Parents visit & Drew's school performance

My parents came down for a visit a couple weeks ago. We had great weather, so we went for walks at the park and played on the playground a couple times. The kids liked walking out on the dock to check out the lake.
Drew likes how Grandpa pushes him on the swing - HIGH!! He keeps saying, "higher, higher!" And when we went to the park while Chad was at work on Friday, Drew said, "I wish Daddy was here to see this!!" haha

Weee!

Here's Drew and Grandpa walking through our neighborhood.

Last Thursday Drew's school had a Thanksgiving celebration. The kids all sang songs, and then we had a big lunch. Here's Emma wearing Drew's turkey hat...upside down!


Drew was so giddy and excited (must be pretty cool to have both parents come eat lunch with you!!). He even knocked over his whole drink!

He knew all the motions to the songs and was VERY in to the performance! (front and center)

He especially liked when the crowd clapped...so he did too!

Drew and Emma play really well together (for the most part!) I love catching moments like this in pictures!

Mountains, Halloween Party, Trick-or-Treating

October 22nd, Susan and Alan watched the kids for us...overnight!! That was a first for us! We headed up to Boone and went on a 5 mile hike and then got to go out to eat with NO KIDS!! We had a great time - especially on the hike! We did the Boone Fork Trail (I think that's what it was called.)

There were some challenging parts where we had to climb across rocks - and amazingly enough, we both stayed dry!

Close up of sweet Emma! I can't believe my baby is 18 months old!

And here's a close up of Drew! He is growing so fast - and not just tall, but is getting broader and stronger! He loves doing strength things (like putting his hands on the ottoman and his feet back on the couch so he's in a push up position, and walks his hands and feet back and forth! haha) and is dying to learn a handstand!! Maybe he'll be the football player that does a backflip in the endzone!

Drew and Emma helped carve the pumpkins. Here's Drew trying to convince Emma that's it's not totally disgusting...she didn't believe him! She reaching in once, but then kept her distance!

Our pumpkins weren't the best...and slugs kept eating them at night! yuck! here's the back of the pumpkin that we carved. I talked with a bunch of others that had the same issues - and apparently the flooding that we had in September caused the pumpkins to not be the best quality.

Drew loved helping with the gooey goo. They had caved a pumpkin at school, so he was a pro!

Charlie loves his baby Emma!

Last year I hosted a Halloween party for Drew and his friends, so this year my friend Ayesha hosted. The kids had a great time! Here's Emma the bumblebee at the Halloween party!

Here's Drew as Elmo before we left for the party. Emma kept wanting to hug him!! haha

The kids had a blast on Monday going Trick-or-Treating! We started off our adventure at our neighbor's house. She goes all out for every holiday - especially Halloween!

Here's Drew and Emma making their way down the street. We only went down one street and back (which still took a long time and earned them LOTS of candy), so we could get back and let the kids hand out candy. Drew really liked that part. Every time the doorbell rang, he scream, "More customers!!" And he was all about saying, "Happy Halloween! Have a good night! Thanks!" LOL