Happy Halloween!

So Halloween finally arrived. Morgan was very excited to officially go "Trick or Treating." All morning long she kept asking me "Mommy, time to go yet?" To which I kept trying to explain that we were not going until 5:30 when Luke came down to get her. Then about 5 minutes later we would have the same conversation again.

Through all the events we did leading up to Halloween Morgan some how ended up with five pumpkins this year (one is hidden beneath her new kitty). She also ended up with a new Halloween Kitty cat thanks to Grandma MaryAnn and Grandpa Steve. Morgan is so spoiled every time we go over to Matt and Georgia's house.

So after a long day of asking if it was time to go yet 5:30 finally arrived and it was time to get Morgan all fancied up and ready to go. I had some extra boa so I decided that Morgan's wheelchair should get fancied up a bit too. We then headed out front to wait for Luke, Matt, Georgia, and Grandma Linda to arrive.

Morgan was very excited to have a Trick or Treat buddy this year. This was the first time she was actually going to go to houses other than her Aunt Georgia and Uncle Matt's to trick or treat.

And we're off. Morgan was a crazy driver that night. I think she was so distracted by Lucas as she kept looking for him and was just so excited about everything that she couldn't control herself. We planned to go only to the houses we knew in our neighborhood, but of course the first two we went to no one was home. As we continued around the block towards Matt and Georgia's house there were a couple of people out in their driveways so we let Morgan stop there.

She did a great job driving right up to the people, stopping, saying Trick or treat, and then Thank you.

We stopped at one more house that Matt knew before heading down to their house.

When we got to Matt and Georgia's they went in ahead of us so Morgan could ring the door bell and Trick or Treat at their house. As usual she was spoiled at the Johnson's by the grandparents. Grandma Linda and Grandpa Don couldn't just hand out candy to Morgan, they bought her a Fancy Nancy sticker book too.

Can you tell that she LOVED the book?

Before heading home for the evening we took Morgan in to play with Lucas for a few minutes. She and Luke found a Frankenstein doll that dances and sings and Morgan was in heaven. She stood in front of the doll dancing the whole time we were there.

After saying good night we headed home to pass out candy to our trick or treaters. By this time it was still really early, only about 6:30. Handing out candy ended up being Morgan's favorite part of the night. I left her in her wheelchair so she could get to the door quickly to help me. Every time we would finish handing out candy she would say "Mommy, who's next? Who's next Mommy?" She was so excited to see all the kids in costume. She would then zoom into the office where David was to inform him of who was at the door each time.

It was so exciting to see Morgan at Halloween this year as she has now reached the age where she understands the holidays. I can't wait until Christmas!

Decorating Pumpkins

Since Morgan is a little too young for carving pumpkins we decided to invite her good friends Maggie and Lindsey and their new baby sister Emmy over for some pumpkin decorating instead. We gathered supplies much safer for 2-4 year olds like paint, glitter glue, fake grass, stickers, etc... and set up a table in the backyard since the weather was beautiful.

The girls all had a good time painting their pumpkins.

All three of them especially enjoyed the glitter glue!

Morgan kept putting dots of glitter glue everywhere saying, "Look Mommy, eyes!" Her pumpkin must have had like 15 eyes.

With a little help from me we did an actual face on the backside on her creation. We then added "hair" together.

On a side note we did allow Morgan to "carve" a pumpkin. We carved pumpkins at Matt and Georgia's house the evening before. Morgan helped pull the seeds out and by that I mean she pulled about three. She was not really into the feeling of the guts of the pumpkin. She then told David what type of eyes she wanted and was very excited to see them come out, but about 1 minute into it she lost complete interest and wanted to go play with Luke. So the kids ended up in one room playing while Matt and David sat together carving the pumpkins. After they were finished carving they lite the pumpkins, turned out the lights, and brought the kids in to see them. Morgan loved her pumpkin and turned to David and said, "Thank you Daddy, carve pumpkin." She is just so sweet! She thanks us for everything without even being prompted. I wish I had pictures of that, but I can't seem to find them (they are most likely on David's phone).

Morgan's First Field Trip!

The Friday before Halloween Morgan's preschool had their first field trip. They were heading out to Apple Annie's to go to the pumpkin patch. Although we had just gone a few weeks earlier I didn't want Morgan to miss out on going with her classmates. And, since Lucas's grandparents were visiting and they wanted to take him to the pumpkin patch we made it a trip with Luke again too. Morgan and I decided to drive up separate for two reasons: 1. so we could take her wheelchair and 2. call me crazy, but I just don't feel comfortable letting my 3 year old go on a bus without seat belts. So, we headed up on our own and met the buses there.

Morgan was so excited to be able to hang out with her buddy Brady. Although they go to the same school they are in different classes with different recess times, so it was great for them to finally have the chance to spend some time together.

