This is what you missed at the Webb's house tonight.

Our traditional Halloween chimichungas. I swear I could open a Mexican restaurant. Nothing spooky about these fried burritos except the calories. Delish! Robin and Brenda, how did your chimis turn out? As a side note, I didn't have any salsa on hand so I opened a can of Great Value Fire Roasted Tex Mex tomatoes. They are as good as any bottled salsa, at a fraction of the price.

We hit a few neighbors at our complex and then headed to the ajoining neighborhood. There were tons of families and trick or treaters. This was at the third house. Empty buckets. Then the kids started running from house to house, bucket got heavier and heavier. By the end of the night Josh had abandoned his bucket and was just accepting candy into his sweaty palm.

End of the night. Look how full Andy's bucket is. Toots rode in the stroller. His costume zipper broke as kraig was putting it on him. That didn't stop people from ooo-ing and awww-ing over him. Most people thought he was an "Angry Bird" instead of just a plain old duck.

NAnanananana

No joke. Josh said, "This is what dead mommies look like." as I was snapping this photo. Stinker.

The first year this costume was worn. Man, I have handsome kids.

The second time the costume was worn. Yup, still handsome.

This duck costume just keeps on giving!

Happy Halloween!

ADD YOUR CAPTION

Sometimes I have so many funny quips to add to a photo, I just can't decide which one to use. Please fill the comment box with your captions to this photo of Thomas. Have fun!

Thursday Photo Dump

I just can't get it together to do a real blog post. But here are a few photos I've been wanting to share. Enjoy!

A friend gave the kids a drivable tractor. Hours of enjoyment.

Josh drives like a maniac.

I took the kids to the carnival at the church across the street from our house. It was super fun!

A good friend was taking photos.

Why doesn't our church do pony rides at the Harvest Party? They were a hit!

Andrew might be the next Man from Snowy River...Or Boy from Dry Riverbed.



Thomas had a little surgery done. He loved cruising up and down the halls waiting to go back to pre-op.



This kid has a great smile.

Kraig was able to take time off work to come and be with Thomas and I after the surgery. Toots wanted nothing to do with the stuffed animal and balloon Daddy brought, but practically leaped into Kraig's arms when he walked in.

This was right after the surgery. He was still really groggy from the anesthesia. But handsome nonetheless.

It's raining, it's pouring, the old man is snoring..

There was some actual, gully washing rain last weekend. It was fantastic. My children wanted to run and play in it, it was such a novelty. Do they forget that rain is not new to them? I cannot even imagine what it will be like when they see snow again.  Hello? We used to live in a blizzard state.

 

In other exciting news, Thomas decided to use a fork this morning to eat his pancakes! What a smarty!

Here's the wind-up...

...and the pitch...

HOME RUN! That pancake is out of here!

This is all of my boys taking out the trash. I don't know why I got so emotional, but I was nearly choked up seeing all of them together. What handsomeness!

Last weekend we went downtown for one last evening with the bats. We left early enough to walk along the lake before sundown. It was a beautiful evening. What a pretty city I live in.

The 400 Club

This is my 400th Blog post! Woo Hoo!

It's been quite a month, and unfortunately I didn't document it all very well with photos. Let's start at the beginning...

The Sunday night before labor day some serious fires broke out across Central Texas and the Greater Austin Area, with one just a few miles away in Steiner Ranch, a subdivision within our ward boundaries. The entire subdivision was evacuated for three days. All of the fires were devastating, especially the one in Bastrop where 1500 homes were lost. Fortunately, the Steiner Ranch fire was contained relatively quickly and less than 30 homes were lost.



Happy Birthday to ME!



So it may sound heartless, but to celebrate my birthday, we had rented a pontoon to spend the morning together on the lake on Labor Day. I know. Our friends' homes were in danger of fire, they'd been evacuated and displaced, and we were kickin' it on Lake Travis. I tried to not let the guilt be a downer to my special day.

"One day they might actually let me drive this thing for real"

We enjoyed a lovely morning on the water with a few friends. Because of the draught, the water level of the lake is at an all time low. That's one of the reasons we choose a pontoon instead of a ski boat. The pontoon was perfect for lounging and visiting, cruising fast enough for a breeze, but not so fast that miss worrywart herself had to be concerned with the exposed rocks, islands, and trees.




