Pumpkin Carving

Tonight we carved pumpkins with the kids. We missed doing it last year due to scheduling, so it was fun to restart the tradition. Here is Kristen with her pumpkin.

I swear Tony was smiling before I asked him to look at the camera. Something has happened the past few years where Tony developed a not-so-rare condition where he is unable to smile for the camera. I guess as a teen you have a reputation to keep when it comes to family events.


Poor Vinnie did not get a pumpkin, but Emily shared her camera time with him. Maybe next year he can get a pumpkin of his very own.

Here is Tony's final result. He did a cool lion. Reminds me of a Lion King pumpkin.

Kristen, always the creative one, did not use a pattern and freehanded her design and then carved it.

Emily did a spooky pumpkin carving.

Now the neighborhood hooligans that have been smashing pumpkins late at night had better leave our pumpkins alone or we are going to have some upset kids on our hands. They put a lot of work into these and did a great job!

School bells still ringing

Kristen just returned from her 8th grade trip! Sounds like they had a great time. They left early, early Tuesday morning for Washington D.C. They saw the sights for 2.5 days and then came home Thursday night and returned home early Friday morning. Sounds exhausting to me, but Kristen had fun. If we get to see any of her pictures from the trip, we'll share them with you.



Emily had another school project due this week. She had to build a creature out of leaves. We took a walk on Thursday night (some things never change, I still procrastinate) and she picked up a bunch of leaves - thank goodness the weather cooperated.



Emily was picking up leaves talking about body parts and this and that and I couldn't figure out what she was talking about. But she had a plan. We got home and she put all the leaves on her poster board and it was a caterpillar! We ended up using some construction paper to define it a bit better, but she did a great job. She had to write a story which is below it and I was going to share here ... but I forgot to write it down before she turned it in. Whoops!

D.S.P.N.

Donato Sports Programming Network - D.S.P.N.



Today was Emily's last soccer game for the fall season. She scored a goal and got a medal for participating. She had a GREAT 4th quarter to end it all. When they blew the whistle to end the game, I wanted them to keep going. It was fun to see her so engaged.

Tony's last soccer game is tomorrow. He is enjoying soccer this year and is even talking about finding an indoor league to play in.

Both Tony and Kristen are taking tennis lessons. Kristen had her first ever lesson last week. She immediately retracted her "tennis isn't a real sport" comment that she had made to Tony earlier. I guess she figured out it wasn't as easy as it looked and it took a bit more ability. She said she was tired after lessons and I overheard her complaining to her Dad about her arm hurting her. Emily is going to start up tennis lessons again during the next session which will be right after Thanksgiving.

Also after Thanksgiving Tony and Kristen will start basketball. They are playing with the same league as previous years. We won't have schedules until right before the season (as they wait to form teams until the school teams are formed). We will distribute schedules as soon as we receive them and their first game will be December 6th.

We also got word that for the first time ever they will start a basketball league for 1st and 2nd graders in January '09. I asked Emily if she was interested and, surprisingly (at least to me), she got really excited about playing. So, we might have basketball games for Emily too.

So, if anyone is bored out there, just give us a call and you can help shuttle these three kids to basketball, tennis, and indoor soccer.

Fall Festival

Last night was the Fall Festival at Vinnie's daycare. Brian, Emily, Vinnie and I attended. Emily was thrilled to wear her halloween costume. She couldn't decide if she wanted to be a leopard or a cheetah. I think she was calling herself a cheetah. And can you believe she put that snake around her neck?

Vinnie just hung out in his lion costume. He was pretty overwhelmed by all the commotion, but "overwhelmed" in Vinnie just means very quiet.

The school held a raffle and we purchased some tickets. Shortly after we purchased our tickets they called one of our numbers. Emily went up to get the prize and they picked something perfect for her - a gift certificate for horseback riding lessons at the farm that is right behind our development. She was estatic!! It is for 2 private lessons or 4 semi-private lessons.

I thought it was cute as Emily's first reaction was that she was excited to tell her first grade teacher!

Pumpkin Patch

Last Thursday Emily's school had a family night at a local pumpkin patch. It ended up that we got there late and had to leave early but we tried to make the best of it. Vinnie just hung out in his wrap and checked it all out.

Kristen tortured Tony - which is what she enjoys the most.

And Emily did the zip line:

Run Away

Tony's last cross country match was last Saturday. He was excited as he broke his P.R. (personal record, for the unhip LOL). He crossed the finish line at 21:26.

Keep in mind that his first match he ran the same distance in almost 24 minutes. So he really, really worked hard and improved his time.

And the good news is that he enjoyed it and wants to keep up the running. He is asking Brian to keep hound him about getting out there and running, so I'll open it up to the lot of you to do the same.

Grades are in!

It is time for the interim grades to come home for the kids. We are proud as all of the kids are doing well this year.

Tony has taken a heavy load this year and is learning a bit more about having to work for grades. Nothing wrong with that lesson.
Algebra II - B-
AP US History - B
Band - A
Biology - A
Chemistry - B+
English II - C
Spanish II - B+

Kristen is continuing to show that she is quite the little student!
Algebra - A
Language Arts - A
Science - B+
Social Studies - A-
Spanish - B

We had Emily's parent/teacher conference last night, but I am running out of time so I'll try to come back later and update.