FORTY-ONE

Last Monday the kids really wanted to carve pumpkins. 

2019 week forty-one

So the weather was lovely and we sat outside and made a mess that the chickens heartily enjoyed. 

Silly kids and happy pumpkins. The extreme heat for the following three days reduced our pumpkins to mush. Now they look actually frightening.

"Luna likes sitting on my lap getting scratched to the bones."

Saturday afternoon Dracula Ballet matinee with this little bug. She was bouncing in her seat with excitement the whole time. 

On Sunday we had an early birthday party for Theodore at a local Fire Station.

Quite possibly the best picture of all time. 

Theo wanted hotdogs and lemonade and chips for his party. We had a room of tables with fireman coloring pages and all the kids got to eat until the firemen were ready to take us on a tour. 

All the kids got to sit in the truck as much as they wanted. 

The joy in his eyes. He almost can't bear it. 

Everyone got to take home fire hats.

Theo was the sweetest while opening his presents, constantly saying "Wow!" and yelling "Thank you!"

His birthday treat was sugar cookies. Matt did most of the decorating while V and I were at Dracula. He did such a good job! 

Both of the kids said this was the highlight of the party: eating while sitting under a table. 

Matt has a coworker who also makes halloween decoration gravestones. Matt got to design his own. He's very proud of it. 

Quotes:

Theodore

"This song feels adventurous!" Theo likes to sit at the piano and play various sound effects for me. He will tell me he's playing lightning or rain drops. I think it's marvelous. Sometimes I'll put on the classical radio and ask him to tell me about what's going on in the songs. Sometimes he says poetic things like "this song feels adventurous," sometimes it's just "this is people eating a bowl of cereal." Somewhere in his soul he is a musician. 

Veronica

"Remember that time Theodore licked a cicada shell?" Ew. No.

"Wow look at this cool bike? Why is it here?" Veronica got a free bike from our generous neighbors who found it and kindly thought of us. It has been amazing for her to learn how to ride. But over the past year and a half it's very nearly a pile of scrap from heavy use. Two separate days this week it just failed to work for various reasons and she didn't get to ride to school. So we decided to just randomly surprise her with a new bike without waiting for a special holiday or reason. It was supposed to rain so I told her "You left some toys in the front yard. Will you go get them so they don't get caught in the rain?" She walked outside and her first reaction was not to believe the bike was for her. She was confused why someone else would leave her shiny bike in our driveway. When we told her it was for her she didn't even know what to say. She was a bit overwhelmed so she could only think to say practically, "Well, we'll have to get those training wheels off it." I really love this girl.