Halloween

For Halloween this year James was a cow (a super cute cow I might mention) and Quinn was Tigger. We went to our ward Trunk or Treat which was kinda crazy and a lot of fun. We didn't get to make our chili for the cookoff this year, which would have won hands down because it has chipotles and chocolate in it, but that day got super crazy so we had to skip it. I think Quinn liked getting the candy but he was way more excited about the decorations in the rooms. One room had a tunnel you could crawl through but he got side tracked by the pumpkin and we had to spend a few minutes persuading him to come out. He also liked the skulls that lit up.

A couple of days before Halloween an aquarium near us had free admission for those in costume so I took the boys in their costumes and I dressed up as a bumblebee. It was fun to see the exhibits. They even had a blue lobster!
James is so easy to photograph. I stick him in the chair and he coos while I take pictures
Quinn doesn't keep still
Nice still cow...
Moving Tigger

It was a blast and I can't wait for next Halloween

Updates on Quinn

Quinn has been really into dress up recently.

Don't you just love how they are upside down
I was going through our winter things and Quinn was trying them out
He has also been starting to role play. Curious George is in time out for hitting a lot these days. Bear and tigger have become good friends who always talk to each other when it is nap time. And Quinn loves taking care of the baby doll; making sure she has a cean diaper, a bath, her milk and is tucked into bed. Its really fun to see him interacting this way.

His vocab has also really taken off. He has always said mama and Daddy but now he really seems to make the connection that those are names and will request who he wants. He loves to say baby, especially when James is around. Other new words include ball, hole, knee, nee naw for nose, star, are, hello, milk, duck, nina (which is what he calls his Mrs. Noah in the Noah's ark, Noah and Jesus and a few others.

I love hanging out with this kid. He might protest naps a lot but he has a great sense of humor and is super silly. If you start to chase him he will run laughing the other way. He is very helpful and always puts things in the trash and in the dishwasher. He will get diapers and wipes for James and loves to help his little brother roll over. Something mom is not thrilled about. He will give James toys when he is sad and will try to burp him.

We have been doing learning time each afternoon and it is so great to see how excited he gets about learning new things. We have been learning about smell, touch, sight and sound this past week. He likes making art to represent what we talked about, especially since he is now allowed to use markers.
And this is the face he makes when we ask him to close his eyes for prayers. What a goof :-)

Pumpkins!

We love going up to the Orchards here. It is so beautiful. We went to pick our own pumpkin for Halloween this year.

Quinn was so cute trying to pick up this super heavy pumpkin.

We settled on this cute little pumpkin. Sadly we never did get a chance to carve it :-(

After we picked our pumpkin we had cider donuts and black and orange cookies which were delicious!

Greatma and Greatpa came to visit us at the beginning of October. My Grandparents are such amazing and fun people. We are so glad they took the time to come see us. We did lots of fun things including going to Edgerton park, Lyman Orchards, the park, and the Trolley museum.I'm glad they got to see James soon after he was born and Quinn and Greatpa struck up a great relationship. Greatpa was a good sport and kept Quinn entertained.
It was so wonderful to see them and can't wait to see them again!

Just had to share

I love this picture! It was taken a few days after James was born. Quinn crawled over and set his car carefully on top of James. It was very sweet.

The Zoo!

In the middle of October we decided to go to the zoo one last time before it got too cold. It was a lot of fun!


Quinn seemed more interested in the zoo itself instead of the animals. Like these stairs. I think he went up and down about 8 times before I was finally able to convince him to move on.
This is what James thought about it all.

Quinn had fun pretending to be a peacock,
seeing how long his arms were,

pretending to be a parrie dog, popping in and out of those holes, chasing a peacock, pretending to milk a cow and watching this Toucan.

I liked these fun signs they had up for Halloween

James' Blessing

We were so lucky to have members from both of our families come out to meet James and to be here for his baby blessing.

Gramma and Papi

Grandma and Grandpa Bracken

A baby blessing is a special opportunity for the baby to receive a name and to to have special blessings promised that will help them throughout their life. We blessed James on August 29th. Peter performed the blessing and Grandpa, Papi, and our friend Nate also participated.

James looked super cute in his little white suit and bow tie that Grandma bought for him

Daddy and James