Jack-o-Lanterns

Daddy and Ben had fun carving pumpkins tonight. Ok, so Daddy did most of the work, but Ben was very proud of his "gut" removal support role. I must say...I am very impressed with Mike's carving skills. The bat was pretty detailed, but I thought it turned out great. The two jack-o-lanterns are now sitting proudly on our front porch just waiting to scare trick-or-treaters on Saturday!

A pirate and a monster...

Last night we made our annual trip to "Boo at the (Akron) Zoo" with Papa and Nana. Ben and Nattie got to get dressed up in their Halloween costumes, collect treats, and look at the animals. They were both pretty cute, if I do say so myself. :) It was pretty chilly, but lots of fun!

I especially love Nattie's striped tights and monster feet... :)

768 miles, so far...

My crazy husband ran another marathon this morning. It was his first trail marathon and he really enjoyed it. There are FAR less runners participating in this kind of race than in a typical road race. He started at 5 am in the woods with only a headlamp to light his path. He said it was dark enough to keep the headlamp on until about mile 14. Crazy! It turned out to be a beautiful, crisp morning as he crossed the finish line with wet shoes and muddy legs...but feeling pretty good! Way to go, Mick! You are well on your way to reaching your 1000 mile goal for 2009. You rock!

Go Kylie!

On Saturday we got to watch my cousin Kylie play in a volleyball tournament at Heidelberg University. Her school, Webster University (St. Louis), was in town for the tournament. We had fun watching her play and hanging out with my Uncle Dave (my Dad's brother...and super fan!) in the stands. We got to watch some pretty competetive games and Webster gave the #7 team in the country (Wittenberg) a run for their money! Go Kylie!

Leaves!

We had some fun at the park today....playing in the leaves, swinging on the swings, and running around the playground.

Here are just a few extras from my camera this week. Benny has been playing with his LeapFrog computer a lot lately. He's really into typing words and showing me what he's done. He likes sitting in the chair with Nattie after bathtime and "reading" her books too. I've been giving Nat more table food lately. She still only has two teeth, but she loves Ritz crackers, fruit puffs, and anything that easily dissolves in her mouth. I've actually even given her some spaghetti a couple of times and she's done pretty good with that too. I'm hoping that her eating habits are much better than her big brothers.

Finally, in the spirit of painting a realistic picture of my family, today wasn't all fun and games (as the lovely fall pictures above might imply). My wonderfully adorable four-year-old (ha ha ha) decided that he was not in the mood to stop playing during our lunch outing today to go to the bathroom. He starts waddling through the restaurant, to the table I was sitting at, yelling "Mom, I pooped my pants!" Mind you, the place was FULL of people enjoying a nice, quiet lunch. I can only imagine how many were completely grossed out after hearing/seeing/smelling him! I was so embarrassed. Anyway, we cleaned him all up, finished up lunch quickly, and got out of there.

After lunch we headed to the park. We were having a blast. Well, until he decided that he was having too much fun playing to tell me he had to go to the bathroom, yet again. I see him running towards me across the park. As he gets closer, I hear him say, "Uh, Mom, I pooped my pants again." ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! This time I was TICKED (to put it nicely). He begged me to take him into the bathroom and clean him up again (yes, the park has a bathroom, so there is NO excuse!). I said NO and made him sit in it the whole way back to our house as he cried from the backseat. Evil mother.

Seriously...am I the only mother in the world who has a four-year-old who becomes so engrossed in what he's doing that he can't take two minutes to poop in a toliet? Thank goodness he's cute, because I really might have killed him. :)

A weekend in MO...

We flew to Missouri this weekend to visit with my family and attend my cousin Julie's wedding. It was a quick trip, but lots of fun. Here's Nattie getting ready to go on her first airplane ride. We quickly discovered that she is not quite as good a flyer as her little brother (at least not when he was her age). Luckily, it's only an hour and a half flight. :)

Here's some pictures from hanging out at Grammy and Pop's house. Ben and Nattie had fun playing with their cute cousin Emma.

Grammy has lots of books and Emma enjoyed taking them all off the shelf and bringing them to different people. Mike was given the two below. :) He strategically placed them in my parent's cars as a joke. My mom got the one on the left and my dad the one on the right. Don't the titles intrigue you? :)

On Friday, my mom dug out some of our old Halloween costumes that she had made over the years. Benny had a blast trying many of them on. He was an astronaut/space guy, Indian, and a jail bird. Nattie got to sport another lovely wig...this time multicolored. Doesn't she look thrilled? :)

On Saturday we headed up to St. Louis for my cousin Julie's wedding. She looked beautiful. It was in a gorgeous Catholic church downtown and the reception was at the top of the tallest building in St. Louis. It was a ton of fun and so great to see my Schweiss side of the family.

