Sunday, November 14, 2010

My 3 Monkeys...I Mean Sons

All three of my boys have been dressed as a monkey for their second Halloween now. I got to wondering if they looked alike. Here are the pictures so you can see for yourself.

For Halloween in 2006, Finn was a monkey. Granny Joyce made him an awesome monkey costume. He was 15 months old.

Monkey Finn sure enjoyed that sucker! He was drooling and as a parent, you know what happens when your child drools while they are eating a sucker.
Now for a profile shot...I can see resemblances between Finn and Rilian in the profile shot. None of the other two pictures of Finn looked like Rilian at all to me.
Two years later, Halloween 2008, Seven was dressed as a monkey. He was 18 months old. The costume survived the washing machine after Finn enjoyed his sucker in the costume.
When looking at the pictures, I realized I had a couple of profile pictures of monkey Seven also. I see a little bit of resemblance to Rilian in this shot.
I think this one looks more like Rilian than the last one. If I didn't know that it was Seven, I might not be sure if it was him or Rilian.
Fast forward to this year, Halloween 2010, another two years later. Rilian was two days shy of being 21 months old. He had such a sweet smile! 
And a close up...
I was kind of surprised that none of my monkeys looked alike. I did a post last year about Piper, Seven, and Rilian being lions for different Halloweens to see if they looked alike. I think my lions looked more alike than my monkeys. I always enjoy going back and looking at pictures of my beautiful children. I also think it is fun to compare pictures to see how much they do or do not look alike. If you are a parent, I am sure you think it is just as fun!  

Trick or Treat

Yes, we decorated more pumpkins...we had a total of nine pumpkins out in front of our house. The four little ones from the last post, these four "Mr. Potato Head" pumpkins, and a jack-o-lantern you will see in a little bit. We let the kids pick which kind of Mr. Potato Head parts they wanted. Two of them picked pirates and the other two picked skeletons.
Rilian picked a pirate.
Piper picked a skeleton. Notice she is holding his hand?
Then she wanted me to take her picture crossing her eyes. You can't really tell that is what she is doing. She just looks like she is looking down at her nose. But she doesn't realize that, she is just proud that she can cross her eyes. And she is still holding her skeleton's hand.
Seven chose a pirate. He is holding his hand out like his pirate is..."Arg!"
Finn chose a skeleton.
Next, it was time to carve the jack-o-lantern.
Piper was holding up her messy hands. She had stuck them in the pumpkin. I remember a couple of years ago, she would not put her hands in it. She thought it was gross, but not this year. She was all about digging the guts out!
Piper was trying to get her hands back in, but Finn was digging at the inside with a spoon, so he was kind of in the way of Piper putting her hands back in.
There is Rilian peeking out from behind Finn. He wanted to see what was going on.
Even Seven put his hand inside to help dig out some of the guts.
Rilian thinks he is just as big as his brothers and sister, so he also tried to dig out some of the guts.

