Carving Pumpkins

Will and Anna picked out pumpkins for us this year and were SO EXCITED to carve them! We ended up carving only the big pumpkin and drawing faces on the two little ones, but after experiencing the work involved with the actual "carving" part of pumpkin carving, they were more than happy to just draw on the smaller two.

Step One: Help Daddy choose what kind of face to carve

(They opted for "spooky.")

Step Two: Pick out the seeds from the goop


Step Three: Entertain yourself while Daddy does the labor

Step Four: Run away in fear from the finished jack-0-lantern

Can you see why they were content to choose "happy," drawn-on faces for their personal pumpkins?

*On an unrelated note, due to my many dentist visits in the past month resulting in an emergency root canal, Anna now takes her baby doll to "the dentist" when her baby is sick. I hope I haven't instilled a fear of the dentist in them.

Partyin' for Daddy's Birthday

Larkin's birthday was last week, and the twins were SO EXCITED to have his birthday party. They helped me wrap his presents, put up his birthday banner, make his birthday cupcakes, and they wore his party hats all day long. They called him at work all day and wished him "happy birthday" over and over and over again. Once he came home from work, they bombarded him with hugs and kisses and wrestling and tickles and lots more birthday wishes. It was so much fun for me to see them so eager to celebrate Larkin. He's such an amazing daddy, and we love him VERY SO MUCH (as Will says)!

After dinner, cake, and presents, we played a little game of Pin the Tail on the Donkey. This was the twins' first time playing, and they loved it!

This last video was a birthday gift to Daddy. He loves to hear the kids sing Primary songs, and lately, Anna's favorite is "I Am a Child of God." This video shows typical Will/Anna behavior - Anna hamming it up for the audience, Will trying to keep order (e.g., telling Anna to sing louder and then telling her to keep her hands down). I don't know what prompted the laughter at the end of the video, but it makes the rest of it just that much better.

Tootsie Roll Procrastination

My friend Samantha is having a competition on her blog, and I, naturally, waited until after the last minute to participate. Better late than never, right?

Contest: Find the most creative way to use a specific candy - whether in a craft, poem, dance, etc. When I read that the candy for the month was Tootsie Rolls, I remembered Tootsie Roll flowers that I had seen years ago. Back in high school, we took a field trip to Ehove, the local career/vocational school. We signed up for classes to take, and being the overachiever that I was, I signed up for things like business, medical (like I would ever succeed around blood), and other worthwhile things. Other people signed up for culinary arts and got to make Tootsie Roll flowers. I was jealous.

Flash forward 10+ years, and I saw use for the skill that other people had learned on that field trip. Presenting my Tootsie Roll flowers!

Step One: Gather ingredients.

Step Two: Divide Tootsie Rolls into 5ish pieces each. Flatten those pieces into petal-like shapes.

Step Three: Assemble petals around a center roll and insert a toothpick.

Beautiful, aren't they? (That odd-looking one on the far left is a calla lily. Obviously.) What did we do with the finished product?

The only sensible thing to do . . .

We ate them.

Now you should go to Sam's blog and vote for me!

Samuel the Lamanite

I wish I could say that Larkin and I taught the twins how to do this in Family Home Evening (see earlier "David and Goliath" post), but after learning about Samuel the Lamanite months ago, Will and Anna's memories have retained this part of the story.

Script -
Anna: I'm Samuel the Lamanite, and don't throw arrows at me.
Will: I'm a Bad Guy, and I throw arrows anyway.
Anna: Awww, man!

Maybe next time, we'll emphasize the whole "teaching the people about Jesus" part of this story. Except due to the fact that the twins decided to play this out on their own without any prompting from us, maybe we'll wait to teach that part. I don't want my kids to call others to repentance in play groups quite yet.

David and Goliath

We learned about David and Goliath during Family Home Evening the other night. We acted it out to help make it more real for the kids. I think it worked.



That was almost as much fun as Jonah and the whale from last week. The people of Ninevah/Will really liked the part where the whale/Daddy spit out Jonah/Anna. He laughed pretty hard and then re-enacted that scene for the next few days.

Cliché

I know this is clichéd . . .




but these kids are growing up way too fast.

Lesson Learned

Time lapsed: 10-15 minutes.

I was using our treadmill. Larkin was playing XBox. Will and Anna were . . .


making sure we had all the pieces to all of our board games all at once?

Larkin and I handled the clean-up of this specific mess. We thought Will and Anna had worked hard enough that day. Aren't twins fun?

*Bonus question: Can you name all of the board games in this picture?
**Hint: There are 11 total games spread across the floor.

Side-note: We have several more games. We're just glad we reached the twins before they could reach the remaining games.