"Look, Mom! I'm a Y."

That's what Elena said to me the other day after making this pose:

Jophes

That's what Elena called the play we went to this weekend. Marshall High School put on Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, and we brought Elena and her friend, Ana to the show. There was a row right in front with just 2 seats so they were able to sit all on their own to watch the show. We sat 2 rows back, and watching them was almost as much fun as watching the show. The kids did a great job - as a bonus, our next door neighbor was the narrator and a friend who I used to babysit was Joseph. That actually made me feel a little old, but then I ran into my old babysitter and my kindergarden teacher, and them mentioned how I made them feel old, which made me feel a little younger :)
Here are the girls before the show:

And about 3 minutes after the show (we hadn't even gotten out of town when I took this picture):

Updates

We've had an eventful last month. Here are a few of the highlights:

First the kids both had the chicken pox. Elena had them first, and Sam came down with them 2 weeks later. We really only had one rough night with Sam; other than that they hardly complained and rarely itched. My most memorable moment was when Sam was up in the middle of the night because his pox were bothering him - especially all the spots on his bottom. At one point he, whimpered to me in the most pitiful voice imaginable, "Mommy, my booty-butt hurts." I couldn't help but laugh.

Here's a picture of Elena reading a book to Sam about chicken pox when he came down with them.



In other news, Sam potty trained himself in pretty much one day. We hadn't really been pushing him because that hadn't helped at all with Elena. I was planning to hit it hard once he hit 3, but he beat us to it. Ironically, he trained himself at exactly the same age I did (1 month shy of 3) and he did it the same way - just decided on his own he was done with diapers. Yay! This is the first time in 4 1/2 years I haven't had to bring a diaper and wipes with me everywhere I go.


Around the same time, Seth's dad had a triple bypass surgery. We were able to take the kids down to Sioux Falls to visit him while he was in the hospital. I'm happy to say the surgery went well and he is recovering nicely - although I know it's hard to him to suddenly go from a such a busy life to a full stop.


Lastly, we welcomed our new nephew, Noah Thomas, into the world on Nov 17th. Seth's brother Jason and his wife, Tina, had their 5th baby - we now have 10 cousins living within one block of our house! Sorry I don't have a picture of the wee one - you can click on Tina's link on the side bar of my blog to see him (her's is the Stay Salty blog).

Drummer Boy

As promised last month, here is a shot of Sam joining the band on the drums:

Halloween Fun

The kids had a great time on Halloween, including the weeks leading up to it. Elena was set on being a skunk, but Sam was undecided until the day of Halloween so they had a lot of fun going through all of our costumes in the meantime.

Here they are Halloween morning, sporting a few pirate accessories.

These were taken a few weeks before Halloween when they discovered a bag full of wigs and some old glasses:

Ready to go trick-or-treating with friends, Ana and Toby. We have a train, a fairy, a leopard and a skunk.

The girls were having so much fun, we decided not to seperate them, and they had their very first sleep-over. Ana changed her mind momentarily around 9:30, but then realized she could have Life cereal for breakfast if she stayed. I don't think Ana slept too much being in an unfamiliar bed, but they made it through the night and had a great time!