Our Latest Photo Shoot

Last month I was able to talk Neal into letting us get our family photos done again like we did last April. They were still taken with Adam from Treasured Moments Photography but this time rather than going to the beach we were at the Point Vicente Lighthouse. They turned out great! Here is just a sample of them, I cannot give away all the Christmas card shots now can I??

Halloween Parties

Last Friday Austin and Paige both got to have some Halloween fun before Halloween. Austin got to participate in our Stroller Strides trick or treating and Paige had her fall carnival that included a Halloween parade for all the kids to show off their costumes and then tons of games and food. We had a great time and the kids really loved all the fun that they got to have.

Austin by the beach as Buzz Lightyear, I love the palm trees in the background

Austin waiting so nicely for all the babies to sit still so we could get a group picture (I never did get a good one)

Austin and Paige with their vampire teeth before the fall carnival

Paige waiting with some of her classmates for the costume parade to start

Mr. Manzanal and her class on their parade turn

Paige parading past us

Paige's kindergarten class all dressed up

All I have to say here is that she LOVES those vampire teeth...even though she looks like a nerd in them!!

Austin playing the golf game, he loved playing all the games and getting the prizes, Paige really didn't like to play for some reason that day.

Pumpkin Carving Fun

Halloween morning we were finally able to carve our pumpkins. The kids had a great time and are eagerly awaiting the pumpkin seeds that they know they get to eat! I don't really know what else to say about it other than enjoy the photos :-)

Paige, Austin and Neal cleaning out the guts
Paige and Daddy

Paige pulling the lid off the pumpkin

Paige and Austin checking out the inside of the pumpkin

Mommy, Paige and Austin carving out Austin's pumpkin

Mommy and Austin posing with his cat pumpkin

Paige's heart pumpkin and Austin's cat pumpkin all lit up on Halloween night, they turned out really good and the kids had a great time!

Happy Halloween

We hope that everyone had a Happy Halloween! The kids had a great time, we have a ton of candy and I think that our version of Toy Story was very cute! This year both kids got to pick out their own costumes, and they both did a great job. Paige decided that even with the choice of any princess that she wanted to be that she was going to be Jessie from Toy Story, I have to admit that I was happy to not buy another princess costume! I tried with all my might to talk Austin into being Woody from Toy Story, but he has said all along that he wanted to be Buzz Lightyear! They had a great time walking around the neighborhood, but for some reason, neither one of them would say "trick or treat" but as soon as we start to change them into their PJ's they were both chanting "trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat"...I still don't know where they even learned that from!

Buzz and Jessie
Jessie and Buzz in front of their pumpkins (watch for the pumpkin carving post soon, we did that today also).

Paige walking around

Buzz on the move

For some reason Paige seems to like sitting out front and handing out the candy more than walking around and getting it for herself.

Austin checking out his candy haul

Paige going through her stash

Paige enjoying her only treat of the night, a tootsie roll

Austin decided that he was going to try a Twix bar for his treat

I hope that no one was disappointed with the costume choices! I know that there were a few of you quite aggravated that we wouldn't disclose the costume choices this year. We carved the pumpkins this morning so I will be posting that soon, I will also be posting about Austin's Stroller Strides trick or treating and Paige's school carnival and costume parade that we got to do on Friday (I didn't post them last night because that would have given away the costume surprise) I know I am so cruel!

Halloween Time Disneyland Style

Last weekend (I admit to being a little lazy/busy and not updating everyone earlier) we went to Disneyland. Neal and I have been looking forward to taking the kiddos to Disneyland to see it all decorated for Halloween. The decorations are unbelievable!! We are excited to go back over Christmas and see it all decorated, I can only imagine how excellent it will look then! The day started out rough, but by the end we had a good time and were glad that we went, I think that it was a little too hot for the end of October, but I guess that comes with living in CA.

Just one of the many themed light posts
About 5 minutes after we got to Disneyland and no one wanted to take a picture. I think that Austin spent the next 2 hours pouting in his stroller, he would only get out to ride the rides (and then only if you carried him and he complained the entire time)!

