Celebrating a Happy Birthday (in more ways than one)

A few weeks ago we celebrated Sarah's ninth birthday.  Our little girl is growing up so fast!  Kate, one of her best friends from school, has the same birthday.  They're fascinated by the thought that they were in the same hospital at the same time, born just hours apart from each other.  It was a pretty low-key birthday this year, but Sarah really enjoyed it.  Especially being able to stay in her pajamas for most of the day.  She even enjoyed attending Kate's birthday party, and tried hard to be gracious and not too jealous about celebrating a friend's birthday on her own special day.

At church a few Sundays ago I was trying to help Michael keep quiet by writing letters and numbers on the magna doodle.  He's been able to sign his letters and numbers for a long time and enjoyed signing as I wrote them.  Then I tried writing words on the magna doodle so he could finger spell them.  The first word I wrote was MOM, and like a champ he finger spelled M-O-M.  But then he did the sign for mom!  He actually read that word!  Next I tried DAD, and he finger spelled it and did the sign for dad.  I wrote down harder words, like BABY, CHEESE, CRACKER, and ICE CREAM.  He read them all and did their sign.  He even read a few with two words, like HAPPY BIRTHDAY.  Liz and I were both in tears as we watched in amazement as our 3-year old read these words to us.  I wonder if the person speaking in church thought we were particularly moved by his sermon. :-)  As much as Michael can't do because of his disabilities, we never cease to be amazed by what he CAN do.

Here are a few other random pictures.

Whenever we get the ladder out the kids always beg us to let them climb it.  Michael and Brooklyn are no exception.

Whitney and Spencer dressing up as Mary.  Or shepherds.  Or something like that.

Halloween 2014

Halloween is here again!  Each of the kids picked out a pumpkin and we helped carve it up for them.

This year I took the kids to Utah for a long weekend to celebrate at the awesome annual Bellamy Halloween party.  I dressed up to look like I do most of the time - right out of bed in my bathrobe.  Reminds me of when I had to dash the girls to school early this week in my bathrobe.  I'm sure the neighbors think we are really weird.  The kids played musical costumes and rotated through a few this year.  I think only Sarah and Michael kept their same costumes. 

Sarah had her Halloween piano recital and did great.  She was an excellent Hermione for Halloween this year.

I also volunteered to help with Sarah's Halloween party.  The kids loved the "mummy wrap" game.

Whitney originally wanted to dress like a vampire princess, but after one night in that costume, she switched to snow princess instead.

Spencer started out as a pirate, then insisted on trying on Michael's cowboy costume, and then eventually settled on Iron Man.  He was pretty proud of this costume and I caught him at his Kindergarten Halloween party right before Michael had a major tantrum and we had to quickly leave to school after enough teachers came out of their rooms to check out what kid was screaming/wailing at the top of his lungs.

Michael made a really awesome cowboy this year.

Brooklyn transformed into the cutest little black kitty ever!  She is at such an adorable age, I just can't get enough of it, except when she randomly shrieks so loud it startles us.  Tim calls her "the drive-by screamer." 

We took the kids trick-or-treating at Tim's work (Intel) for a long walk from cubicle to cubicle to rake in the candy. We often give a lot of what we get at Intel out at night to those that come to our door.

It's a tradition every year to crowd Tim and kids into his cubicle and take a picture.  This is the one time of year we get to see where he works.

Happy Halloween!