Halloween 2010

This is our first year as parents to do the whole Halloween thing. Jack and Emma Grace had never heard of Halloween and we hadn't made a big deal of it. But lots of our neighbors invited us over so we decided to join the fun. Jack was a Chinese Emperor and Emma Grace was a princess.

It was a lot of fun to trick or treat with friends from our complex.

We visited about 5 apartments and got A LOT of candy!
We let the kids eat whatever they wanted. And they did! Above EG is munching on a butterfinger.

Jack decided to unwrap all his candy at once. Once one lollipop was finished he had another one ready for immediate replacement!
Check out Jack's post-trick or treating pre-bath photo! That boy loved the candy!
Trick or treating in an apartment complex was the perfect fit for our family. We didn't have to get in the car-we just walked around for about half an hour, let our kids eat what they wanted and we were back home before dinner time. It was a fun night.

Jack starts school

The Lord really worked it out so that Jack and Emma Grace can both go to school this year! Emma Grace is going three mornings a week and Jack is now joining the fun for two days! He is so social and LOVES school! He looks so cute with his little Thomas the Train backpack! It's a great break for this mommy to have two mornings with no kids and they both are doing really well in school. We don't have high academics hopes for this year-just a fun environment for them to be with other peers. But they are both learning lots! Jack's teacher, Mrs Davis is so precious and kind and I love how happy he is when I pick him up! So thankful for such a great place for our kids. Thanks God for the money to be able to send them!

Bouncy Ball Fun

Our first family pumpkin

Andy and I have carved many together over the years sans kids. This year we were excited to have the kids join in the fun. Except they didn't. Jack lost interest immediately, due to a lollipop offer from a neighbor and EG lost interest when she discovered scooping out the guts was part of the "fun." She had no interest in getting her hands yucky. So Andy, following in the footsteps of his dad, completed the lonely task of cleaning out and carving the pumpkin. Once fire was introduced the interest level went back up! The highlight of the evening was feeding the guts to the massive catfish in the pond. Happy first pumpkin carving for the Huffmans!

Our Jack-O-Lantern

Mary and her sidekick

You might remember that my child, formerly known as Emma Grace, as taken on many aliases in the past year. The most long running of them is Mary, mother of Jesus. Can you guess who else has started to play along?

Fall Festival

Last Year, I wrote a post about how much we love the fall and how this time of year makes us really miss home. Thankfully some friends in our city in China threw a massive Harvest festival that included costumes and candied apples and games of lots of fall treats. Since our city doesn't have the traditional round orange pumpkins this time of year, they improvised with his awesome photo backdrop. I remember the weather was mildly fallish and we walked around outside with the Greenes for a while. It was really fun and felt like a taste of home.

It's strange to be back in America and still not be enjoying the NC/WV fall that we both love. It's crazy hot here! We are totally in the fall spirit though! We have pumpkin spice creamer. We've made oatmeal raisin cookies, we've eaten pumpkin and apples. We've had caramel apples for dessert! We have those mini pumpkins on our table. It's crazy how precious these things become to you when you live without them for years. There are lots of fall festivals to go around as well!

The one we attended this year was great, but definitely lacking in fall weather. (it's so hot today that I'm taking the kids to the pool after naps!) But we did have lots of great food and a TON of fallish desserts! There were lots of friends, ironically friends from China, and tons for the kids to do! Hayrides and mazes and pumpkin patches and bounce houses! This year we will actually have a round orange pumpkin! Woohoo!

Happy Fall from hot and sunny Florida!

Drawing

Emma Grace is learning how to draw. I am surprised at all the skills she is picking up at school these days! One day she came home and knew how to draw a circle. The next thing you know, she's busy drawing sunshines, and rainbows,

and a princess!

Awesome work Emma Grace!

Today's score

Kids:1

Mom Squad:0

This is what happened today during Emma Grace's room time. She really loves playing by herself, ESPECIALLY when I accidentally leave craft scissors in reach. Oops. When I asked her why she cut her hair, she gave multiple reasons, including:

It was bothering me because it was too long and touching my shoulders (nice try, it's not long enough to touch your shoulders!)

I didn't want my hair to get torn???????????

I didn't want Jack to pull my hair

It was in my face (That's true if she doesn't have a hair bow)

Mom, it seems it's a rite of passage for most kids. OK, she didn't say that, but it's true.

Animal Kingdom

From this post and my last one it looks like we are spending a lot of time at Disney. Since we have annual passes this year, it really is a fun way for our family to spend a day! Though I wouldn't say I love Disney, we really really liked Animal Kingdom. We went there last week on Andy's day off and had a really great time. It's a unique Disney experience in that it's fairly low-key. I got really sad when we ventured into the Asia section though. We actually met a guy from our city in China, who was working there. There are tons of internationals working there so it's fun to get to speak Chinese with people from China, like the guy we met last week. It was so weird to see his name tag. FRANK, China. My guess is many of the internationals go by English names, but it was just weird. Anyway, here are a few highlights!

Emma Grace LOVED the African performances. She and I got up and participated in the dancing. Andy took video which I will not be posting.

One of the coolest parts was the African Safari. Here we are loading the jeep and looking out for animals. Jack actually fell asleep before we saw any animals. We'll have to come back for him to experience it!

The parade was really cool and really different from the one at Magic Kingdom.

We spent the entire day there and did about half of all there is do to. We will definitely go back several more times this year! Parts of the safari reminded me of the wildlife center in China that we visited with the Greenes. Made me miss you guys! Can't wait to see you in a few months!

YAY for free Annual Disney Passes! It's seems like a small thing, but it really has made the transition to America a lot of fun for us. One of things we were most looking forward to in our move was the ability to have more fun together as a family. "To do new and exciting things together." It was hard for us to figure out how to have fun together as a family in China. I think it was the combination of our stage of life, living outside the city, and a lack of fun things to do where we were that made it hard for us. So far this year, we have really had a good time as a family venturing out to parks, Disney, the beach and the pool. It's a huge part of living a healthy, balanced life for us, so we are really grateful for all the fun options we have this year!

Date Night

One of the fun parts of this year is using the Annual Passes to Disney that we were GIVEN!!!! It's so fun to have access to all four Disney parks and be able to go for a few hours here and there. A couple weeks ago Andy and I went on a date to Magic Kingdom. We road 2 rides, watched the parade, got ice cream and came home! So far we've taken our kids to Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom. I am really looking forward to going to Epcot with Andy.

New Wheels for Everyone

Everyone in our family has moved up the ladder when it comes to transportation! Andy and I both got cars when we returned to the US (though I haven't retired my double stroller yet)! And Jackie Boya is now cruising around on a family treasure! You might remember that Andy's grandfather restored Kathi's childhood tricycle for Emma Grace when she was just 18 months old. He spent hours working on it, finding the parts, and painting it. It is a truly a treasure in our family. (He hasn't learned to pedal yet so we still pull him with the jump rope!) He had occasion to move to the tricycle because Emma Grace left it behind for this...
HER FIRST BIKE! Thanks so much Kacki and Poopaw for the awesome Purple and Pink Princess Bike. She loves it! We have great places to ride in our apartment complex and we take it out almost everyday. She is really great on it, thanks to many opportunities to practice on Julianna's bike back in China! Thanks Tim and Kathi, what a perfect gift for our little 3 1/2 year old!

Silliness

Hope you enjoy this video of our silly kids! Oh what joy they bring to us!