I told you Piper was all about taking the guts out. Look how deep her arms are in the pumpkin. Really, I think she was just excited about getting all the pumpkin seeds out so we could bake them. Talk about motivation!
I guess Rilian wanted a closer look at what was inside the pumpkin. You can also see how messy Piper's hand is. This is kind of surprising because when she eats, she is real careful about not getting her hands messy. She will even tell you which hand is clean, so you know she doesn't need to wash that one.
A close-up of the "close-up". 
 Rilian made it look like alot of fun, so Piper had to try.
And of course, Seven had to try it, too. I think Finn was playing games on the computer, so he didn't really know they were doing this. Otherwise, I'm sure he would have played the "monkey see, monkey do" game also.
Piper said she wanted our jack-o-lantern to have heart shaped eyes. Who says jack-o-lanterns can't have heart shaped eyes...not our family.
My little pumpkins with their jack-o-lantern. I took three pictures with the jack-o-lantern and this is the best of the three. At least all four of them had their faces up. It is often hard to get a picture with all four of them looking AND smiling at the camera. 
Seven wanted his picture taken with the jack-o-lantern again. In this picture you can almost see all nine of our pumpkins. There are eight on the wall and then the ninth pumpkin is beside Seven.
Now for the costumes...
Rilian is a monkey. Finn is Optimus Prime. Seven is a pirate. Piper is a black cat.
As I was looking through the pictures to put them on this post, I had to put all three of these on. Finn was just cracking me up with his poses! I didn't realize he was doing that when I took the pictures.
Piper was also a black cat three years ago. Her hat still fit. She just doesn't grow very fast. This fact really came in handy this year. She wore a black turtleneck, black pants, and black shoes. Luckily, the tail from three years ago was detachable and we were able to put it on her this year. Unfortunately, I forgot to draw whiskers on her face. Do you like how she is posing like a cat? She did that in two of the above pictures as well. There was no prompting by us, she just came up with it on her own.
Rilian is the third son to wear this monkey costume. It was made by Granny Joyce four years ago for Finn. I will look for the pictures of Finn and Seven as monkeys and make a post about all three of them. Rilian was copying Piper's cat pose.
My little pirate doesn't look happy. Truth is, he wasn't happy. Seven did not want his picture taken. I told him I just needed one good picture and I would stop taking pictures of him. All he had to do was smile and look at the camera, that constituted a good picture. I finally just gave up and this is the picture we have. Oh well. 
And another cool pose by Optimus Prime. Finn was full of poses that night! No prompting by us, it was all Finn!


Monday, November 8, 2010

Pumpkin Patch

I know we are into November now, but it should be no surprise that I am behind in my posting. Better late than never, huh? A few weeks ago, we had a play date at the Pumpkin Patch. Piper and Finn were at school, so I do not have any pictures of them at the Pumpkin Patch, but Seven and Rilian picked out 4 little pumpkins. One each and then one for Piper and one for Finn, which you will see decorated in a little while by them.

The Pumpkin Patch always provides a great opportunity for a photo shoot. It took a little bit, but I finally got this one of Seven and Rilian sitting on pumpkins.

Then I realized that it might be better if they were sitting closer together, so with a little bit more work, we got it taken care of.
This picture is neat because both Seven and Rilian are doing their own thing. Rilian is studying all the pumpkins. Seven is trying to roll the big pumpkin. It makes me laugh that he was trying to do that. I took the picture of Rilian and got a good laugh at Seven in the background.
The swing and pumpkin made a perfect prop for a great picture, but Rilian refused to get on the swing. But I still got a good picture of Seven. I guess it is Rilian's loss. He could have been in the picture, but he chose not to.
 Rilian had just learned to say pumpkin a few days before we went to the Pumpkin Patch. He was proud that he could say it as he pointed to several pumpkins and said it.

Seven saw this green pumpkin and said it was a dead pumpkin. I had to take a picture of it so I could show everyone what he was talking about. He is quite a character! I would have to agree that something is not normal about the green pumpkin.
My cute 3 year old sitting on a pumpkin...He was probably in "heaven" that day. Seven's favorite color is orange. He was surrounded by a sea of orange!
Holding pumpkins and saying cheese.
Another great prop for another great photo opportunity!
What trip to the Pumpkin Patch is complete without a story read by a pumpkin? I was very surprised by how well Rilian sat and listened to the story! I really did not think he would sit there that long. He sat through the whole story! Seven did good, too.
That night we decorated the pumpkins that Seven and Rilian picked out at the Pumpkin Patch for everyone. Piper with her pumpkin.
You couldn't see the face very well that she drew in the last picture, so I took a close up.
Finn and his decorated pumpkin. Can you tell by his face that he is not happy with how it turned out?
Seven and his decorated pumpkin. He wasn't quite finished with his pumpkin when I took the picture.
And Rilian holding his decorated pumpkin.