Halloween

Better late than never...

This year, for the first time that I can remember, Indianapolis/Marion County officially moved trick-or-treating.  The weather on Halloween was stormy and rather dangerous, so it was pushed off one day (to Friday Nov 1st).  On Halloween, we went to our friends house, the Hicks, for the already-planned post-trick-or-treating party and enjoyed catching up with friends.

Friday night we already had plans...so we pushed things back a bit so we could take the kids trick-or-treating before leaving them with Aunt Becky to babysit for the night.  Months ago, after visiting the butterfly exhibit at the Whiteriver Gardens, Charlie decided he wanted to be a butterfly.  I found monarch wings online and he LOVES them.  Sam decided he wanted to be "a batman" after watching the older boys play super heros at church.  He didn't want a mask so I gave him a shirt and a cape, and then the morning of Halloween he changed his mind.  We made one out of felt and he wore it the whole night!  Julia, in efforts to avoid a third appearance of the monkey costume (seen here and here), wore a ladybug costume gifted to us by a friend.

We headed out just before 5pm in order to hit the early trick-or-treating on one block of our street.  And after making the loop, we were home by 6:15.  Charlie totally rocked it this year.  Sam was a bit unsure (mostly because he tripped walking up to one of the houses...and then pouted for the rest of the block) but by the end he loved running up to the doors with Charlie.

Everyone smiling!

 We made too much noise to make them laugh...which of course scared JuBee

A fun night!  Our only wish was that we could have relaxed a little bit more without having to rush off, but we did the best we could with short notice.

Nine Months!

The Florida MOON!

Sandy Days

We spent most of the next two days just hanging out on the beach...collecting shells, playing in the water, digging in the sand, and a bit of complaining here and there (I mean, they're 2 and 4, right?).  We also managed to get a few shots for our Christmas cards...which I won't post quite yet until I know which pictures I'm using!  The boys were fascinated by the THOUSANDS of shells, and every find was a big deal.

Checking out the shells in the bucket

 

 

 

 Scott dug a huge hole for the boys to sit in

 I had to include this picture...because I think I read approximately 3 sentences in this book.  But I look relaxed, right?

 "Working so  hard" that I couldn't get them to look at me for a picture!

 

Fortunately, Julia slept through most of the beach time.  We set her on the sand and she immediately put a fistfull into her mouth...9 months is not the best age for a beach trip!

The hotel also had a pool on the 8th floor which overlooked the beach--it was pretty amazing.  We stopped by a few times and the kids enjoyed the kiddie pool.  Many thanks to my parents for the financial and moral support on the trip--with kiddies this young, we needed all hands on deck! (and now, I think I need a vacation from the vacation...)

Magic Kingdom

We arrived in Florida on a Wednesday afternoon, with enough time to check out the beach for an hour and then have dinner before putting the kids to bed.  Our first night, Charlie had a cough...and since all 5 of us were sleeping in one room, it was a rough night.  After getting up a few times in the middle of the night, we still decided to stick with our plan to head to Magic Kingdom on Thursday (for fear that Thursday night might be even worse!)

The drive was easy and uneventful, but it takes such effort to actually get to the park when you don't stay on Disney...especially with 3 kids (even though we had 4 adults!).  Car to tram (we skipped tram and walked since we had the stroller) to the monorail and then into the park, whew.   We went straight for the Dumbo ride.  Sam was thrilled to give it a try; Charlie (my cautious firstborn) decided to wait to see how Sam fared before deciding it was a safe thing to do.

 Julia wanted to nurse so we sat this one out with grandpa...and just took a few pictures instead!

The kids in the "portrait" Dumbo.  My dad was taking the pics and while I appreciate the close-up, you can't see that they're sitting in Dumbo :)

 We all started clapping and making noise trying to get the kids to smile, which of course made Julia start crying.

 

The boys were very excited about the race cars.  I regretted my decision to let Sam "drive" as it was really hard to steer while leaning over him!  But both boys loved it.

 (Julia thought the cars were a little boring...)

Buzz Lightyear ride--my dad didn't want to buy the picture so he took a picture of the screen. Sadly he only took the one of our cart and missed out on the rest of the family--but I love his intense stare (he creamed Charlie, if anyone was keeping score)

 Watching the show

 Our crew minus dad (hindsight...should have sought out the rental strollers!)

Sam's favorite part of the day was meeting Mickey.  The "new" Mickey actually talks, which caught me off-guard (the old one was just plush if you know what I mean).  We got to visit him "backstage" with almost no wait at all, and he was so cute and chatty.  I wish we would have made more of an effort to get a better family picture, but it was the end of the day and we were all tired!

We rode several other rides.  Charlie's favorite is different depending on when you ask him-but he loved the rocket ships over Tomorrowland, and the flying carpets of Aladdin.  The train was out of service (disappointing especially since we talked it up to the kids before we realized it!).  The crowds were a bit overwhelming, even though we never waited more than 20 minutes for a ride so I can only imagine how crowded it is at capacity!!!  We had a fun day but were grateful for our beach escape for the rest of the vacation :)