Trick or Treat! It was a soggy and wet night for Trick or Treat this year, but the boys enjoyed walking around the neighborhood with Abbie and Finn’s classmate Ethan, who joined us this year. Reid made it 3/4 of the way through the neighborhood before heading home to get to bed. Griffin had so much candy that by the last house it was spilling out the top of his pumpkin!
I was able to go to Finn’s class party this week. All of the kids were dressed in their costumes and enjoying sweet treats and classroom games. The second group picture is of Mrs. Menary and Mrs. Wilkers classes together as they investigated the differences in the white and orange pumpkins. 
Here are some samplings of Griffin’s artwork. The first is a drawing of our family and the second is Finn playing football which still seems to be his all time favorite sport. 
Griffin earned his third sticker on his pink booklet this week, learning the words as, an, can, have, was. 
And here are some other photos from our week. The boys love playing in the driveway, I made Instant Pot Sesame Chicken which turned out delish (nevermind the look on Finn’s face!), the boys enjoying ice cream at Grandma and Grandpa Armstrongs, and unfortunately the last one is of them at the pediatrician’s office where they were both diagnosed with Croup! Griffin woke up Sunday at 5:30 in the morning and sounded like he was having a really hard time breathing. He kind of freaked himself out and began gagging and drooling (and then began to freak me out). Neither of them seem too bad, though our experience at the pediatric support center (affiliated with our pediatricians office) was less than ideal. The nurse gave Finn his medicine first, but mistakenly gave him Reid’s dose. I asked her if she gave him the wrong syringe as they had a confused look on her face, and she proceeded to ask Finn to open wide as she dispensed more medication from the second syringe into his mouth (down to a certain amount and then stopped). She then had Reid open wide and gave him the remaining portion. I was not happy at all and asked the physician to come back in to the room. He had the personality of a card board box and wasn’t really apologetic much at all. I’ve since voiced my concern and experience to our actual pediatricians office who were quite apologetic that we had such a poor experience. 
November 4, 2018
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I enjoyed a fun day at home this week with the boys. As everyone knows, I’m not gifted with art, but I do love how much fun the kids have with it. So I broke out a bunch of paints and some paper and the kids went to town. Griffin is really creative and likes making many different pieces of art. We also ended with a fun bath, which was quite necessary by the end!
We completed another puzzle this week – it was another one that gave us some challenges! Those tree branches are much harder than they appear at first glance!
The Bethune’s invited us to the Dublin Spooktakular this week where the kids enjoyed dressing up in their costumes and filling their bags full of crazy amounts of candy! Reid was Mr. Independent and wanted to walk (or really wander) everywhere. Kevin had to work late so he wasn’t able to join us this year. But we did enjoy some pizza dinner before we headed home. 
Griffin was treated to a spontaneous Daddy date on Friday when Kevin was home early from work. They had a late afternoon lunch at Corner Bakery, followed by fun at Dave and Buster’s.
Reid and Griffin play pretty well together most of the time. Reid definitely lets you know if he doesn’t want to be doing something – he will scream loud and clear. He is very observant and regularly mocks behaviors that he sees. 
We made our annual trip to Young’s Jersey Dairy this weekend to go pumpkin picking. We rode the trailer out to the fields where we walked all around to find our perfect pumpkins. It was a blue-sky day with pretty clouds, though it was a bit windy!
We are building 5 new greenhouses at Millcreek in the I-pad and have had a new well drilled in that area also (that’s the white stub). So we’ve been clearing some trees and getting the area ready to start construction. It’s been several years since we’ve put up new huts!
Here the boys are a couple months ago in their Santa hats being silly playing together in the loft. Next they both suited up in their super hero outfits, which we ended up having Reid wear as his Trick or Treat outfit since it was the perfect fit. 
Griffin and Cole play together after school every Monday and Tuesday (when the boys are at Brian and Lisa’s house). Brian sent me this cute pic of the boys in their unplanned matching Batman shirts.
The boys and I took in some nice weather this week. I also had an eye appointment and for the first time ever took both boys with me as tag-a-longs. Thankfully, Dr. Bryan is pretty laid back and engages the kids in conversation. 
Griffin has been doing really well with his sight word booklets. This week he earned two stickers in his pink booklet. He is not very fond of practicing at home with me. When I bring it up he usually sighs and and rolls his eyes and says he doesn’t want to do them. His personality is such that he doesn’t want to be incorrect or fail at anything, so he’d rather not try to do it. I certainly get the perfection thing, but I’m sad that at such a young age Griffin already is prone to not wanting to be wrong. So we’re working on that! Once we go through the words and work through any that he doesn’t know I usually get a big smile (and his signature lip lick) once he goes through them all. He does enjoy reading to his brother!
It was also Fire week at school so the Liberty Township firefighters came to Tyler Run to talk about Fire Safety. The kids got to go outside and check out the firetruck and see the firefighters in all of their gear. 
Daddy was able to come to soccer this week and watch Griffin in his 3 on 3 play. Griffin seems to enjoy playing the 3v3 rather than the “lessons”. 
I had some special visitors at Millcreek this week! Dad and Bob Solberg came for a tour. Bob hasn’t been to Millcreek before and he wanted to see our operation and learn a bit about how we grow, starting with how we propagate. We had fun walking around :). 
Griffin enjoys going in to Reid’s room in the morning when we wakes up. It’s fun to get on the video camera and listen to what he says to Reid and to see the two of them interact when we’re not around. Another fun fact: Griffin loves to get in his bed with him and talk and play! I caught him climbing out and also reading some books to his brother. 
It was a busy weekend with Fall Fest at NPC and a birthday party for Griffin’s classmate, Ethan, on the same afternoon. I was able to break away from church setup for a bit to take Finn to the party. He had fun running around outside at Emily Traphagen Park. Then we headed back to NPC and finished decorating and setting up. Kevin and I took on a smaller role this year with Fall Fest. It was both good and frustrating. The event definitely had a lot of people (despite the poor sign up numbers online) and by the end of the night every pot of chili was empty!
