Exciting Family News

 

I'm excited to share that we are expecting baby #3 this spring! I am due April 8th. Leyton is really excited that we are having another baby and cant wait for it to get here. I am feeling good and the time is flying by so far. Here's a few photos of Cal in his big brother shirt :)

 

Trick or Treating

On Halloween we headed out Trick or Treating with the cousins.  We started in Town hitting up the local stores, then headed to the relatives houses.  It was a long fun night and everyone seemed to have a good time.  We ended at Grandma and Grandpa's and Grandpa got in the spirit and continued the tradition of scaring the pants off the kids!  I look forward to it every year because he always catches all of us by surprise! :)

 

Cal was a Monkey this year:

 

 Leyton was still in the Disney spirit and chose his own Price Charming costume.  It was a really big decision for him and took a lot of patience... he was set on astronaut for awhile, then Beast from Beauty and the Beast but I couldn't find a costume, then Batman and Spider man, then ultimately Prince Charming.

 Lauren dressed up as Cinderella and Leyton was SO happy!  A big part of his Prince Charming decision was based on if any of his cousins were going to be princesses or not :)

 Group shot on the bench in town (only missing Tommy). 

 Cal was a super happy guy trick or treating:

 Leyton goofing around like usual...

 The only problem with Cal was that he wanted to stop and look in his bucket after every single store.  He would walk outside the store and plop right down immediately to see what they had given him, then pick something out to eat...  This was a problem because it was crazy busy in town and we were always in the way!

 They had the helicopter in the kids play area just like last year and the boys were excited to see it.

 Cal was really happy lounging in the helicopter and did not want to get out:

 Leyton wanted his picture with the helicopter:

 At school that day Leyton also got to dress up.  For school he decided he wanted to wear his fireman dress up outfit:

I didn't get any decent pictures at the relatives, I'll have to do better next year!  Everyone spoiled the kids and got them so much neat/good stuff.  Thanks Guys!

Open Gym with Lucy!

A couple weeks ago Kelly and Lucy took Leyton to open gym at Lucy's gymnastics place in Hudson.  Leyton was really excited to go and it sounds like they had a blast!  Kelly said they were pretty sweaty when they were done!

                                     
 

 

Carving Pumpkins

The day before Halloween we finally got around to carving our pumpkins.  Leyton was really excited to do them, and I had no idea how excited Cal was going to be about it!  He seemed to really understand which pumpkin was his and he loved it!  As soon as Eric was done carving it he started hugging it and kissing it!  His expressions were hilarious the entire night. 

 

 Leyton did a good job getting all the guts out of his pumpkin:

 Cal really getting into the carving...

 Cal's pumpkin!

 He started hugging it like this immediately! 

 The middle one is suppose to be a ninja turtle (Leyton's request)

 At Leyton's preschool they've had this scarecrow sitting outside and the boys both love it.  One day when I let Cal walk up by himself he ran over and started hugging it!  This week when we got there he was in pieces and the kids were pretty sad.

Fall!

Fall is here and the kids have been enjoying the new yard!  We have a lot of trees so a couple weeks ago Eric spent the day raking leaves and saved a big pile for the kids to play in.  The kids had a blast, and Eric had a blast bagging 16 bags of leaves from just the small side of the yard! 

The pictures aren't the greatest since they're from my phone but they'll have to do.

Disney World Trip!

Ok, so like usual, this post is more than a little overdue... Sorry for the delay but it took me a long time to go through all of our photos and finally sit down to do the blog. 

Back in September we took a family trip to Disney World in Florida.  Tina was expecting Tommy any day so was unable to make the trip, and my Dad got sick and was in the hospital so my mom and him had to cancel.  Luckily the Mansell's and Weimert's were able to go and we had a blast!  I would definitely do an "all families" trip again!  We hit up all of the Disney parks, and Sea World during a week long trip together. 

We went in September to avoid the busy season and that worked out great.  It was also really helpful to go with someone who had done the trip before so we were knew how to plan our days,  to make reservations for certain things before we even left, etc.  Thanks Kelly and Dave for having gone a few times before with the girls!

Here are some photos from the trip... sorry there are a lot, I always have a hard time choosing!

 

Anxiously waiting at the airport in Mnpls, bright and early! 

 We made it!  Excited to be at our hotel, even if we didn't spend much time there!

 Cal was in love with the splash pad.  It was huge and had a lot of different things going on, and it was never very busy.

 Leyton and Grace loving the pool!  When you went under water they had Disney music playing that you couldn't hear from above.

 Cal did great sleeping in his pack n play the whole trip, thankfully.

 At the hotel there were different themed wings.  We were in The Little Mermaid, but there was also Nemo, Cars and Lion King.

 The kids getting ready to swim at the little mermaid pool:

Posing with some of the artwork that was all over the hotel:

 This picture cracks me up... Lauren in heaven hugging her new Minnie, Ella and Leyton being crazy like usual, and Cal just laughing along with everyone.

 We had to walk by this statue everyday to get to our room, and on the first day I was explaining that it was Prince Eric to the kids, and i said "Just like Daddy's name".  For the rest of the trip every time we walked by it cal would say "Dada!".

 More goofing around at the hotel:

Magic Kingdom!  I think everyone was most excited about going here. 

 

 Group photo in front of the castle:

Meeting the characters was a highlight for the kids, and took A LOT of patience!  The wait to meet the characters (if you didn't need a reservation) was usually about a half hour. 

 The whole group with Donald Duck:

 Animal Kingdom was beautiful and a nice change from everything else.

 

 I had no idea hippos can sleep underwater!  That was pretty neat to see.

 We had breakfast with the princesses one day, and luckily all the ones we "needed" to be there were.  Lauren specifically wanted Snow White, Leyton wanted Belle and Ella Cinderella.  We were relieved that everyone was happy!

 Leyton and Belle!

 The kids with Ariel:

 To say Cal loved rides would be an understatement.  He would scream and bawl hysterically the second a ride was done.  So you'd have to drag him off the ride kicking and screaming and everyone would look at you like oh the poor kid hated the ride... No, quite the opposite.  He's irate that he has to get off!

 This was one of the kids' favorite rides by far.  They went on it at least 8 times straight before we drug them off of it.

 The teacups were another favorite:

 Everyone was also really excited to meet Aladdin and Jasmine:

Cal took any naps he got pretty much like this in the stroller... dripping sweat.  He's always been a great napper, napping 3+ hours everyday, so I was a little worried about him not getting naps, but he did just fine on about 45 mins. of naps a day, and luckily got back on his normal nap schedule once we got home.

 The family at Epcot:

 The kids loved riding the buses to and from the parks:

 At Epcot:

 Cal catching another cat nap:

 Inside a shark at the Nemo Ride:

 We got to watch several parades throughout the trip, and they were all great!

 Watching the fireworks at Magic Kingdom one night.  We proudly shut down the parks on more than one occasion, and got to see a couple fire work shows :)

 The Weimert Family with Donald:

 The Mansells at the fountain at Epot:

 Checking out the Cars area of the hotel:

 Toy Story is a favorite movie at our house so Leyton was pretty happy to see them there!

 We also hit up Sea World one day.  Unfortunately it rained quite a bit the day we were there, but it was still fun!

 The Shamu show:

 At Sea World we had Dinner with the Sharks, which was pretty neat:

 Waiting for the Shamu show to start:

 Leyton and Lauren posing with the cute whale bushes:

 We bought some nasty looking fish to feed the Sting Ray and the kids loved touching them.

Thanks for the great trip everyone!