Thanksgiving

This year we spent Thanksgiving at Micah's cousin's new house in Visalia. Tim and Amber were great hosts and the kids had so much fun playing with all the cousins.

My Favorite Part of the Day

James has pretty much given up naps, but on the rare occasion that he does take them, my favorite part of the day occurs when he wakes up. He loves to sit on my lap and cuddle. He doesn't move at all for at least 15 minutes; he just burrows himself into my neck and rests and I cherish every single moment of it!!

Photo courtesy of Haylie

The Climb

Yesterday we were itching to get out of the house and do something fun when Micah came up with a great idea. He had recently met with the owner of a local rock climbing gym and thought we should check it out. It turned out to be so much fun, it had a whole kids play area and it cost half as much as a bounce place.

The kids play area had tons of climbing obstacles that gave the kids a sense of accomplishment:

It also had huge PVC pipes that served as slides, tunnels and swings where the kids could be silly:

They love being silly:

The kids crawled through this tiny little tube which was a very long tunnel. I thought once James went in he would surely get stuck in the middle and one of us would have to go in after him, but he did great! He was so cute, the whole way through I could hear him saying "almost there, almost there." I have never thought of myself as claustrophobic but just thinking about crawling through this long skinny tunnel was making me nautious:

Unfortunately we arrived a little late and missed the last class so that Micah could learn how to "belay" so that Haylie could go on the ropes and climb the really large rock wall. Luckily, we ran into the owner on the way out and he remembered Micah and offered to help Haylie and James himself. He was the nicest guy and, we found out, actively involved in Youth For Christ.

Haylie getting ready for her ascent:

I can't believe how high she went - so brave:

James wanted a turn too:

He didn't go quite as high but he went up a little ways :)

This was so fun! Can't wait to go back!! Haylie wanted to climb it over and over and I think James could have done a little better with some more warm-up.

Thankful for Haylie

Today we had the pleasure of participating in Haylie's Friendship Feast in her class. It was great to see her wonderful teacher singing "the grateful song" with the kids - it is such a sweet song and I love listening to their little voices singing the words.

Haylie was so happy to see us when we got there and even though she wasn't paying good attention because she was so busy trying to talk to us it was very sweet how excited she was about us being there. I was very thankful that we both had the ability to be there with her.

Trick or Treating this year

The kids were counting down to Halloween with great anticipation for the loads of candy they would haul home. They have been wearing their costumes for a month already so they were excited for the big day. We caught up with some twin boys across the street, just a little older than James and headed around the neighborhood with them:

That is way too much candy!!!

I guess I will have to eat some too:

After we got back, Haylie was excited to hand out candy to the other kids that came to the door:

Halloween Costumes

Got some cute pictures of the kids in their Halloween costumes: