Playing with birthday party playdough and a nice moment.

Anne was trying to get William to sing Happy Birthday and caught the following:

1. William at his cutest.
2. Mary Grace trying to take over.
3. William saying "my do it"
4. William saying "emm!" (the universal "and I mean it" punctuation)
5. Mommy suggesting Mary Grace let William sing the song.

Plausible deniability

(10:54:01 AM) Anne: "I dont do stuff naughty to myself"
(10:54:20 AM) Rick: ?
(10:54:34 AM) Anne: Mary Grace after she accused me of "bending' one of her coloring pages and I told her that I didnt do it, she did
(10:54:42 AM) Rick: hehe

Poor Mary Grace was sick with some short-term stomach bug yesterday afternoon into the evening. She's much better today, eating and playing just like herself. And even contradicting her mommy too.

Sisters and brothers

There are times when the kids fight over toys or fight over what to watch on TV or fight over who gets to play on the computer, or fight over food or treats or just try to see who can scream the loudest.

Then there are times when William will walk up to his sister and give her a nice big hug. And times when Mary Grace will put her arm around her brother just because. They always give a hug or a kiss goodnight and are always happy to see each other in the morning.

So long as it all balances out in the end, it's all good.

William's favorite sayings

Mommy was putting William to bed last night and leaned in to give him a sleepy kiss and whispered "William you are so sweet!" to which William responded "I not sweet, I a boy!". This has also been his excuse for getting into to trouble around the house.. "William, why did you make this big mess with your goldfish crackers?". "I a boy"...

He also recalls the time that he fell off a piece of playground equipment onto a (luckily) soft surface playground base several months ago, whenever anyone asks him "how are you"? The standard response: "I fall down playground, go boom."

Fall fun, New York style.

It's that time of year again. The leaves in the neighborhood are turning gold and red and the mornings are a bit crisp for anything but lounging in front of the TV (or Spinning classes :)

So in accordance with customs, we headed out to Baumanns/Schutts farm markets, this time to REALLY pick some apples. The kids up to this point thought picking apples meant going to the farm market and selecting them from the bins.

So we went out to G&S Farms near the corner of Lincoln and Atlantic in Walworth. Fabulous experience. We picked a bushel of various delicious apples. The kids had a great time picking the apples from the nice low trees and actually listened to directions (like to not throw the apples into the box).

Next, we headed over to the pumpkin patch to get some pumpkin. Mary Grace termed this act "pumpkin patching", similar to "apple picking". We like it, so we've integrated that term into our vocabulary...

The trip's only downside was when Mary Grace tripped in the pumpkin patch and fell into a rotten pumpkin and got her pants full of pumpkin guts. Luckily mommy had a spare pair of pants in the emergency bag in the car.