Family Day

Each year our family celebrates its very own Family Day the first Saturday of November. (Except last year we celebrated a month early.) The "holiday" began to commemorate the adoption of Marcus and Will but has now morphed into a celebration of the unique way that we all became a family. It doesn't matter what we do, just that we do it together as a family on this special day. This year we went bowling (which was Marcus's idea), followed by pizza at Pizza Hut, and rounded out the evening with some ice cream at home and presents for the kids.








On the day we found out about each of our children, we got them a stuffed animal. Marcus and Will got their pictures taken with their frogs on the first day that they were home with us.






And the first Family Day for these two...



Presents for everyone!


Sean and Aaron got elephant puppets. Marcus and Will received hand painted letters that we purchased when we were in Guatemala.

Taking Out Insurance on the Future

Happy Halloween

Hope your family had a great Halloween! This was the first year we carved pumpkins with the kids since Greg and I are boring people and dislike carving. It ended up being a fun evening. Marcus and Will decorated two pumpkins with kits they got from the birthday party mentioned in the previous post, while Greg and I handled the knives. Greg's pumpkin was supposed to be Gus from the tv series "Breaking Bad" although it didn't turn out like he expected. I made the completely awesome witch.


The little guys were skeletons.


The big guys were both going to be Steelers players but Marcus decided at the last minute that he wanted to wear his dragon costume from last year.


I made the big kids pose with a pile of snow that was leftover from a few days prior. It reminded me of a photo my mom took one year of our jack-o-lanterns covered in snow.


Even though the snow was mostly gone, the weather was not so good. It was cold and as I was snapping these pictures it started to rain. The big guys had layers of clothes under their costumes. The little guys had their costumes covered up by their snow suits that had little bear ears on them.


It was raining pretty good when trick-or-treating started. The little kids and I caught up with the big kids and Greg when the rain started to let up. It was a good night, even though Marcus was slightly bummed we didn't hit up more houses. And I made it all the way to November 2nd before stealing any of my kids' candy!

Speed Blogging: October (minus Halloween)

I'm never going to catch up on blogging so here is a picture heavy post of what we did in October, not including Halloween.

Sean stole Aaron's sock and then ate it.


I started giving Sean and Aaron a bath together. This is one of the most difficult things I have ever done. I've never wrestled a greased pig but I imagine it is like doing that, times two.


We've hung out together.


We've stared off into the distance together.


We went to Grandpa Sam's 88th birthday party, and all the Kline men got to be together for the first time.


We've enjoyed the colors of fall.


We had brunch with our buddy Henry.


We went to a festival at Marcus's school where he had his face painted.


Marcus had his first trumpet lesson, and insisted that he had to march while playing. Not sure where he even picked up that playing a trumpet and marching go together.


Aaron had his first piano lesson.


I ordered kid sized rakes online for the big kids. The little kids enjoyed the box.



I didn't look too closely at the photos of the rakes I bought and ended up with two mostly pink rakes. My big kids didn't care. They were really excited about raking. Greg and I were really excited about free child labor.


Then there was lots of playing in the leaves.








We put babies in a bag.


We put babies in a box of balls.




Sean played with his favorite pup.


Sean was adamant about taking a nap.


We went to Henry's first birthday party at a pumpkin farm.


While there, we went in a corn maze.


The little guys tried out the backpack carriers for the first time while there.



Aaron passed out mid-pumpkin picking.


We came home with four very cute pumpkins.





We kept up with our dental hygiene.


We played with hockey nets. Aaron likes to try to lift everything over his head. This was no exception.


Sean likes to taste things. This was no exception.


It snowed.


My dad had a birthday.


We carved and decorated pumpkins.


And finally, Aaron and Sean had their first (baby sized) Eat 'n Park Smiley Cookie.