Halloween festivities

 On Thursday, Levi's preschool class visited Bethesda to give a short program and show the residents their costumes. We dropped a couple "jack-o-lanterns" off at Great Grandma Schmidt's room for her to enjoy.

 Levi was not his usual self at Bethesda that day.  He was very shy and he never seemed very comfortable, which is highly unusual for him when we visit Bethesda!  

 He was one shy motocross driver.

 But lucky for the preschoolers, Levi's daddy works at Bethesda and handed out candy to each one of them as they left for their walk back to preschool.

 On Halloween, Bethesda hosted a Carnival for all the kids in the community.  It was a ton of fun! They had a lot of the residents there too, so they could watch the kids playing games and having fun. 

 Ben was in charge of the bowling game, so that was our first stop.  Can you guess what Noah's costume is?  He decided to dress up as Grandpa Schrag.  He was very handsome and even had a name tag, just like Grandpa Schrag wears at his church.

 The cowboy boots were Noah's own spin on things...

 Levi's preschool teacher Gayle had amazing hair and tons of tattoos! 

 After the boys won 2 liters of pop, ate popcorn, got lots of candy and had played each game at Bethesda at least once, we headed out to the farm to trick-or-treat. 

 The funny thing about our boys is that they like to change costumes.  Levi caught on that Noah was dressing  up at school as grandpa Schrag.  So, Levi wanted to wear a costume to Debbie's, too.  But he'd already worn his motocross outfit on Thursday so he could not wear that again.  Finally, he decided to dress like grandpa Schrag too.  So, he put on his church pants, white button-down shirt and church shoes.  But, I grabbed his motocross outfit before leaving the house that morning hoping he'd change his mind.  He did.  So, he's got his motocross outfit over his grandpa Schrag outfit.  Just after supper, Noah decided to be his other grandpa for trick-or-treating up and down our street. 

 And surprise!  Ben dressed up too.  At Bethesda they all dress up for Halloween so he took advantage of his reddish beard and went Scottish for the day.

 And, now that Halloween itself is over with...I can start throwing candy away.  Candy causes lots of problems at our house, so I just slowly get rid of it.  And, interestingly enough, after getting home this evening they never once asked about their Halloween candy.  Maybe I should just dump it all before they remember!

Arkansas Weekend

The boys and I went to Bella Vista, Arkansas with my parents, sister and niece for the weekend.  It was such a nice get-away - except that Ben couldn't come with us.  He needed to save a vacation day for our upcoming trip to Illinois for Thanksgiving.  So, the rest of us took off on Friday morning.  I quick long 5 hour drive later we arrived at our destination.  

 We got right to work playing football.  The house we stayed in didn't have much of a yard.  Most of it was on a steep downhill slope and all of it was covered with rocks.  Noah was just about in a crying fit when I finally got him to hear me saying, "There's a grassy area just down the street.  We can go play there!"  Phew!  We played LOTS of football - hours worth of football over the weekend.

My dad worked with Noah on learning to tie his shoes (or in this photo the drawstring on his pants).  The difference in the size of their fingers is pretty amazing.  My dad has fantastic big farmer fingers.

 The leaves on and off the trees were gorgeous.  The weather was absolutely perfect for spending every possible hour outside and we did our best to enjoy all of it.  

 Saturday we walked on the nature trail, checked out some lakes,

 the waterfall and tried to take in all the small things that we so easily pass by without noticing.

 I let Noah walk with me right next to the waterfall, where the rocks were slippery and the water splashed on us - he thought it was "really cool!"

 We made and ate wonderful food, we laughed, told stories and spent good time connecting and relaxing together.  

Random Sunday Photos

Sunday afternoon and evening were spent at the farm with my parents, sister and niece.

We kept busy outside working in the trees

playing with tractors

and the main event, which isn't pictured, was playing football.

Tractor + wagon + two boys (thankfully) = amazing teamwork

Singing Cowboy

 This guys just melts my heart.

 Lucky for me, he sang me a few songs on Friday morning.

  It's great to watch him explore music, who knows if his interest will last.  But I'll certainly take a personal concert any day - especially from this shy cowboy.

Football Boys

 Saturday evening, our Sunday School class had a get-together and these boys played football.  I walked over to watch the game for a while and was surprised to see Noah at quarterback.  He can through an amazing spiral with a kid-sized football, but these "big" boys wanted to play with a "real" football.  I assumed that meant Noah would need to be a receiver or lineman, but I guess they gave the young kid a shot at QB.
There's the snap...

 he's looking for an open receiver....

 spotted one...

 and the ball falls incomplete.  Shucks.

 Next snap...

 this one looks more promising, but I don't recall if it was caught or not.

 Time for a huddle, and time to share the QB spotlight...

 apparently, Noah opted to be the ref.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of him waving his arms to stop the clock and "whistling" at the players.  It was legit.

These boys had some serious speed and intensity

 but they seemed to keep it in check.  There weren't any tears and there were lots of smiles.