Family Pictures

While on vacation we had family pictures taken.  Here are a few of my favorites.

 

This one cracks me up. The photographer asked the kids to jump. After repeated tries this is what we ended up with.

Grove of the Patriarchs

Cooper Dancing

We have a lot of videos of Cooper dancing, singing, or talking while Talmage is playing his violin.  I can't post most of them though because the files are too big.  Here is one that's small enough, though it is not the best.  All the talking/singing sounds are coming from Cooper.  He is a very fun bird and Talmage loves him.  He makes practicing the violin more enjoyable though less productive.

Raking Leaves

We had a small amount of time to play as a family one Saturday and this is what Anya chose to do.  She was so happy to have the whole family out creating a huge pile for her to jump in.
Aaron was in charge of picture taking and putting the leaves in the yard waste bin at the end.  Anya got us all started and was willing to use the worst rake to keep everyone happy, Talmage did just enough raking to qualify for a few jumps but for the most part he doesn't think yard work is his thing, and I got to use the best rake and move lots of leaves.

 This is how Anya thinks we should dress to do yard work.

I made that skirt for her birthday and she wears it every weekend.

 

Talmage loves posing for pictures.

 

 And this is proof that I do exist.  Usually I'm the one behind the camera so we don't have many pictures of me.  And that's ok.

Halloween Costumes and a Poem

Talmage is a hobbit. Frodo to be precise.  He wanted to go bare foot and have hairy feet but I told him he had to wear shoes to go trick or treating.  He thought I was being a mean mom.  I did make this costume and let him borrow a gold chain to put his ring on.  So I'm not that mean.  He also had a thick wooden walking stick.

 

The weather was so warm today.  Nearly 70 degrees out.  It was a perfectly comfortable evening to go knock doors and beg for candy.

Anya wanted to be a witch.  She wears these pink striped tights to school as often as she can.  This was a trow together costume, but she was pleased with it.

 I just happened to have this pink feathery thing in my craft room so we put it on the hat-- Anya can never have enough pink.

She looked too cute to be a witch so we put eye liner on her lips and a big black mascara mole on her cheek.  It didn't really make her look less cute.  I guess she's doomed to be cute. 

She even tried to make a scary face.

The following is a poem that Talmage wrote in class today.

Happy, happy all day long
After candy is our song
Let us go down the big slide, oh no now its time to hide
Lollipops chocolates let us cheer,
Oh man, he's a gigantic ear
Wow a monster passing by
Eek, I think I'm going to fry
Even bed time's passing by
Noon is gone and so am I