School Halloween

At Jackson's school you can't dress up for Halloween. So instead his kindergarten class celebrated 'Teddy Bear Day'. They each got a teddy bear poster board and had 2 weeks to decorate it however they wanted. At first Jackson wanted to make it Batman, since that's who he's going to be for Halloween, but then changed his mind to Iron Man. He and Jonathan worked on it together. Jonathan drew out the different pieces and we let Jackson do most of the cutting, gluing, etc. The cotton balls for the lights on his hands and chest were actually his idea. Creative kid!

At school today they got to parade their teddy bears around the school. They went into every classroom holding their bears while the others kids either clapped or 'oooed' and 'aaawwwweeeed'. They were so cute!

Prehalloween

Aren't kids fun?! The boys got these mummy treat baskets and have found that wearing them as helmets is just as fun as getting treats in them.



Cooper must be growing. I keep finding him asleep in the strangest places. I forgot to take pictures of him sprawled out on the kitchen floor, or sitting up watching a movie. But I did remember to grab the camera for this one. Douglas had just moved into the bigger carseat that faces forward. This one hadn't made it down to the basement yet and I guess Cooper thought it looked comfy.

Party!!!

Well it wasn't much of a party, but we tried our best. Jon was on call last night and ended up getting paged as we sat down for cake. And that was only 10 mins after he had finally been able to make it home. So we ate cake quickly, opened presents in record time and then he had to run. Douglas loved all the attention, and was so cute opening he's presents. He would get excited and start waving his hands around when he could see what it was. So fun!! Cooper and I sang Happy Birthday to him throughout the day and he would clap everytime we'd sing it. Jackson and Cooper called him 'birthday boy' anytime they talked to him and I have to admit, I was a bit sad. I feel like so much has happened in the last year, and I didn't like the reminder of how fast this is all going. Slow down guys!!!
The cake was a big hit (we haven't had much luck on 1st birthday messes with the last two). But Douglas didn't disappoint with getting into eating his cupcake. It may have been a quick party, but it was memorable. :)
Some stats on the little guy:
Born- 10lbs 9oz 22 1/2 inches
Now- 22.1 lbs 29 1/2 inches
Crawling
Standing on his own
Feeding himself (loves turkey, string cheese, yogurt, bread, and applesauce)
Says 'mama' 'dada' (although I'm not convinced it's with any meaning yet)
Loves to yell "AAAHHHH" just to hear his own voice (thinks it's pretty funny too)
Favorite thing to do is...follow his brothers around and ruin anything they may have set up.
VERY shy
Will finally wave bye (the whole shy thing made this hard for him). But only to people he's comfortable with.
Will not keep socks on his feet.
Likes to climb (which scares me)
Loves to clap. Claps right along everytime we watch Dancing with the Stars.
Loves the introduction to movies. He gets excited, claps his hands, rocks back and forth (this is all for the THX and studio logos) but as soon as the actual movie starts, he's done. Usually never even looks at the TV again.
He keeps us all entertained and smiling, and we love him for it. Douglas, you've been a wonderful addition to our family and we feel so lucky to have you as a son and brother. We love you so much!!!

Happy 1st Birthday Douglas!!!

We're so glad you're a part of our family!










Love, Mom Dad Jackson and Cooper

I know my ABC's

Just a quick shout out for Caleb, we are so proud of him! This is his new teacher, Mrs. Hargrove. We had a meet the teacher night tonight and it was great. It was not Parent/Teacher conference; that is in November. Tonight was just to meet Mrs. Hargrove and hear her goals. My favorite thing I heard tonight was that Caleb is a good kid, "it just depends on who he is sitting next to." Isn't that funny! And I can totally see it. He is the same way on the soccer field. If "so and so" is on the field Caleb is more likely to dink around. But if he is playing with the other "so and so", he is a lot more focused. Seems as if it has passed on into the classroom.
As for Caleb academically, he is progressing and doing great. As of late he has shown more interest in reading and writing and he just impresses me each time he comes up with something on his own. Tonight he wanted to write out his own grocery lists. So, I helped him know what letters to write for the words and he just wrote his words for about half and hour. He did not want to stop, he took his note pad to bed. :) And he is getting better at sounding out his words and really doing well. He is a good kid, hates...absolutely hates getting up in the morning, and seems to keep to himself at recess (which is surprising) but he seems to like school. Yeah for Caleb!
One more thing, this is Caleb's entry for the Reflections contest. Pretty good, huh? The theme for this year is "WOW!" so I asked Caleb to think of some things that "WOW" him. I helped him out with some ideas of the things that wow me and he came up with this painting. He used watercolors (his best medium I believe) and it is a whale jumping out of the water. Then there is Caleb, Peter and Willy (in Caleb's arms) standing on a dock watching fireworks in the sky. What a creative kid.

Fall Photos

Last week my sister Denika, cousin Breanne, and I took the boys and Emma up Provo Canyon to get some photos of them with the leaves. Unfortunately, by the time we arrived it was pretty dark-and so the pictures are a bit pale-colorwise. The kids had a lot of fun playing in the leaves though and Denika took some cute photos. We were up there during the BYU-TCU game-and we didn't miss much. :)

For everything there is a time and a season

Well, the season of soccer just ended. Saturday was Caleb's last game (he is the one in the hat) and he did great. He was rather bored on defense because the other team only got it down to their goal two or three times. :) So, they put Caleb on offense, to give his legs a little running; he did great. He kept up with the ball and had fun. He really likes soccer but is also looking forward to baseball in the spring.
With the ending on soccer season game the beginning of raking season. Rob and Caleb came home after the game and raked up the leaves in the yard. And then Caleb did what every self-respecting child does and jumped in the leaves and buried himself in the leaves. Oh, did I forget to mention that he also frustrated Rob by scattering the leaves once they were in a neat pile? That is just to be expected. :)And my boys are pretty much ready for Halloween. Isn't Peter just too cool in his costume! Let's just hope that he agrees to wear it on Halloween night and will not be a stick in the mud.
Willy is almost ready for Halloween, he has his Squash pumpkin that I carved for him. Yes, that squash grew to enormous size in our garden so I dubbed it Willy's pumpkin. :) Now all he needs is for me to get together his spider costume and the two Spidermen (Caleb and Peter) will have a spider to tag along. :) Happy Fall to everyone! -Diedre

A whole new spin on 'Eat rocks'

On our little day trip Douglas discovered something new. Rocks!

Hey what's this?

I'm 11 months and the only way I know how to figure it out is...

Is this ok?

Oh the flavors!

And that texture...

Yum, that was good stuff!

We had to take him away after that. I hear they're addicting. Not to mention it was like nails on a chalkboard for my ears. :) (you have to listen carefully)

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Fall colors

We went on a drive up to northern Connecticut to see the colors. If you want to see pictures of our trip, check out our blog.
http://grayclanfan.blogspot.com/

I've been busy growing and learning. Look at my new trick!

'Hey mom, I want that ball.'


'Yikes!'


'Steady...'


'Yeah! WooHoo!!!'