Lately

"Water doesn't taste like anything. I'm tired of water," said Emery at dinner the other night.

What she isn't tired of is jumping. The girl is a crazy jumping bean these days. Every time I turn around she's jumping up and down as if I just announced we were going to live at the ice cream store. It took her a long long long time to learn how to jump, so I guess she is just making up for lost time.

Halloween came and went and naturally there were a fair amount of emotional displays from Anna Kimball regarding "more candies!" In fact, I even caught her licking away on a second lollipop after I told her she could only have one. Par for the course, I know, but seeing as how Emery is a first-born rule follower to the letter, I simply have no template for this kind of misdemeanor ... other than to throw that lollipop in the garbage and keep my eye on this one a little closer now. Oh and try not to start worrying about teenage rebellion yet.

I'm thankful the girls aren't really aware that many moms buy or make expensive and/or elaborate costumes for Halloween. That is just not my scene, at least right now. We were able to keep it simple with a borrowed Raggedy Ann suit for Anna Kimball and a few random items from the dress-up bin for Emery.

For Jamison, well, he got about four minutes in the spotlight. His average bedtime is 5:15 so he had already begun his night by the time the festivities started. I did manage to get him into our signature baby giraffe costume for a few minutes so that he could snag a little candy from our dear neighbor.

One big pumpkin ... one little boy!

At dinner tonight Emery prayed and the end of her prayer went something like this, "And I don't want to do anything. I just want to wash dishes and help Mommy in the kitchen when she is cooking. Amen."

Well, Emery, lots of times I don't want to do anything either. If you can manage to feed this family of five and keep the kitchen spic-and-span, have at it!