We decided that as long as they were cranky and uncooperative they were going to go on the Haunted Mansion, it was all decorated for the season from the movie "Nightmare Before Christmas" The kids said they liked it, but when asked they also said that they would not go on the ride again.

Neal and Paige got to meet Woody, Austin was still pouting and refused to get out of his stroller

I will start by saying that no one looks good in this photo, but we were waiting to get our turn on the Matterhorn...even Austin rode it and we all LOVED it. He was grinning from ear to ear, if you ask him about it he gets all excited and starts to tell you about how he "saw 2 monsters and wasn't even scared"! It is totally cute!

As we were leaving Disneyland we took one last ride on the carousel, that always brings out the smiles!

I was able to bribe the kiddos on the way out of the park, they had to stand for a nice photo or they wouldn't get popcorn for the ride home. I don't know that I would call this nice (they could have at least stood next to each other) but they did both stand there!
We took a quick trip to California Adventure to see what their Candy Corn Acres was all about. They decorated Disneyland in pumpkins and California Adventure in candy corn. Paige and Austin got to meet Minnie and Dale in front of the HUGE candy corn.
Paige posing in front of the candy corn cactus
Austin with the candy corn cactus
Paige and Austin taking one last photo before we got our popcorn and headed home

Angels

This is a conversation between Ms. Jane (the kids Sunday School Teacher), Paige and Austin

Ms. Jane: What do you think is in Heaven with Jesus?

Paige: There are Angels in Heaven

Austin: NO, Paige! Angels aren't in Heaven, they were on TV last night and they lost to the bad guys (a.k.a the Yankees)!

Is that not the funniest thing that you have ever heard! Ms. Jane totally understood what he meant and just sat there trying to figure out how to tie it back to the Sunday School lesson...I don't know that she ever found a way to do that :-) You can totally tell that Austin has baseball on the brain!!

On a side note, here are a couple pictures of my Angels! We had our friend Rosie ask us if she could use the kids to practice taking head shots and using her camera. She did a great job, I picked out my favorites for you to check out.

Pumpkin Patch

Yesterday we had a very busy day! We started out with church, where 45 minutes before our family pictures for our Christmas card Austin decided to run straight into a door frame and bust his lip open (thankfully he didn't knock any teeth out)! After that we had our family photos, I am really excited to go and look at them on Thursday, they were taken by Adam at Treasured Moments Photography. Adam took our photos at the beach last April, so we know they will be great, it is just a matter of how bad Austin's busted lip looks. I don't know yet if we will post them here or if you will have to wait for the Christmas card to come out???

After we were done with pictures, we decided that we were going to have very few opportunities left to make it to the pumpkin patch, so we decided to go. We went to the Irvine Park Railroad Pumpkin Patch. We were told about this pumpkin patch last year but didn't have time to make it out there, it is about 45 minutes from our house (in light traffic). I am really glad that we took the time to go out there this year. The kids had a blast! There was a ton to do, we went thru the haunted house, took a train ride around the park, went thru the hay maze about a dozen times, and of course picked out our pumpkins. The kids were really good at taking photos for us, we ended up with over 140 of them but once again you are only going to get a select few. They really do enjoying taking photos more and more every day, they like knowing that everyone gets to see them and wants to see them, so enjoy!

Paige and Austin taking a break with the pumpkins, I just love the orange with the black and white tones!
Standing with their new friend

Neal was acting really funny!

Austin and Paige sharing their first ICEE while waiting for our train ride

Checking to see how tall we are!

Getting lost in the hay maze

Victory, we found our way out!

Neal must have had food stuck on his face again, they were thinking that he was pretty funny!

Don't ask how they ended up laying on top of pumpkins, it couldn't have been that comfortable, but I think this is definitely one of my favorites!

Austin trying to decide if this is his pumpkin

Austin trying to walk thru all the pumpkins carrying the one that he decided to get

Austin smiling with his pumpkin and very fat lip

Paige just couldn't decide on her pumpkin, there were just too many to choose from!

Paige finally talked Neal and Austin into coming and helping her pick out her pumpkin

Paige proudly smiling with her perfectly picked pumpkin