It’s Wednesday night and I have yet to even start downloading Halloween pictures. Everyone from my dad to Tony at Houston Swim Club is on my ass to send them pictures. I have five minutes until bedtime routines, and then a friend is coming over to visit. So maybe tomorrow I will be able to share our Halloween pictures. And this week was supposed to be a slow week for us!

Last night we had a great family night. First, we went to the YMCA for their Fall Festival. We’ve done this for the past few years, and the kids really enjoy it. They drew on pumpkins, each won something in the cake walk, and had lots of food! Overall, they had a great time. After that, we went downtown to China Garden to have the best egg rolls ever. This part of the night was for me and Squirt! The kids were all in great, silly moods which made for a great night.

Once home, the kids hurried to get ready to watch It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Even though it was way past the baby’s bedtime, (really it was past all but Squirt’s bedtime), we let him stay up too. Kobra was the cutest thing last night. He was loving all over his brothers and just so happy. It was hard to put him down last night!

It would be so nice if every day was like last night!

Goose has a conduct report daily. If he is good, he gets a smiley face. If he doesn’t follow the rules, we get numbers according to which rules he failed to follow. I have been pretty worried because after the first few weeks of school, he has yet to have one straight week of smiley faces. There have been a few weeks with more notes than smiley faces.

This might not seem like a big deal, but since Goose has never been outside the house, I don’t know how to gage his behavior. The teacher is more than willing to talk about Goose and his work and behavior, but I don’t want to have to micromanage every second he is away from me.

I went to volunteer yesterday morning and sat with two moms who commented about things seeming a bit strict. I was all ears, ready to join in about the lack of smiley faces. Turns out these moms have daughters who always get smiley faces! What were they complaining about??? As soon as I was done, I called Lance to complain. He just said, “there’s a difference between boys and girls.”

Maybe he’s right because today two other moms told me that their sons rarely get smiley faces. One kid went over a week without a smiley face. I guess I feel better knowing that Goose isn’t alone is failing to follow directions!

He has made a 100 on every spelling test so far!!!

Goose is five and has been going to the YMCA kid center off and on for his entire life. If I was working out, he was at the kid center. I trust the ladies who take of my kids. I have to, these kids are my life, so I have to like and trust those who care for them even if it’s just for an hour. As I have struggled with Goose going to school, they have listened with a kind ear. They have missed him this Fall and have been happy to see him during school holidays. These ladies know what my children like and don’t like.

Just Tuesday, one of the caretakers gave me a Woodstock for Goose’s Snoopy collection. I couldn’t believe it! And he is so happy! Woodstock rides in the car with Snoopy now and anxiously awaits for Goose to come home each day. Thank you so much to the wonderful women who care for my children just so I can workout in peace!

Honestly, I would trade my kids for cookie dough. I have had a sweet tooth all day long and was trying my best to ignore the calling for the one thing that can satisfy it. Even the bite size Twix candy bars didn’t help. Finally, I decided to make cookies. I ate so much cookie dough I can barely move. I figured the kids would be happy to have some cookies, but I forgot about them and burned the first batch. Now I only have enough dough for 8 more cookies. I guess I’ll just have to make more dough.

A few plans for the week…

• Super Saints
• getting haircuts for the boys
• buying a few Christmas gifts
• taking pumpkin patch pictures before all the pumpkins are gone
• trick or treating
• watching UT

A picture thought I am sharing…

My handsome boy!

Tonight Goose was purposefully aggravating Baby Hulk. The Hulk finally got frustrated and hit Goose. Goose told me he had to hit his brother back. I went on and on about how he didn’t have to hit his brother, how he was older, more mature. And finally, I said if I saw him hit the Hulk, he would be in big trouble. His response, “what if you don’t see me?”

Goose has been taking Chinese at school since the beginning of the year. Once a week for forty-five minutes. You can imagine how much he has learned. Every week I ask him to tell me one word, and he comes up with “ummmmmm”. Not really impressive.

Last night while going over his papers for the day, I came across a sheet and asked him about it. He claimed it was for sign language, another class he can’t tell me much about these days. I asked him again since it had a Chinese symbol on it. All of a sudden, this kid starts talking Chinese for me, he knew several vocabulary words and could count. It sounded good, but the thing is I have no clue if he is making up words or not. I mean, his counting sounded like “DO, RA, MI, FA, etc….” from the Sound of Music.

He has a family project coming up soon so I guess I’ll be learning Chinese.