I'm back... I hope

This fall took me by storm.  With starting back to work and a crazy school schedule where all three kids are on different days at different times, many things that were normal for me stopped happening.  Blogging is one thing that I'd really like to get back to so here goes.

We've been trying to get the cousins together about once a month and this past weekend was our October gathering.  October gatherings are always going to special to me.  This year it marked 4 years since my mom's passing.  Getting together with my family offers a time to remember my Mom and it also serves for me as a reminder for how special family is.  Four years ago we spent a lot of time together at the end of October and the beginning of November, and while it was hands down the worst time in my life so far, my family was a blessing - HUGE.  And I love to remember that every October too.

In planning for these monthly get-togethers, we usually e-mail around about food and who will bring what for a big family meal time.  This time one of my sisters also asked about carving pumpkins.  Perfect!  We had not found the time yet to carve and apparently neither had any of the other families.  I knew I had been waiting on something.  :)

Let the planning begin!  Notice how there are more kids at the table than parents right now.  Ahh, the beginning when the drawing is fun and the ideas are flowing.  Then take out the knives and tell the kids they have to just stand back and watch because they are too young to actually use the knife and the kids quickly get bored and wander off.  By the end of carving we had all parents at the table with no kids.  Who ever decided that carving pumpkins with sharp knives should be a kids activity wasn't planning things out well.  But alas, we do it every year....



Becca hard at work.  This is the first year that we actually carved 3 pumpkins.  Usually the kids share 1 or 2, but the boys were insistent that they each have there own, so Becca got her own too.  And we roped Grandpa into carving it with her since we were one adult short in the family.


I love the look on Jon's face here:


And Michael's too.  I put my foot down that if they were going to desert us for the carving, that they had to do most of the de-gooping.


Becca was so proud of her happy face, "because I'm so happy!" she said.


Jon and Tim went to work for a batman pumpkin!


Michael, of course, always wants a traditional jack-o-lantern.  At least he wasn't picky with me this year about how many teeth it had to have.


And here they are: Cody, Becca, Allie, Jon, Judah, Michael, and Luke.


Or should I say Emily, Grandpa, Brian, Tim, Sam, Christy, and Michele.