::pumpkin hunters::

Yesterday we took our traditional trip to the "pumpkin church" to pick out our Halloween pumpkins. We had a car full of excited kids that were ready to go. The assortment of pumpkins is awesome, I love the monochromatic richness of the line up. Here's "superhero face" Sandy. I kept trying to get him to make a normal face and it was impossible. I also tried to get Lucy & Sandy to hug each other in the pumpkins. They did it and I missed it. Of course. Lucy was super excited beause she looooooooves pumpkins. And I mean LOVES pumpkins. She even tries to say the word pumpkin. I think it sounds something like "Boo-Bah." But actually I worked on figuring out how she says and and it's more like "Bup-kee." Super cute? Yes. She didn't even know where to start. So many options. She decided to first head towards the Lucy sized mini ones. Yes, she loved and adored them. We picked one to take home and we moved on to the bigger dudes. "Bu-gkee!!!"

It was fun to do with these cute kids, and I'm always glad when we can get a tradition like this done and don't accidentally miss out because I got too busy.

I love the cute pumpkins but the cute kids are even better!

::once upon a sunday::

Dad gives Max a much needed tie tying lesson.  This will not be the last time that this information is given to Max, that's for sure.



Looking at this made me realize how tall Max is and made me think about how soon he turns twelve, yikes.  Double yikes.



Mom and I had just gotten back from the photography conference that I took her to for her bday, and we brought back these little cute camera keychains for the kids.  Sandy liked his and wanted to show off how the little camera flashed.



After church the kids tried on their halloween costumes to show Mom.  They're all very proud of themselves in their outfits, and rightly so.



I mean, Max looks pretty much like the spitting image of Captain America in his costume.  It's perfect for him really, (except for the fact that the legs were about 3 or 4 inches too short).

Lucy is supposed to be Cinderella, but given her current obsession with Frozen, she thinks she's Elsa, and keeps dancing around singing, "Let it Go!!" and telling people that she's wearing a "let it go dress."



This, evidently was a sneeze.  Lucy was wisely trying to save herself.  Captian America's sneezes can be powerful.

At one point here if I'm remembering correctly, Max said. "This is my girlfriend, Cinderella."  Then Lucy sang, "Let it Gooooooo!"



And Sandy is Darth Vader.  He was very thrilled when he was given the costume.  He's perfected the intense superhero/darkside look and can hold it for quite a long time.  I think the bare feet only add to the intensity of the entire look.



I like the background there with Cap helping Cindy with her shoe problem.  Doesn't get much cuter than that.

::fall::

It's fall, and we did some fall stuff this week.  I took some pictures.  Can you believe it?  Here are a few.  We'll see if I can get to posting more.  I'll try SUPER hard.

::he's a sith::

Kris and I were out on a work trip with Lucy, and Victoria was staying with the boys for a night. Sandy had been dying to go to the Children's Museum, so they took a trip there after school. Turns out, the reason why he wanted to go so bad was because there's a face painting station at the museum. Sandy was planning to have Max fix him up as Darth Maul. He was SO excited. And here's the finished product: He was extremely pleased with himself. And very dangerous. He's hilarious. Wish we could have audio on here so you could hear him humming his own soundtrack. It really adds to the whole experience.

::first day::

Lucy had a couple of firsts today.  She had her first ponytail.  Pretty exciting--look at all of that hair!



Yesterday was her 1.5 year anniversary which means she gets to go to nursery!  Yikes!  I'm in shock that she could be that old.  It's a very good thing, she's been going crazy trying to be good in class with Kris (or making Kris crazy rather).  But my little baby?  In nursery??



She did great.  She didn't cry when she got dropped off and the report was that she was perfect.  We'll see how next week goes.  But really, you give a Hendricks baby and snack and some toys and they're happy.  We've never had too much trouble getting the kids to go to nursery which is nice.



We felt like Emily and Lucy's color schemes matched, so they got a couple of inappropriate sacrament meeting pics.  At least the meeting was over.  Two dang cute little girls!



Dinner.  Max is pretending to drink out of the gallon.  Dork.  Lucy decided last week that she loves milk, so that's good since we're still trying to talk her into eating anything besides crackers, cheese, baby food pouches and the occasional banana.



Anyway, it was a big day of firsts.  Firsts for our last.  We sure do love her.

