November Favorites

And.....I didn't take very many pictures during November so here is a look at a few of my favorites this month.

Trying to make it look like Max doesn't hate me. He was looking for his escape route the entire time.

Coco lounging in what has become her office chair.

Fall leaf pile! To demonstrate how few pictures I took this month....these are actually from October, but Halloween day, so that's practically November.

Waiting in the car while Rick and Kyle ran inside to pick Tyler up from school. I took very few pictures of myself this month because my lips have been a swollen mess. Apparently I'm allergic to an ingredient in some toothpastes. All I know is that Hello toothpaste is a NO. Crest 3D White is iffy as well as Sensodyne Pronamel Whitening. I've been recovering while using Walgreen's generic version of Sensodyne Pronamel Mint. It's awesome when you're scared to brush your teeth.

Freese Family Gathering

Rick's brothers Justin and Derek, along with Justin's wife Jamie and their son Wyatt came to stay with us for the Thanksgiving holiday week. We booked a room at the Great Wolf Lodge for Monday night and met them there. So we spent the rest of the day there and stayed through Tuesday afternoon. The boys had a great time playing in the water!

Back at our house, we discovered that it had snowed for the first time this season while we were away at the water park. Not a ton of snow, but enough for the kids to make a snowman.

Later that day we went to the trampoline park Get Air and being that it was the day before Thanksgiving, the place was pretty dead.

Right at 9:00, which we thought was closing time, they actually turned out the regular lights and turned on the disco lights for the last 30 minutes. By that time our family was the only ones in the building so it was our own personal dance party.

Gah! I was so busy in the kitchen cooking on Thanksgiving that this is the only picture I took that day.

No Black Friday shopping for us. Instead we took Highway 97 north to an area with some snow and let the boys play for a few hours.

And on Saturday, the last day with our guests, we went to the Family Fun Center by our house for a little bit, but otherwise stayed at home.

All in all, it was a great week with a whirlwind of fun activities. The house already feels kind of empty with all the missing family, but hopefully they'll come back and visit again soon.

October Favorites

As always, here are my favorite Project Life and Instagram pictures for the month of October:

We recently got the board game Fibber and I was trying to play it with Kyle although it is better with at least 3 players. On each turn you place some cards face down on the board and make a statement about the cards you put down. You can either tell the truth or tell a fib, but if you get caught fibbing, then you have to add a nose piece to your face. The goal is to get rid of the cards in your hand while keeping the shortest nose. Kyle ended up with the longest nose, which technically made him the loser, but he was so happy with his long rainbow nose that I decided to let the scoring go and just let him have fun.

Tyler has been in the kitchen a lot this month baking various things such as apple crisp, pudding and chocolate chip cookies.

Me and my big helper out running errands.

The "My brother is making me do this" face.

Some silly string type of product that Rick found on clearance and bought for the boys. Oh my god! It smelled so bad and it made a horrible mess that was an absolute pain to pick up. The boys had fun, but it's not something we're likely to ever buy again.

For whatever reason Tyler has an absolute love for the Hobby Lobby, or at least he thinks he does since he's only been there once, but asks to go relentlessly. So I made a bargain with him that if he went to Kohl's to try on jeans, then I would take him to the Hobby Lobby. He held up his end of the deal so I was compelled to hold up mine. He went straight to the Christmas section and found the perfect ornament...a Rubik's cube.

Drawing with chalk on the front walkway.

I'm going through a disgusting phase called "buy all of the high end eyeshadow palettes". Actually, it's not that I want to buy every palette so much as try out the major brands. I've had the Urban Decay Naked 2 palette for years and a small Smashbox palette, but have recently tried Lorac, Cargo, The Balm and Too Faced. I bought the Lorac Pro Mega 2 palette the day it was released earlier this month and I'm a happy customer so far.

Tyler's turn to wear the Hoberman's sphere on his head. And since it was his idea, he was way more pleased about it than his brother.

Kyle helping me with his Halloween costume.

My #ultapinkover contribution on Instagram. Ulta was donating money for breast cancer research for every use of the Ulta pink over hashtag.

Halloween decorations, which I realize now are all from Kohl's. I bought the candle and the spider candle holder on clearance last year, but the wine bottle covers are recent purchases.

Kyle was so excited to see the progress of his costume.

Back to the Future day was last week and all three movies were playing on the movie channels, so we watched them all back to back. Both boys really enjoyed them! Kyle was especially on the edge of his seat during the 3rd movie when they were using the speeding train to get the Delorean up to 88 mph. Suspense!

Hearts and Love.

A neon light writer that Rick found on clearance somewhere and it's the perfectly nerdy sort of toy that Tyler likes to play with.

October books. The Martian was really good and now I'm ready to go see the movie. I was telling Tyler what it was about, the whole idea of being trapped on Mars and finding a way to survive and he became so interested that he kept stealing my book so he could read it for himself.

Lastly, my favorite outfits this month.

Halloween 2015

It was nice having Halloween on a Saturday this year. Both Rick and Tyler were home all day to help carve pumpkins and decorate the house without any of the last minute rush.

I made both of the boys' costumes this year. A red M&M for Kyle and a Vanilla Tootsie Roll for Tyler. Tyler had come up with his costume idea by himself and was trying to measure himself and design a pattern, but I ended up making the candy package from the M&M pattern (Simplicity 9895 - an old pattern from the 90's) and embellished it to look like a Tootsie Roll. I just had to figure out the font for Tootsie, which is Cooper Black, something we already had on the computer. Easy enough.

For candy this year we got some big bags from Costco to mix in the the fun size bags were got at the candy sale at Rosauers.

The boys and I made Halloween sugar cookie cut outs yesterday after Tyler got home from school. Perfect for dessert after trick or treating.

Carving pumpkins! Tyler wanted me to look at his cool hat.

The finished lineup: Frankenstein, a Minecraft jack o'lantern, and a ghost.

For dinner we had a perfect pizza from Papa Murphy's. Half pepperoni and half Hawaiian.

I headed out with the boys around 5:30 to trick or treat around our neighborhood.

Rain was in the forecast today, but thankfully it never got to be much more than a drizzle.

Back at the house and time to sort out the candy.

 

Where's all my peanut butter taffy (Abba Zabba, Mary Janes), Green Tea Kit Kats, and Candy Corn? I guess I'll settle for Twix, Skittles, Baby Ruth and bite sized candy bars.

Happy Halloween!