Yet another milestone for Reid, his first cereal! He has been really interested in food for several weeks. Whenever I’m holding him and eating he often grabs for whatever I have or opens his mouth and his head turns and follows the food all the way to my mouth (how mean!) or he talks to the spoon or fork full of food! So with a plenty full weekend we decided why not pack one more thing into it and give Reid his first taste of rice cereal. Check out how messy he got. We brought up the high chair from our basement and he did pretty well sitting in it. Although he does lean to a side and then stays propped up from the side of the chair for now. He was so grabby that we went through 2 spoons since he grabbed one out of my hands and threw it on the floor. And another time he grabbed the bowl of cereal while I was holding it and spilled it all over everything! He is quite fast. But he seemed to enjoy the process. He was a bit tired so after the photo op and trying out the spoon many times we opted to mix a bit more and put it in a bottle for him to eat more easily.
Earlier in the week I was able to take the morning off work in order to take Griffin to a party for one of his Monkey friends, Julia, at her home. It was a “get to know our friends” party given by her parents. There was a balloon/facepainting artist there and the kiddos were able to make their own ice cream sundaes (a great mid morning treat in the eyes of Griffin!).
Griffin loves to take my phone and snap photos of various things. Sometimes I don’t even realize he’s done it since he knows how to take the pictures without unlocking my phone. I found this one from this week. He is very good about having independent play time in the loft where he colors or plays dominoes or other games on his own. He really likes lining up these piece :).
Griffin also got to make some tasty apple crisp this week with Debbie. It was delicioso!
This fall has been a pretty busy one. The weekdays and weekends seem to fly by. I’ve been swamped at work and when I get home I feel like I’m often working from behind there too. So the mornings we have to just be still and laze around are so nice!
Kevin was able to go to Griffin’s field trip to Leeds Farm this year with his preschool class. They had a good time on a brisk fall morning feeding the goats, riding karts, taking a wagon ride to pick gourds and such. I was bummed to miss, but am thankful that Kevin got to go and enjoy the time with Griffin. I was spending the days at Millcreek as we had a two-day visit with consultants in town from Florida/Montana to assist us with some process assessment and potential changes. It was a great two days of brainstorming, walking around the property, talking new and different processes for increasing efficiency, and picking the brains of the two gentlemen who have clients in every industry including over 120 clients in the green industry, many of whom are our vendors. There client list and efficiency gain statistics are impressive!
On Saturday, we had another progressive dinner with our neighbors. This time we went with an italian theme and began at our house with appetizers and drinks. We also decided it would be fun for the kids (and adults, lol) to carve pumpkins. The Buckeye-vs-Iowa game was on also and it ended up being a pretty intense evening! Nate and AJ are moving the first week of November so this was our last dinner before they depart. 
And if that wasn’t enough for a Saturday, it was also Lily’s 9th birthday! These aren’t the best pictures as I actually took them when I was upstairs feeding Reid during dinner with our friends! I didn’t break out the party hat this year :(. Seems hard to believe our girl is 9 years old. I remember when Kevin and I had just begun dating and she was still a bundle full of energy. She has arthritis is her wrists and shoulders and knees and hips and even with her daily medications she still has a slight limp which is better some days and worse on others. She and Brutus play pretty hard from time to time and she puts up with a lot from Griffin too. She’s as sweet as ever. She definitely does not like loud noises, shouting, amazon air bubble packaging (she leaves the room when we open boxes!), and she and Brutus have had more than a few battles when a new bag of food is being opened. And though I don’t get much these days, she still loves to cuddle on the couch, to hide and relax in small and tight spaces, and to be given any kind of people food that isn’t fruit. 
On Sunday we headed to Mom and Dad’s after church to get the Hostaworks website and seed shoppe up for business for the 2017 seed sale. We figured it would be best to be together in person to get it all right. We enjoyed our visit and got most everything done though we ran in to a bit of a snag at the end! Nothing that can’t be fixed with a bit of time though. 
One tidbit from the consultants is the idea of progressive work. It’s something I’ve seen many times before but we haven’t implemented yet at Millcreek. Here our crew is trying out progressive sticking, where each person sticks cuttings into a portion of the tray and then passes the tray along to the next person. Our team did a few sample trays and in doing so, even their first attempts, they cut their rates down from 10 minutes a tray to 6 minutes a tray – even in a less than ideal atypical setup using our production line as a table. We will likely be making this simple change in our propagation area. 
After more research, we also ended up purchasing another Jeep on Saturday. The Jeep Commander was in need of more repairs and we’ve decided it’s not best for us to keep putting money into an 11 year old vehicle. Kevin’s parents are going to keep it and get it repaired. So we have a 2018 Jeep Cherokee, a small SUV for me to take drive during the week for work and such. I love it and am thankful that I didn’t have to be a part of the car-buying process at all thanks to Kevin’s research and negotiating skills! They even drove it to our house to deliver it since Kevin drove to the dealership by himself :).
We started this week by celebrating our pup Brutus’ first birthday! Wow, how can it be that he is already one. He’s been a part of our family for 9 months already and in that time he has grown immensely! We were able to get him to wear a party hat for a short bit and snap some pics. He also had a cupcake and we gave him a huge rope toy which lasted all of a couple hours before he had it torn to shreds. His teeth are sharp! He was sick a couple days later from eating too much rope, ugh! We’ve found thus far that the only toy he isn’t able to destroy are the large jolly balls we got awhile back at Costco. 
It’s that time of year – apple art!
And it was unseasonably warm, so much so that the water toys made one last appearance. Griffin, Sam, Cole, and Cooper enjoyed some sunny afternoon play this week. Reid, he wasn’t a fan though the water was cool I’m sure. He can’t always be all smiles, lol. 
