Octoberfest

 October was a very very busy month.  Have you seen this side of Miles?  We see it every night when his poor brother tries to go to bed.  Grant wants to sleep with him.  Miles says "I eed Dant" when we separate them. Miles still body slams Grant while Grant is trying to sleep.  Neither one wants to sleep by themselves.  So for about an hour, this little fellow shows up at our house.

 Below, Grant is patiently waiting to go to mass after getting out of his religion class.  This year is a big year for him.  He will have his first Communion (May 4th) and his first Reconciliation.  The Reconciliation part bothers him a lot.  He doesn't want to have to confess his sins to a priest.  "Why can't I just talk to God directly?"  he asked me one day.  Well buddy, you have to consult the Catholics on this one.  I am Protestant and we confess as a congregation using this prayer:

"Most merciful God, 

we confess that we have sinned against thee

in thought, word, and deed,

by what we have done,

and by what we have left undone.

We have not loved thee with our whole heart;

we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.

We are truly sorry and we earnestly repent.

For the sake of thy Son Jesus Christ, 

have mercy on us and forgive us;

that we may delight in thy will,

and walk in thy ways,

to the glory of thy Name. Amen."

He is afraid to tell the Priest that he flooded the school.  Ha! I guess he will think about things before he dumbly does what kids in the Captain Underpants books have done.

We spent the next weekend in the woods with his fellow cub scouts. He really enjoyed working on belt loops - archery, rock climbing, bb gun, and sling shot.

We didn't get to spend our entire weekend in the woods.  Unfortunately, my grandmother passed away.  We took off from the woods and went up to North Carolina to the funeral.  MeeMaw was very sick so it wasn't a shock.  My little 7 year old was an emotional wreck with it.  He wasn't sure how he should be feeling.  He summed it all up on the way home.  "I was really sad about MeeMaw dying and seeing her made me upset but I was happy to see all my family and cousins."  He was stuck to Aunt Rachael like glue.  On a side note, death has really gotten me down lately.  

 And then the next weekend, the boys took off to the Dauphin Island. I stayed home and organized closets and watched girl movies. Also, I did a little running.  I was training for a half marathon this month and was meeting Jill on Saturdays for long runs.

                          One day, I am going to make it there in October.  I hear it is beautiful.

Wurstig turned 10 years old this month and got to celebrate with an ice cream treat. He proceeded to vomit the rest of the night as an added bonus.

The last Saturday of October, my girlfriends (and our coach Russ) and I went for a little jog. 13.1 miles later we were enjoying the fact that we were able to do it again.  I seriously want to start heavy weight lifting.. my legs look scrawny.  I finished in 2 hours in 5 minutes (or something like that) which was almost 11 minutes faster than last year.  We all did great and I still can't believe I did it.  I had some serious Heart Rate scares lately but come to find out, I must be moving on to an athlete conditioned heart and my heart rate is just low now.

I came home and rested and then got ready to go the first annual Grant Park Lantern Parade!  Becca and Rob met us there.  I dyed Miles hair black since he was dressing up as Christopher Reeves or Superman.  I will never dye a kids hair again.  What a mess!  Becca let me borrow her Wonder Woman outfit and a guy at work let me borrow his invisible jet. 

Super Heros

Wonder WomEn (neighbor's child Hazel)

Lantern Parade

On Monday before Halloween, Grant, Miles, and I went to tour Oakland Cemetery with Grant's Cub Scouts.  Daniel was covered in deadlines during the month of October.  He worked a lot and missed out on a couple events.

Finally, Halloween!!!!  Grant went as Tron.  I was worried about people not recognizing what he was but that did not seem to be a problem.  Several guys screamed "how cool, he is Tron!"  I quickly figured out who were "gamers" in our neighborhood.

Miles LOVED trick or treating this year.  He jumped up and down every time he got a treat and all his candy fell out on the sidewalk.  He also learned to scream "Happy Halloween!" which got him lots of attention.

The True Super Heros!

The Oakland Crewe