After a brief science lesson we headed into the corn maze. Morgan did an amazing job navigating her wheelchair through the maze.

Morgan and Seth had a blast racing through the maze to find the next number sign.

Morgan would then shout "Miss Katie" until Miss Katie caught up to read them the next clue on which way to turn in the maze.

Morgan successfully found her way out of the maze!

Morgan and Brady enjoying the hayride together.

Again, Morgan wanted to hold her pumpkin. Maybe next year we will have to invoke the "you pick what you can carry" rule.

Yet again we attempted to get a photo of Morgan and Lucas together.

Ready to head in for some lunch.

Morgan and JoLynn spending some time together. She is the best!

VIP Fall Festival

As though I am not busy enough taking care of Morgan and working part time, for the past year and a half (before Morgan was even in preschool) I have been helping run the preschool parent group (it is basically a PTA). I am not sure how I got roped into heading this up. So, needless to say I have been busy helping out with that and this year we decided to try to put on a Fall Festival at the preschool to give the kids a chance to trick or treat at school and for families to get to meet.

It actually turned out to be a great event. We had a lot of families come and the teachers and paraprofessionals did an amazing job transforming their rooms into fun Halloween themed centers. In one room there was face painting and a bean bag toss, then there was a "Dance Party" room complete with disco lights (Morgan didn't want to leave this room), there was a pumpkin science room, and then fishing and bowling in the last room. We even had 14 of the high schoolers that come into the preschool as part of their child development class volunteer to come and help run centers.

Morgan all "fancied" up for the night.

Morgan had fun bowling.

With a little help from her dad she was able to knock them all down!

Decorating pumpkins in the pumpkin science room.

Enjoying a little pumpkin pie playdough time.

Morgan was SO excited to see her parapro JoLynn. She had asked JoLynn if she would dress like Fancy Nancy too and she did!

Morgan checking out all JoLynn's fancy accessories. She kept looking at JoLynn all night and smiling and laughing. She thought it was so funny that they were both Fancy Nancy.

Picking out her face painting with Ms. Amber.

Holding still.

Checking out her bat.

It was a fun night, but we were ready to go home. Morgan was exhausted when we got home and was very sad when I told her it was time to wash the bat off.

Ready for cake, please!

So I continue to be way behind.... two Sunday's ago was Lucas's birthday party. Again, Morgan spent the whole day playing "Happy Birthday baby Yuke" with her baby doll and birthday cake. She also spent most of the day saying "Mommy, time to go, Yuke's birthday party, eat cake." Yes, Morgan has officially figured out that birthday parties and cake go hand in hand.

For Luke's present Morgan picked out a giant blue ball.

Luke loves to investigate Morgan's walker. If he could I think he would take it all apart and try to figure out how each part works.

Luke's adorable cake that Morgan spotted right away. She spent the rest of the afternoon asking to eat cake. In fact, she ate only about two bites of her dinner and pushed her plate away saying, "Mommy, ready for cake please."

After cake it was time for presents. Morgan helped Lucas open the present from us. We then had fun teaching Lucas how to golf. Morgan even made a hole in one!

Happy 1st Birthday Baby Luke!
(Now if only we can get Morgan to just call him Luke)

A Birthday Celebration at the Zoo Take 2

On Lucas's actual birthday Georgia wanted to head to the zoo again for the Halloween Zoolights. This is a fun evening where our zoo decorates with lots of lights and people dressed up and the kids can trick or treat through the zoo. We had done this once before when Morgan was about 18 months old. It is a fun evening, but is always very crowded. This time we were prepared though and bought tickets ahead of time. We debated before going as to if we should bring the wheelchair or not (with lots of kids around it always makes us nervous) but we figured Morgan needs to learn to deal with it in crowds and lately every time we go out she asks if we brought her wheelchair or walker. So, we brought the big wheelchair and figured since we had a large enough group (Matt, Georgia, Lucas, his Grandma Linda, Grandpa Don, Aunt Shawna, Grandma MaryAnn, Grandpa Steve, plus the three of us) we could all just box out around Morgan and if anyone got ran over it would just be one of us.

Morgan was super excited about going Trick or Treating at the zoo and celebrating Lucas's birthday. That day we must have had at least 5 birthday parties with her baby Luke and her birthday cake.

Fancy Nancy and Superman ready to hit the zoo.

A rare family photo.

Morgan loved seeing all the different characters and kept telling who each one was.

This year Morgan had down how to say "Trick or Treat" and "thank-you" of course not everyone can understand her. But at least her 'thank-you' is now thank you and not what it used to be :)

Morgan wanted to stop and say hi to all the people dressed up in character.

And of course she wanted to join the dance party!

I love being fancy!

Thankfully despite all the candy she got that night Morgan's favorite thing was the giant pink glitter pencil. So she played with the pencil while David and I enjoyed all her candy. I wonder how many more years we can get away with that?