Meme

Just thought this was funny...

Halloween at school

There may not be any parties this year or a big Halloween parade, but the girls still got to dress up in costumes for school on Friday! Morgan picked her Belle costume (the one we got for the Disney trip that never was) and Avery decided to recycle her Jasmine costume from last year.

Voted!

Erin and I voted early!

Silliness at the park

The girls went to the park with Anneke and she took a bunch of pictures of them being silly.

And here's a video...

Stuffies

 This girl LOVES her stuffies... but it looks like the leopard is either hugging her or choking her! :)

First snow

Yikes! Snowing already! :(

 

Family Hike

It was chilly, but we wanted to get outside. So, we went to Gilbert Park, where the girls had their Brownies hike a few days before. We walked around and the made up stories about what we were doing in the woods. :)

 

Pumpkins

We picked up some pumpkins from the "store" by the bowling alley on Ogden. No pumpkin patch this year. :(

Avery and I decided we'd paint our pumpkins. Morgan wanted to carve hers, but then after it we started carving it, decided she wanted to paint hers also. Mine was an emoji, Avery's was a cat and Morgan's was some sort of rainbow creation.

 

Brownies Hike

The girls' Brownies troop had an outdoor meeting and hike this week. The weather was really nice the day of the hike (after being really cold the rest of the week). The girls always have fun when they get to see their friends. The kids all do great keeping their masks on and don't even complain. It's so strange that this is getting more "normal" to them and everyone.

 

First day of school - part 2

So, the girls' school voted to have them go back to school in person starting on October 20th. We struggled with what to do - should they stay remote or should we send them to school? We really only thought it would work if they could be in the AM session. Since we still need to keep our nanny, it would really not be good to have her do a split schedule if the girls were in the afternoon school session. So, we emailed the principal and asked nicely :) to be in the AM session. Of course, nothing was guaranteed and requests were not being taken, so we just crossed our fingers. Luckily, the girls got assigned the AM session! But, we had to change teachers. Their current teacher got moved to teach kindergarten and we were moved into Ms. Sullivan's class. Morgan was a little apprehensive about having Ms. Sullivan because she had heard some "stories" from former students in the past during Champions that made her scared. Kids!

School is a little different right now. The girls go from 8:20 to 10:50 each day. Every morning, I get an email at 5:00 AM asking me to self-certify that the girls have no COVID symptoms (fever, runny nose, etc). It's an online form that has to be filled out by 7:45 AM. If I forget, the girls can't go in the classroom and have to start their day off at the nurse's office getting certified by her (who then calls the parents as well). There is also some paper form I can fill out and send with the girls, but I think they still have to go through the main door and see the nurse before entering their classroom.

"First" day of school - in October - in winter coats!

Once they get to school, they enter through the outside door to their specific classroom. There are red dots on the ground that show them how far they need to stand apart from each other. Someone is at the door with the list of pre-self-certified students and a thermometer. They take each child's temperature before entering the classroom. They have taken them on the forehead, the wrist and behind the ear. Once they are cleared, they are allowed to go into the classroom. Each desk is 6 feet apart. All of their supplies they will use for the day are in their backpacks (which weight a TON!).

So, of course, the day before the girls were to be back in person, the state of Illinois raised the level of COVID cases to "substantial". This means that restaurants are no longer supposed to serve people inside in person. Originally, our school district had said that we would be fully remote if the level was "substantial", but they came out yesterday saying they would re-evaluate each week we continue to be at "substantial" and look at the positivity rates and then decide if the kids could be in school in person. We'll see how long this lasts.

The Big Birthday Party - 2020

Every year we have a big birthday party to celebrate all the October and November birthdays with my family. Here's the lowdown:

Avery and Morgan - October 5 - turned 8 this year

Hunter and Beckett - October 8 - turned 6 this year

Nolan - October 13 - turned 7 this year

Grayson - November 3 - will turn 8 this year

This year instead of getting the cakes from a bakery, I decided it would be fun to make them myself. Ha! I made different flavors for all the kiddos. Matt smoked pork on the Green Egg.

My two favorite 8 year olds!

They got some really great gifts from everyone!

Mama brought a craft for all the kiddos to do!

Time for cake! Papa made Grayson put a shirt on - ha!

Getting all the candles lit!

Ready for cake!

Hope all their wishes come true!

So much fun had by all! The kiddos were so exhausted at the end of the day. Avery just cried and said she just wanted to go to sleep!

Last soccer game

This Saturday was Morgan's last soccer game of the season. I'm sad that it's over because she was having such a fun time playing! In her last game, she scored 4 goals. Of course, one of the goals was off the legs of the opposing team, but as she told me "it still counts!" :)

There were a couple less girls this week, so it was only 4 on 4. So, there really wasn't a goalie. Made for easier scoring... like this goal Morgan made from pretty far away. Just need to have a halfway accurate kick and there's your goal! :

Ballet and a Rainbow

On Friday night, we took Avery to ballet class. Morgan and I went to Ty Warner park to play while she was at class since it's right by there. Morgan made friends with a few kids at the park and rolled down the sledding hill a few too many times! Dizzy! We also saw a rainbow while we were there!

Ballet hair - with some pink!

 

Fun weekend with Mama and Papa

While Matt and I were in Quincy, the girls had a fun weekend hanging out with my parents.

They made forts under the kitchen table!

I had signed the girls up for an American Girl Halloween Party before I realized that we'd be out of town for the weekend. So, Mama got them all dressed up and ready for the party. They even did a mini photo shoot with their dolls! Love these girls!

Goober!

Papa borrowed Elsa's braid! :)

Elsa was not impressed!

Morgan had a soccer game and scored 3 goals!

They played at their cousins' house quite a bit. And they even tried on their cousins' Halloween costumes for fun!

 They definitely had a fun time and were exhausted when we got home!