Happy Birthday, Aaron!

Aaron is two years old! He is one strong-willed little guy who loves his big brothers and always wants to do whatever they are doing. He is goofy with Matthew, constantly trying to wrestle with him, and having "morning parties" with him before anyone else wakes up. (Usually these parties happen before 6 am and end up waking everyone else up). He is super sweet with Daniel, constantly asking when Daniel will be home from school. He often asks for Daniel when he's sad--those two have a special relationship. Aaron is still pretty small for his age, but he is super agile and courageous. He will climb anything he can and jump fearlessly from the top (as long as mom or dad is there to catch him...). If there was a circus he could join, he probably would. :) Our favorite phrases that he uses right now are "and me" (instead of "me too") and "something else" (as in, he always wants to eat something else or play something else). He is quite the spunky kid and we love him to pieces!

Aaron's photo tribute on the mantle. I'm not sure if he noticed it, but we sure had fun looking back at photos of his early days...

 Birthday breakfast--nutella on toast!

After breakfast we took a very special--and very cold--trip to the zoo. Aaron fell in love with the baby giraffe (who isn't quite a baby anymore) and hasn't stopped talking about him since. The boys also love wolves right now, so here they are with the grey wolf.

 Aaron loves fish (Blue Planet is a favorite show around here) so we had a fish-themed family birthday dinner for him. Thanks to Aaron's godparents Matt and Katie for the cute goldfish cupcakes!

 Aaron loves to blow out candles.

 Going straight for the m&m eyes.

 His own fishing pole!

 We tried to take some birthday photos a few days later...two-year-olds are hard to take photos of. (But, I do love that giant curl on the side of his head...)

 Cheese!

 Fish face.

 Inspecting a fish-lantern decoration.

 I can still see you...

 Matthew hopped in on the fun. What a ham. :)

 Happy birthday, Aaron!

John Denver Obsession

Every once in awhile, when the boys ask Daddy to sing a song, he sings a song called "Grandma's Feather Bed." Mommy had never heard of this song, but was amused by it. Last month, the boys wanted it more and more and Daddy was tired of singing it, so he bought the song. We listen to it on repeat. Then one day, Mommy found this video on you tube:

Watching that video all the time led to watching three other videos of Grandma's Feather Bed, (one of John Denver with the Muppets and one of him in concert and one of some high school show choir). Aaron will tell you that he wants "puppets" or "singing" or "dancing" to distinguish which one he wants to see.  And everyone's favorite part is the part where he "even kissed Aunt Lou. Ew!"

We have since acquired an album of John Denver's, and the boys listen to "Thank God I'm a Country Boy" on repeat. Daniel can sing the entire song...Matthew is trying...Aaron knows exactly when the song is close to finishing and says "again! again!"

The fast songs are always the favorites, but there happens to be a slower song called "Matthew" that Matthew calls "his song," though he gets confused because the word "die" is in it and he always asks if he died. :/

We're not sure when the John Denver obsession will subside, but I have to say, we don't really mind. The music and lyrics are clean and fun, and to be honest, we'd much rather listen to this than some of the other "kid" music we've heard.

Leaves

We had a few really sunny (though chilly) days here last week, and the trees around the neighborhood are so colorful, we just had to go down to the park to *try* to take some pictures of the boys with the leaves. I'm not sure if we got any where everyone is looking at the camera and not making goofy faces, though we did have a lot of fun with the leaves.

 Aaron was so funny...I told Daniel to try to keep his eyes open, and Aaron closed his.

 I think this is my favorite one. It was pretty windy and obviously hard for the boys to sit and smile.

 I'm not sure who Matthew is fighting here, but he seems pretty fierce.

 Time out for a brother hug.

Not sure what they're looking at.

 Love. Aaron just started whispering, so now everyone likes to whisper in his ear.

 Sweet Matthew.

 Look at my leaves!

 Leaf fight.

 Aaron was promised a trip to the playground, and he decided when it was time.

 Walking back home we found another good spot to play with leaves. Aaron is happy because he found a forgotten piece of granola bar in the stroller.

 Handful of leaves.

 And he's off again.

 I love the pure joy on Matthew's face. 

Silliness.

Love these boys.

Halloween and All Saints

We love costumes around here, so we LOVE halloween. This year, we also participated in our parish's procession of the saints at their All Saints Day Mass.  We had Daniel's old St. Dominic costume for Aaron to wear, Matthew was going to be a knight for halloween, so he could be St. George, and Daniel could be a larger St. Dominic since we had recently made a new habit for him. However, once Daniel found out that Matthew was going to be a saint with a sword, he decided he wanted to be St. Michael the Archangel. So much for easy costumes.... In a stroke of luck, though, I found a pair of angel wings on sale for $6, so St. Michael it is!  We added the cappa to the St. Dominic costume, made some shields and tunics and we were good to go! Here are some pictures of our Halloween/All Saints Day festivities.

 Neighborhood pre-Halloween activity: paper ghosts! All of the kids on our block are boys, and they're all under 6, so we have lots of fun with them. This day was almost like summer camp.

 All the boys flying their ghosts down the street.

Ghost flying video.

Mommy was working hard at getting our costumes ready. Can you guess what Daniel is?

Matthew tries on his knight costume.

No uniform for Daniel on Halloween...it's black and orange day!

 Matthew had the Halloween spirit right down to his socks.

 Too bad the big boys had school...this little gnome and Mommy went day-time trick-or-treating at Great Grandma Eva's house. 

 Here they are, ready to go! A knight, a wolf, and a gnome.

 Trick or treat!

 After a night of treats, here we are outside Blessed Sacrament getting read for the All Saints Day Mass. St. Dominic, St. Michael, and St. George!

 There were a lot of little saints running around, it was hard to get many good pictures.

 St. Dominic looking very pious.

 Fr. Marcin with the founder of his order.

 Posing with a few other saints.

 Happy All Saints Day!