He is still loving his paci and ripping it out of his mouth. He hangs on to it and puts it in and out of his mouth, but he tends to bite and chew on it more than actually put it in his mouth correctly and suck on it. I love how he always holds on to my hand. 
Griffin had his yearly eye exam this week too. He did really well at this machine, which takes a picture of his eye. And his eyes are looking great – he was able to read the letters on the wall without any issues. My appointment was at the same time also though my prescription has changed, for the better in my right eye. I’m glad to know why my vision has been so blurry. It turns out my right eye needs a 1/2 power less, hence the focus issues I’ve been having! 
Griffin has really been enjoying soccer and he’s been super happy that Kevin has been able to make it to a couple of his lessons. He always enjoys having Daddy out on the field for Sharks and Minnows before or after class. Kevin is the Shark who tries to take down the minnows (kids) by kicking the ball and hitting them with it. If you’re struck with the ball you have to lay down and the only way you can get up is for someone to jump over you. There is another Griffin is his class, who also has a younger brother, and each week after class they love to stay after and play a good game running from Kevin. 
Griffin continues to have fun at preschool. I enjoy looking at his papers and how he’s coloring, cutting, counting, and writing numbers and letters. He’s very particular with his coloring, often choosing several colors in small spaces and really staying within the lines!
On Friday evening we attended Griffin’s last NPCA Fun Fest! He enjoyed a night of playing games and eating hot dogs and ice cream. I can’t believe this is his third and final year of pre-school. 
And here are a few others from the week. 
My first Pumpkin Spice Latte of the season – hard to believe it is that time of year. Kevin treated me to this one when he brought it home to me when he returned from running some errands. I was able to rock Reid to sleep while enjoying a sweet treat!
We also ventured to the library this week where (gasp) I even checked out a book for myself! Griffin was getting so frustrated with me trying to find something I could start reading while he wanted to play in the kids area. Several times he handed me books off the shelf and said things like “here, Mom, this is the one. Read this one. This is good.”. I’ve never been good at reading as I fall asleep as soon as I start not to mention my wondering mind. But it’s a small goal of mine so I wondered around not being familiar with any authors and in the end took a book off the end that was a “librarians pick”. So far I like it! And as for Griffin, he loves reading or being read to and he really has fun choosing new books. He loves being read to at the library to see if he wants to check the book out. 
This particular morning Finn wanted the same thing for breakfast that Grandpa Beilstein had made him for lunch earlier in the week: scrambled egg and salami slices. And thanks, Mom and Dad, for coming down to watch Reid and Griffin so I could head in to work for a few hours for a meeting. Somehow I didn’t snap a single photo!
I’ve not always made time for tummy time each day but I’ve begun to get more regular use out of the jungle mat with Reid. It’s cute to watch him reach for the animals and listen to the sounds and watch the lights. And then there’s Brutus always wanting to be around the activity. 
I actually took Brutus to the vet on Thursday as he’d been doing some licking. I figured while he was there I would also ask them to cut his toenails (that’s a real win right there!). I’m really glad I took him there as my initial reason for visiting the vet was to refill Lily’s medicine. He weighs 105# and I was surprised to learn that she thinks he should lose about 10 pounds! What?! He’s only 11 months old! But it seems we’ve been feeding him too much (perhaps 6 cups some days, but he’s often not interested in eating all of it). He should have 3-4 cups a day so we’re going to shave his portions back to 4 cups total each day. She also looked in his eyes, ears, looked at his feet, teeth, etc., and she showed me some redness and scabs in his right ear. He doesn’t have an infection per the ear cytology so she gave me a topical ointment to put on it to clear it up. She thinks he may have some allergies (perhaps food or environmental) so I’m going to start being more observant as to what and when he licks and itches. Looking back I realize he’s always been more of an itcher but I never once considered allergies! He did great at the office and only barked a couple of times. Even those barks were soft barks not his deep loud barks. He is just a ginormous baby though as I had to walk with him to the table for him to be examined. Otherwise as they were leading him to be examined he was yanking backwards trying to slip his collar! 
On Friday morning I met up with Laura down at Columbus Commons. It was a beautiful warm and breezy day full of fun inflatables, building blocks, and art activities. Oh, and it’s free! I left Reid home with Debbie and Griffin and I had a morning date. It was fun!
The letter of the week this week, “O”, is for Octopus, 
I love how much Griffin loves Reid. He regularly asks to hold him and snuggles with him. He talks to him and is such a great helper. Whenever he hears him crying he rushes to his crib to give him his pacifier. He often says things like “I just can’t believe I have a brother”, “he’s just so cute”, “awe, look at his cute face”. It brings my heart joy. And guilt for being overly stringent sometimes about germs or just correcting him rather than just letting him express his love for his brother Reid. So, each day I try to do better than the last and strike a better balance. I love when Griffin is able to calm Reid down and make him smile. It’s the cutest. 
On Friday night we went out for our first Japanese Steakhouse experience with Griffin. He thought it was super cool to see the chef do the tricks with his utensils, including cracking the egg on his spatula and trying to toss broccoli into his and Kevin’s mouths! Oh, and he absolutely loved the soup (just not the mushrooms, lol). 
On Saturday we took meals to Missy and Brett as she is recovering from surgery. We then made a pit stop at Grandma and Grandpa Armstrong’s house. It was a fun afternoon. 
And on Sunday after church we celebrated with the Bethune’s and friends for Rowan’s 6th birthday! It was a sunny afternoon and a fun group of kiddos. I can’t believe he is already 6! He was just 3 months old when Kevin and I began dating!