Star Wars

I got some star wars action figures for the boys at a garage sale.  Dan has made it a top priority to make sure the boys know and love star wars.  But beware, as soon as Dan starts talking Star Wars his inner nerd comes out. :)  I'm surprised how many of the characters they can name.  Seth is especially interested.  He jumps up and down during the fight scenes and laughs at the Ewoks.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

It may be my last year to choose their costumes, so I decided to milk the twin theme a little longer. To Infinity, and Beyond! I told the boys what they were going to be for Halloween and the two of them worked it out between themselves who was going to be who. Can you tell which boy is Woody??

Brad's blue mouth proves how much he loves his candy.

Yesterday we got to go to a Halloween Birthday party for cousin Ellie. Seth gave the pinata a good hit.

We went to Great Grandma Brown's assisted living Halloween party. Brad kept handing candy back to the residents if he didn't like it and refusing the candy if it was a duplicate of something he already had. Fortunately, he did get a sucker that he liked. Before official trick or treating tonight, we reviewed the proper etiquette. At his first house he was handed an unfamiliar candy, he hesitated, then took it saying, "this will be for daddy" which is how I explained to them that we take everything we're given- we just give unwanted candy to dad. They must've been listening to my lesson because they only took a single tootsie roll, even when they were offered more, saying "No! Just one."

Great grandma and Maacha

Grandma and Grandpa Ogilvie helped the boys trick or treat since Dan had to work. Uncle Jim and his friend Madison also helped out.

The preschool party.

Considering the number of 3 and 4 year olds in this pic, it's actually pretty impressive we got as may smiles as we did.

Notice how good Brad is getting at coloring.

Summer Fun

The boys like to sit on their chairs while watching a show. This is their friend Carter with them

After bath the boys were being "Cyclops" with their underpants.

Seth frequently falls asleep with a book in his hand, but I loved that he fell asleep mid page turn.

Currently, their favorite activity is digging in the dirt in our backyard. We really should get a sandbox, but they don't seem to mind the mulch.

Stapleton Yellowstone Trip

This past week we had a Stapleton Family Reunion/Vacation to Island Park and Yellowstone (Thanks Grandpa and Macha Stapleton). We all stayed in a cabin and activities included: Yellowstone, Mesa Falls (above), golfing, fishing, and most of all, playing with cousins.

This is the start of one of the tributaries of the Snake River. It's a spring that bubbles up and turns into a river right in front of your eyes. The water was crystal clear. This was possibly the most picturesque place we saw.

There were a lot of cousins and second-cousins to play with.

The "triplets". This is the boys' cousin Sophia. They are all the same height and people will ask if they're triplets.

Yellowstone hot springs

Waiting for Old Faithful

I wish my camera was better, but this is a grizzly bear that was off the side of the road and she had three cubs with her. I thought it was by far the coolest wildlife we saw.

Yellowstone Falls

Preschool

The boys started preschool on Tuesday and were very excited about it. There going just around the corner to a lady who does it out of her basement. There teachers were worried about telling them apart, so we're going to use name tags for awhile and the boys thought that their masking tape name tags were awesome.

Siblings Trip

Mark, Jimmy and I had our first Siblings Weekend retreat last week. Jim and I flew to Milwaukee to visit Mark. We went to the lakefront,

riverwalk (this is the bronz Fonz),

The Dells (a tourist trap of a city where the Wisconsin river has been dammed along a gorge, where we went to a waterpark and amusement park,

and toured the med school.

Capital Reef

Last weekend Dan and I were able to take a trip to Capital Reef National Park, minus the boys who stayed with Maacka and G-pa Stapleton. It was awesome. Only a three hour drive from our house, campsite had grass and shade tress, and we ate at an amazing restaurant for dinner. Camping without cooking is so much better.
We hiked Sulfur Creek which included bypassing three waterfalls like this and crossing through water.
Dan's two co-workers and their two friends joined us. Unfortunately, Bertha didn't inform her friend it would be in the water and he went to great lengths to keep his new shoes dry, but eventually he lost the battle.


The day before Dan's friends came he and I hiked Burro Wash to an incredibly narrow slot canyon, about 18 inches across.