::::

Lucy's room has a window in it that looks out into our sunroom.  It has shutters and they usually stay closed so the room stays nice and cool.  But when I've put her down for a nap, I will tip the shutters a bit and check on her.  It's such a wecome sight to see her sleeping peacefully, as she's had a long history of sleep struggles.  The sleeping has been so so much better lately thank goodness.



But--she's smart and savvy, and if she's awake at all she will see me check in.  Even if I'm super sneaky and silent she will notice me.  She's a little stinker.  A cute one.  Anyway, I thought it would be fun to see how it looked to peek in and see her all happy and cuddly and sleepy.  She's hugging Pooh Bear of course.




And this is so goofy, but this bottle of hair oil that I have is her favorite thing in my room.  She will go into the bathroom, get under the sink and find it, and then carry it around.  She likes to take the cap off and put it back on.  She's so funny.



The little dress she's wearing in this picture was given to us by Grandma & Grandpa Jeffrey when Lucy was just tiny.  I remember thinking there was no way it would ever fit her.  How could it!  It ws like 3 times her size.  But of course, time moved on the way it always does and now it fits her just right.  It's so cute too.

And to end off this weird and kind of random post, I like what I did with my eyes this day.  This was sometime in July.
I'm not feeling as serious as I look, and I know that the back thing is a nice background.  Oh well, it's real I guess!

::::

This just reminds me of Goldilocks and the three bears. Except in this case Goldilocks is one of the bears.

Look at all ouf their goofy little feet.

Look at that messy old pantry. I can never keep the light off or the door closed--I think it's the bears' fault.

Look at the pacifier lying in a nest of crumbs under Lucy-Bear's chair.  This is another thing that I can't quite beat.  There are always crumbs, various toys and other items under her chair.

Lucy loves this chair because she really likes to be one of the big kids, and when she's eating up at the bar like them she thinks she's just the same as them.

Those goofballs, when they're not fighting over legos at breakfast, they're the best.  The best bears anybody could ask for.

::movie night::

I don't even remember what day this was, or what movie the kids were watching.  It's so adorable though.  A long time ago I started doing "movie nights" with Max, if Kris was out of town or someting.  We'd get a fun movie, make a treat, make a snuggly nest, and enjoy.



We continued on the tradition with Sandy.  In fact, if you asked him, a movie night might be the activity at the very top of his favorite things to do list.



And now Lucy is ushered into the fun.  I thought it was the cutest thing that the boys set up a little spot for her too--Max letting her using his Kermit pillow.  She lay there for a really long time too.



It just melts the mama heart, right?

::more CA fun::

So after we had breakfast we went back to the hotel for some naps by way of a quick Target trip to pick up some necessities and a couple of snorkels for the boys.

Lucy actually did nap a little which was nice, and Kris went out to catch a few quick waves.  It was pretty cool and cloudy all morning but the sun came out as soon as Kris got back.  After he was back we headed out to walk to lunch.  One of our favorite things about this part of San Diego is that we can walk a lot of places.  It's super fun.



Miss Lou was super patient and relaxed about riding in the stroller.  We had fish tacos at Rubios and then walked over to Sandy's favorite ice cream sandwich place, the Baked Bear.



How I love that little Lucy in the big hat!



The boys love the ice cream sandwiches.  You pick what kind of cookies go on the top and bottom of the sandwich and what kind of ice cream goes inside.  The boys usually pick something rather gross.



Kris and I shared a sandwich with Lucy and she was very pleased about it.



After that we went out to the bay--the hotel room we stayed in opened right out to the bay so we just went downstairs and set up so the boys could swim and play.  There was a lot of snorkeling, a lot of digging in the sand and mud and a lot of goofing around.



Sandy in the snorkeling getup was hilarious.





This was the first time Lucy ever walked in the sand, and she was very unsure of herself at first.  Not scared to be put down like Sandy was when he was 1, but she thought it was pretty weird.







The bay is so fun for the little guys because it has a nice slow slope down into the water, there are hardly any waves, but there is still nice sand to play in and the water is fresh enough.



Lucy was having a blast playing.  Max was out noodling around like usual, he's basically a fish where things like that are concerned.



Sandy alternated between swimming and floating and digging and all that fun stuff.



It was a great fun day, and we all kind of felt like little Lucy there at the end, big smiles all full of ice cream and sunshine.