Oh Boys

I tend to forget to post the little nuggets of comedy gold my children (unintentionally) provide, but I had to make sure to get these two on here before I forgot.

On Saturday, John and I were getting ready to head out to his company party. It's a fancy affair, so I was applying darker, "smoky" eye makeup. Nathan looks at me and says, "You look really tired now. Also, that would make good witch makeup." I decided it might be best to tone the makeup down after that.

I picked the boys up at school this afternoon and checked in with Aiden's teacher. He had been a little moody this morning, so I wanted to make sure the day had gone alright. His teacher informed me that she had laughed until she cried when she discovered that Aiden had answered every single question on his reading comprehension test with "I cannot answer this due to my religious beliefs". That kid is just too much sometimes.

Let's recap October before November is over, shall we?

Wow! October flew by before I knew it, and November is doing the same thing! Here are some pictures to cover just some of things we did through October.

Nathan finished up his fall soccer season. (He's #4)

We had the same coach from spring season, which was really nice for all of us. Nathan improved a lot through the fall and plans to do it again in the spring. The coach is planning on being there for one last season, and we plan on requesting him as coach again.

Coach Keezel and Nathan

We took our annual family outing to Baggenstos for our pumpkins.

Yep, the boys are wearing shorts and tshirts. In October. In Oregon. It ended up being 86 degrees that day!

 Nathan did a Read to the Dogs session (reading to service dogs) at my work. Since my schedule was changed, it freed up our Monday nights for him to actually sign up. He loved reading to Clark (who snored through the whole thing), and the lady who owns Clark was very impressed with Nathan's reading skills at age 6. She is a former teacher and said she couldn't believe he was only in 1st grade.

Since it was too darn hot on our original trip, we waited for a somewhat cooler day to take the boys back to Baggenstos to do the corn maze. I attempted to take a family picture and failed miserably.

The boys loved reading the map and finding their way through.

Nathan and I took a moment for a "lost in a corn maze" picture.

We had our first big storm of the season. The large tree down the street by the neighborhood playground just couldn't handle it. I was at work most of the day and we ended up with a couple of power surges and flickering lights, but managed to not lose power entirely. That's saying something since the power tends to go out in that neighborhood quite easily for some reason.

We finally sat down to carve our pumpkins. Nathan was fairly grossed out.

John did his own design.

As did Aiden.

Nathan and I opted for a template design.

Halloween was Spirit Day at school and the theme was Crazy Hair. I bought some hair mascara in a few different colors and colored up Aiden's faux-hawk. Nathan ended up spiking a random fever the night before, so he stayed home from school so I could keep an eye on him. He was fine, which was good news for trick or treating in grandma and grandpa's new neighborhood that night!

 And the Minthorne family costumes of 2014....

Carrie: Library Witch

 Aren't the striped tights super fun?

Aiden: Zombie. I bought some "flesh gel" to make open sores on him. That stuff is hard to work with, but gives a great effect! I can't tell you how many people ended up asking Aiden what happened to his forehead with real concern. Aiden thought it was hilarious. I would then get congratulated on my makeup skills.

Nathan: Harry Potter. The cutest Harry Potter ever. There were quite a few little Harry Potters (plus one Hermione) roaming around the neighborhood - all Nathan's age. They would stand there and stare at each other. It was adorable.

And John was also a zombie, but he refused the makeup. Oh well.

 We've been told that this needs to be our Christmas card picture. (Don't worry - it's not)

The boys ended up with SO much candy in a very short amount of time, we actually got home at a reasonable hour (of course, grandma and grandpa now living 5 minutes away helps too!).

This was our first Halloween after changing the boys diet to limit sugar and eliminate high fructose corn syrup. We knew it was going to be a challenge, so we got creative. We allowed the boys to keep about a 1/3 of what they got trick or treating. They went through and picked their favorites, then handed the rest over to us in exchange for new Lego sets. I then donated the candy to my work to use for the volunteer candy bowl. It did take a little more convincing on Aiden's part than I expected, but after discussing how Legos will last longer than candy, he agreed. And you know, they haven't missed the candy at all.

We Have a Nine Year Old!

This post is a tad late, as we've had a nine year old for over two weeks now, but you know....life.

Yes it is true. Aiden is NINE years old. We had a friend birthday party at Out of This World Pizza, where the kids stuffed themselves with pizza, salad, and cupcakes and then ran off all the sugar. Plus, I didn't have to do much of anything except bring the birthday boy, cupcakes, and my wallet. So worth it.

After the friend party, we rushed home to get ready for the family party. Yes, I am insane and planned two parties for the same day. Luckily, we had been able to do everything that morning except frost the cake. 

 Creeper cake! (His theme was Minecraft)

We had a great time with the family, but definitely missed the family members who live too far away to make it. Aiden got some awesome presents, and was particularly enthralled with grandma and grandpa's gift.

 I just can't get over how old he looks!

He really raked in the Minecraft stuff from his friends, including a "pixelated" Minecraft torch. It's been used quite often as a reading light after he's supposed to be in bed. :-)

We absolutely LOVE having a nine year old in the house. But I might be a bit of a mess when he turns 10!

Tired Update

After a month+ of exhaustion and then frequent headaches kicking in, I finally realized that my vision has been struggling (when I'm most tired, my eyes are actually aching). I have an eye appointment next Tuesday to see if that is what's causing it.

My current glasses are bifocals. The bifocals help fine while I'm reading or at the computer, but seem to lack in helping my vision with normal daily activities and things get increasingly blurry throughout the day. I can definitely tell a difference in my vision from when I first got them a year and a half ago, so I am hopeful that it will just require a change in prescription to ease my issues.