harbor in downtown.

We went to Boston to attend an adoption conference. The conference was great. It was at the church adjacent to the temple. The temple is beautiful, we were wishing there had been time to do a session. We did manage to attend the aquarium while we were there. The kids enjoyed the sea life and it was fun to spend some time seeing things that we don't normally get to see.
Benjamin loved his temple cookie.

The Boston temple.

The touch tank. Yup a sting-ray.

They were "friendly" they would swim right by and let you touch them as long as your hand was flat.

Who doesn't love a penguin?

Since we've been home it's been the usual day to day stuff. Benjamin has been eagar to be a knight the last few weeks. He usually banishes Emma for chewing on his toys.


And last but not least here are some photo's of Emma. I learned today that she will probably be going home to her family on November 10th. Of course I have mixed feelings. It's been nice having here in our home.