In between the wedding and reception we had some time to kill, so while Nattie napped, Benny, my mom and I watched the movie UP at the hotel. My mom took this picture of me and Benny snuggling on the bed. I just thought he looked so cute. :)

Some pictures from the wedding and reception. Nattie got to meet her second cousin Thomas (actually I'm not sure what he would be to her...he's my cousin Erin's baby). He was born about a month after her and is actually bigger than she is. They were cute together.

Finally, here are Benny and Daddy doing a little reading on the way home (nothing like SkyMall).

It was a fast, but fun, weekend. We can't wait to see some of you again at Thanksgiving! Love you!

Hairy Nattie...

This (see below) is what happens when you leave your eight month old with her great-grandparents for an afternoon. :) Mike's grandparents, Angy and Paps, came to watch Ben and Nattie yesterday and shared these photos they had taken of my baby girl in a lovely little wig. It actually took a minute for it to register that it was Natalie in the pictures. Doesn't she look fake...like some kind of doll baby that would be propped in the corner of a little girl's bedroom?? Maybe it's the combo of the hair and the look on her face or something?! She'll let you do anything to her. :) Anyway, I had a good, long chuckle over these.

Here she is, sans wig, attempting to crawl. She's been doing a lot of rocking forward and looking like she's going to start to crawl, but then her arms seem to give out and she falls flat on her belly and gets mad. Oh well, we're making progress slowly, but surely.

Uncle Brad and Aunt Christina

We traveled to Columbus this weekend to visit Uncle Brad and Aunt Christina. It was fun to spend time at their new house just relaxing with the fam. Ben had his first Wi experience and loved it. He is a pro bowler, but really loved boxing and golf too. :)

Christina was the "hostess with the mostess"...she had prepared enough food to feed an army. We managed, somehow, to polish it all off though. Breakfast this morning was good! These are her famous blueberry, banana, oatmeal pancakes...yum! I think I need some cooking lessons. I can make a mean toaster waffle or frozen pizza...but that's about it. :)

We went to a local metropark this afternoon and took a walk. I LOVE being in the woods in the fall. After eating like total pigs for the better part of the weekend, it was good to take a little stroll. :)

I love Nattie in this pink, fuzzy jacket. The color looked so pretty with her eyes.

Thanks for inviting us for a visit, Brad and Christina, and for being such generous hosts! We had a lot of fun and love you guys!

Crazy love...

I know this blog is sappy and overly lovey dovey, but it's primarily about my kids and well, I really love them. This love turns me a bit ooey gooey...I just can't help it. When I've had a rotten day, or I'm in a bad mood, or I'm overreacting to something...I can look at Ben and Natalie and everything is better. There are days, if I'm being honest, where I find myself taking credit for the good I see in them. I have to remind myself often that they are not really my children, but God's and that I am just here to teach them and guide them and ultimately show them, through my example, just a small glimmer of how much Jesus loves them. I feel so honored, blessed and thankful to have been given these two special little people. While I know this is a huge responsibility, I must admit, it isn't hard to love them...in fact, it's one of the easiest things I've ever done. Now, the teaching, guiding, and disciplining part...well, that's another story! :)

Here are a few shots from tonight. The middle picture below is the first time I've really been able to see Nattie's two bottom teeth in a picture. She's such a sweet little bathing beauty with her chubby cheeks and sticky outie ears. :) Ben and I were just being goofy before bed...in case you couldn't figure that one out!

Finally, I thought it was time for another Ben video. Here he is reciting the Pledge to the Bible. This is something they teach the kids at preschool. He actually learned this at the beginning of the school year, last year, but this is the first time I've been able to get him to say it on video. You'll have to pardon the hiccups. I still love hearing that cute little voice. :)

Snuggly Saturday and Bauman's Orchard...

We had a lazy Saturday morning of hanging out in our jammies. I sat Nattie in the chair next to Ben while I was making their breakfast (he was watching some cartoons) and when I came back in to get them they were snuggled up close and holding hands. Will they always love each other this much?? :)

In the afternoon we headed to Bauman's Orchard to do a little apple picking. The group family shot below makes me laugh. This was me trying to fit us all in a picture while bouncing around on a hayride.

Happy Fall!

Today was a good day. I decided since it is now officially October, I would kick off the Fall season with our first trip to Walsh Farms. Natalie went on her first hayride and Ben got to feed a three-week-old baby calf. I had so much fun with my kiddos.

Ben LOVED petting all of the animals.

A few more random pictures from our day...

Happy Fall!