Don't know why the photo didn't rotate. But doesn't it look like I know what I'm doing?



Three kids awake



Two kids asleep

Tuesday, my actual birthday, I was surprised twice! Kraig came home at lunch time and brought me a treat and several of my girlfriends gathered to celebrate my birthday at a local restaurant. It was a lovely day and I felt loved by those around me. Especially from Andrew who gave me two packs of gum, and from Josh who gave me a pumpkin because I love orange. :)

A few of my dear friends here in Austin.



A few weeks later my dear Mother came to visit. We had originally scheduled her visit to be here during a little surgery of Thomas', but the surgery was rescheduled for next month, and so I was able to enjoy a lovely visit with my mom. We celebrated her birthday while she was here AND got to go see Gladys Knight preform. Oh, and we played a few hands of Rencher Uno.

This is my cute Mom. Can anyone guess how old she is?

Here are a few extra photos of my crazy kids from this month.


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Josh made Thomas a headband like the stripling warriors. He even wrote Thomas' name on it. No, this is not the reverse of the photo. He actually write all of his words backwards. Might be a left handed thing?

 

Thomas spends a lot of time in the stroller walking back and forth to the bus stop 4 times a day. He's a good sport.

 

Maybe I should buy a few more wii remotes so everyone can play...

Thomas has almost mastered horsey rides with Daddy.

Orange is the new appliance

I had a friend stop by this evening and ask me what my favorite color was. Hello? My kitchen is bathed in orange from the dishes to the tablecloth. And now to the blender.  Ooo! It makes me so happy. We needed a new blender so that I could make Brenda's green smoothies, and this orange one just happened to be on sale yesterday. And the best part was that it was only a $14 commitment. The blender will probably last as long as the novelty of having an orange appliance. We can then part ways amicably and I can go back to my pewter color themed appliances.

My Sweet made me some delicious Orange Julius for the first blender grind.

In other news, Thomas has been working very hard at walking. He took his first few un-assisted steps last week and was a ROCK STAR today during therapy, really showing off his new moves to his therapist. Here's just a little taste. Before I know it, this boy will be running from room to room stirring up mischief.

 



Watch the video a few times. Listen closely to what Andrew is telling Joshua in the background. It is in reference to this mask he brought home today from his theater arts class. I might have nightmares. What are they teaching him?



So scary. He colored and cut it himself.

Finally the BooHoo comes

Well, it happened. I was finally sad that I sent my child off into the care of another adult. But, it was  my little Thomas and it was only 90 minutes of nursery on Sunday. What is it? I know all of these people very well (much better than I know Andrew and Joshua's teachers/bus drivers, and yet I trust them daily with my children). The adults that are responsible for the nursery in our ward are entirely capable and engaging, and yet I teared up and couldn't hardly leave my little boy. 

Certainly I couldn't leave without a photo or five.

Ok, mom. I will allow you one more picture and then you have to leave me. This is getting embarrassing!

In other news, Thomas is my new favorite helper with the laundry. He is an ace at unloading the clothes from the washer, handing them to mama, and then going back for another handful. I suppose this isn't that unusual. Both Andrew and Joshua went through that phase, but Toots is the first one to really get into his job and climb into the washer to get those last few socks and shirts. Talk about great job performance!

What the?!?! How do I get out now, Mama?

And lastly, just because I've set a goal for myself this week that I needed to get some sewing projects done, here is what I did this morning. Once again, it is some retro fabric that I inherited from my mother. I used part of the fabric a few years ago to make some pillows for the kids for valentine's day (Don't ask. I don't have any idea why.) When I picked Joshua up from the bus wearing this skirt this morning, he said, "Hey! Did you use my pillow to make that?"

**Update** I just picked Andrew up from the bus and he gave the skirt a long look and said, "Wow! How did you make that?" "I sewed it today. Do you like it?" "Yah! It looks just like my pillow" I am assuming he meant the fabric and not my volumptious curves :)

I don't generally tuck my shirt in, but I wanted to show off the three different lines of the skirt. Joshua took the photos of my skirt and didn't include my head in any of them. It's just as well, I suppose. I didn't do my hair today ;)

And, I am pleased to announce that I have stepped into a new phase of blogging. Yes, I am now using the new version of blogger. And it had nothing to do with my old computer and running on windows XP, simply a button miss-click. Thanks for the headsup, Robin