halloween funfest (or, halloween part I)

Tonight I took the kids to the mall for the annual Halloween Funfest. Yes, it was pretty much the same as last year with too many pushy people and long lines, but they really wanted to go again, and didn't believe me when I said they didn't have that much fun last year. Besides, there was a costume contest, which was just way too enticing for Kestrel. I figured they are only kids for a short time so if they wanted to go, I would take them.

They both participated in the costume contest. Cooper as the Black Power Ranger didn't win anything in his group (crazy judges), but Kestrel got called up as one of the top 10 in her group. She was very proud!

Power Ranger and Scarecrow - on our way out to the mall.

Kestrel on stage with the top 10 costumes!

Her top 10 prize was a token for the carousel. I bought one for Cooper so they could have a ride together.

goin' buggy

The 2nd grade at Kestrel's school performed their music program last night, titled "Goin' Buggy". It was very cute and was all about bugs demanding respect. They had studied bugs in science all first quarter. Kestrel was Little Miss Muffet. The way she described it, she was the only bad guy in the show. The rest of the kids were various bugs. Kestrel did a great job with her lines.

Here is a very short clip I took while she was saying her lines. I missed the beginning, but at least you get to hear her famous "eeek".

with baby

I meant to post this a while ago. This was October 9th, during Kestrel's fall break from school. I meet up with a group of my mom friends every once in a while for breakfast and Kestrel came with us a couple of times while she was out of school. These were taken at Panera, and she's holding my friend Erika's baby Oscar. I just thought they were cute!

leaves

It finally feels like fall! We were at the park yesterday and Kestrel found some leaves she could make into a leaf pile (we don't know the other girl in the picture).

Today it was about 30 degrees cooler. The kids and I bundled up in coats and hats and took a long walk around the neighborhood late afternoon. Actually Cooper road his bike but Kestrel and I walked. Kestrel was having fun searching for colorful leaves.

roller kids 2

We went back to Skateland Wednesday evening. When we were there Saturday afternoon the kids each won a free family pass for Wednesday evening and were excited to go back. It was nice because there were only a few people there so the rink was pretty empty. Cooper was definitely getting better with his skating!

Both of the kids entered the race. They stop the skating and have a race for anyone who wants to participate. Kestrel has been wanting to enter the last several times she's been there, but keeps missing it. This time she went right out there and so did Cooper. Usually they separate the girls and boys, and have them race within their age group. However, there were only 2 young girls, so Kestrel raced against a girl who looked about 5 (but could skate pretty well). Kestrel won, and they gave her a card for a free soda. After the race Kestrel noticed that the other girl looked sad, and Kestrel felt badly for her. She said to me "I would be sad too if I was little and had to race against a big kid like me. I'd think it wasn't fair." So then Kestrel went up to the girl and gave her the prize for a free soda, and told the girl "you deserve it". The girl looked happy after that!

Cooper was the littlest boy there, so he had to race against a boy who looked about 10. The other boy won of course, but Cooper did great and didn't even fall! They gave Cooper a free soda prize anyway, for doing such a good job trying. We were so proud of him, and he brought the free soda card home to show daddy.

After the race we were skating a little more, and the girl who raced against Kestrel came up and asked Cooper if she could give him a hand, and the two of them skated around the rink together holding hands. So cute!

I decided that Skateland is one of the hardest places to take a picture with my phone, but I thought these were cute anyway.

This is Cooper when he came back from racing. He was so proud of himself!

And speaking of skating, I was rollerblading yesterday morning and it was such a beautiful day! It is still hot here, high in the 80's this week, but not such a miserable hot like it was in the summer. It stays cooler in the morning, and was such a nice blue sky morning while I was skating. Here's a prairie picture for you. I've decided my phone definitely takes better pictures outside! Or perhaps the big blue sky is more forgiving.

pierced ears!

My girl got her ears pierced! We had told Kestrel she could get her ears pierced when she turned 8. However, this past Tuesday we had some time for a mommy-Kestrel morning, as Kestrel is on break from school, Cooper was in school, and we had nothing planned for the morning. I thought it would be a fun thing for us to do together. I discussed it with Paul and we both felt she was close enough (she'll turn 8 in less than 2 months). So, when I woke her up in the morning I told her we'd have a special day and get her ears pierced.

She was so excited! We had breakfast out and then arrived at the mall before the stores were open. She wanted to wait outside of Claire's. She couldn't think of doing anything else. She was a little nervous, but very brave. She picked out the pink crystal flower earrings. Afterwards, she told everyone she saw that she just got her ears pierced. When asked if it hurt, she described how it "hurt a little for half a second, and then felt weird for a few minutes, but then felt like my normal ears!" We did some shopping and I bought her some new clothes and a purple headband to show off her earrings. She was ecstatic all day, and kept telling me that I was the nicest Mom ever!

Here she is cleaning her pierced ears, in the mirror. She wants to take care of them herself and doesn't want me to help. So grown up! I tried to get a close up of her ears with the earrings, but I couldn't get it in focus. Oh well, I'm not much of a photographer.