Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween from the knight, Captain America, and Mickey Mouse.

When everyone was costumed, we went to the same little Halloween Village with decorated witches that we've gone to for six years now. Six years! How do we have that many Halloweens under our belt?

Nash changed his mind on what he wanted to be for Halloween about six times. He went from minion to robot to LEGO ninja to owl to Mickey Mouse to Captain America. He has absolutely no idea who Captain America even is; but I was just so happy when he finally stuck to something. Plus, I didn't really want to make a robot costume.

Blake, however, decided he wanted to be a knight for Halloween months ago.

I couldn't resist another opportunity to pull out Crew's Mickey Mouse outfit that he wore at Disneyland. Since Halloween fell two weeks after our trip, it was an obvious choice of costume.

The older boys' costumes weren't made and assembled till the day of our trunk or treat party. That's just how we've been rolling around here lately...one day at a time.

King of the Pumpkin Patch

Last weekend, we went on our traditional fall family outing. This was the year of Nash vs. the pumpkin patch.

It all started with a plump pumpkin that Nash set his sights on.

The only problem was, it was much too heavy for a three and a half year old to carry.

After a few failed attempts, Nash resorted to kicking the pumpkin all the way down the row. He was dedicated to getting that thing into the wheelbarrow.

But right towards the end of the row, after a valiant and tedious rolling effort, he spotted a "cupcake" shaped pumpkin and quickly switched his allegiance.

Even better, he could pick up the new pumpkin.

Nash proclaimed himself to be the king of the pumpkin patch.

Blake joined in the celebration.

As did my other little pumpkin.

We made our way through the corn maze. Thrice.

And jumped on a hayride.

The boys showed the tractors who was boss.

King of the pumpkin patch indeed.

Newport

On our days off from Disneyland, we headed straight to the ocean.

The boys dared each other to jump.

Guess who actually went for it?

He loved every second of the jumping until we put a stop to the injury prone idea.

Of course, Blake had to follow suit.

Oh, the sand.

The face of a boy whose snack was just swiped by a seagull.

My friend Julee and I braved the freezing water to about our knees and called it good.

There were some pretty cool play structures on the strip of beach we discovered.

We loved the spot we found at Newport Beach so much that we went back with more friends on our other off day.

There were shells to be collected.

Kids to bury.

And surfers to watch.

We watched a jet draw a smiley face with smoke in the sky.

We enjoyed such gorgeous days at Newport. It was so nice to set the kids free and not have to worry about them staying right by us and hustling them along like at Disneyland.

We topped off our second day at the beach with dinner on the pier overlooking Balboa.