Happy Halloween!

We had a really fun Halloween today. First we went to brunch at our friends' Mike and Gary's, and that was really nice. Stian had fun there too. He kept telling us afterwrads how much he liked Mike and Gary (they are awfully nice). While we were there some other friends gave us some advice on where to take Stian trick or treating. No one goes in our neighborhood - I suppose the houses are too far apart. So we knew we had to drive somewhere. We missed it in Battle Ground as they did trick or treating on Friday night there and Kris was in class Friday night. So we got advice to go to this really nice old neighborhood in Lafayette. Our friends told us there are tons of kids there, and lots of young kids especially, so it will start early.

This was great advice. The neighborhood was so much fun. It was so festive with lots and lots of people out and about. And lots of the people who lived there were sitting on their stoops and there were a bunch who had fires going in outdoor fireplace thingies. It was great. Stian had so much fun. He wasn't so sure at first. You may remember that last year he had swine flu on Halloween so he didn't get to go trick or treating. So he didn't really get the whole concept, as much as we had tried to explain it to him. But once he saw what he was supposed to do, and he saw all of the other kids in their costumes, he started to have a blast. There was much giggling and laughing as we walked around. It was a very nice evening. And the best part was that someone gave him a purple dum dum sucker. Dum dums are his favorite and purple is his favorite color, so he was so excited to eat that sucker on the ride home! He probably would have been happy if that was the only thing he got. Though he's pretty excited about the Tootsie Rolls too...

We noticed when we got home that Susan had her porch light on, so we went over there to trick or treat too. So Stian got to see Susan and Dave, and he got some cookies from them. They liked his costume, and then he took it off and got to show them the Halloween shirt he was wearing underneith that says "The creature from next door!" - which was fitting.

Karin, Brad and Klebo come to visit!

Karin, Brad and Klebo came down last weekend for a long weekend. We had a really nice weekend with them and Stian was in heaven. He loves all of them so much he was just so excited and bouncing around talking constantly. He had so much fun.

Stian writes!

We went out to dinner the other night with our friends Kevin, Dawn and Quinn. While we were waiting for our food to come out the kids were playing with crayons and drawing. We asked Stian to write an "S" - we had never asked him to write any letters before, he's been learning which letter is which (and is getting pretty good, but still has a hard time with a few of them - C and X seem to trip him up). We were surprised he did as well as he did. So then we asked him to write a "T" then an "I" then an "A" and then an "N". We were very impressed for his very first attempt. Kris did help him finish off the "A" as he got a little stuck. But otherwise that's all him. And yes, the letters and their order are backwards, but still - pretty good for a kid who's not quite 3 and never tried to write before!

Grandma and Grandpa come to visit

My parents came to visit two weekends ago and I've been remiss in posting about it. But now pictures are starting to pile up on me, so I better get to it before I get too overwelmed! So here you go!

We had a really nice weekend. Stain loved playing with his Grandma and talking both his Grandma and Grandpa's ears off. And for some odd reason the word of the weekend was "perfume!", which was yelled randomly and then laughed about hysterically. Aw the humor of an almost three year old.

Speaking of being almost three, Stian turns three at Thanksgiving, so my folks brought his bigger birthday present down with them. This was he has more time to play with it before the snow flies (though I'm sure he'll be out playing with it all winter too) and we don't have to try to get it into our car - which is usually rather full - on the way home from Thanksgiving.

It's a Plasma Car - you operate it by turning the sterring wheel back and forth and that makes it go forward. We had a bit of hard time geting it to work, but Stian doesn't mind, for now he's happy to just push along with his feet. (Incidentally Kris's sister, her husband and their 12 year old son were here this weekend - I'll get to that post eventually - and Klebo, the 12 year old, had no problems getting it to work. Thought you'd be happy to know that Grandma! It's not the driveway, it was user error!)





We also went to the pumpkin patch while they were here. It was unseasonably warm that weekend, in the upper 80s, so it was not really what you think of as pumpkin patch weather, but it was still nice, and we got some good pumpkins.

We did other stuff too, but Kris and I were bad about getting out the camera while they were here, so this is all we have pictures of.

Sunday Evening

Morning on the Farm

We took Stian over to to Prophetstown State Park this morning to look at the farm. They have an old fashioned farm where they do things like they did back in the "olden days." They were harvesting corn today, so we went over to take a look. In general Stian was not all that impressed. He did however love the cats running around. He especially loved the one napping on the porch of the farm house. We sat there and patted on the cat and talked to the cat for a good 20 minutes. I think he would have spent hours there if we hadn't finally forced him to move on.











Stian also liked the chickens. And the chickens liked him as he was eating popcorn and would occassionally drop some.

Notice the ear protectors. People probably think we are the most overly protective parents ever. But I assure you, he is only wearing these because he absolutely insisted on it. There was a tractor running, though it wasn't loud at all. But Stian just hates loud noises and I think he was afraid it was going to get really loud at any minute.



Stian thought it was quite funny how the chickens would stand on one leg.