Thanksgiving Play

right to left:

Gabby, Jared and Hannah...
















Jared has a fabulous kindergarten teacher! She put together a musical play for her class and invited all the parents to join in a pot luck Thanksgiving lunch with the kids. The songs they sang were so cute. The final lines of the final song went something like this - "All I really need is food in my belly, a song in my heart, and love in my family..." It was so cute to see all these squirrelly kids grinning and singing (some louder than others...hee hee hee).

Greeting the natives...

The Pilgrims sailing on the Mayflower...

Sunday afternoon naps...

After Baby...

Before baby...

Funny boy

Does this kid know how to accessorize or what!

Fashion forward "green" rain

gear - way to recycle Ethan - and

Pajamas with teeth to match!

Happy Halloween!

It's time to cowboy up for some rootin' tootin' trick-or treat!

Cowboy Jared was so excited to go trick-or-treating! Cowboy Ethan looks like he was "rode hard and put away wet." Scott said Ethan fell asleep before they even got to the first tower to trick-or-treat at.

Pumpkin Carving

Pumpkin Guts are "greasy..."

What kind of boys don't like slimey, gooey, gross, things?

Jared and Ethan, that's who!

I guess we focus on cleanliness too much...

Scott made Jared and Ethan put their hands in their pumpkins - Ethan was not happy about it!

Scooping the pumpkins out was okay as long as nothing touched their hands...

aww teamwork...

Eeeww! Why are we doing this dad?

Voila! The finished product!

Scott's is the biggest (the one with the goofy teeth), mine is the mid-sized pumpkin with the sideways grin, Jared's is the one next to mine on the chair (he drew his face all by himself) and Ethan's pumpkin has the same face as his ghost.

Cookie Monsters

We made Halloween Sugar Cookies to eat with our Spooky dinner.

Ghosts, pumpkins, bats, cats, and Frankenstein feet!

We love Halloween treats!

"C" is for cookie and cookie good for me!

Yumm, yumm, yummy!

Rewind...

Bomba!!!

For Hispanic Heritage month Jared learned a dance

called Bomba from Puerto Rico.

He is learning Spanish in school and loves to come home

and tell me the names of colors and phrases he has learned in class.

New Addition

Christian Reed Pierce

Born October 29, 2009

2:12 pm

Weight: 6lbs 15oz

Length: 19.5 inches

The big brothers are so pleased to meet baby after all the waiting!

All my boys!

Enjoying Mom's last meal in the hospital. Hurray for going home!

Happy to be home at last!

GQ Jared

Sunday after church Scott took Jared to Mikasa Park and held a photo shoot.

What a handsome boy. Just had to share.

Golden Book Award!

Jared was awarded the Golden Book award for excellent behavior in class. The teacher wrote The following on Jared's certifcate as the reason for selecting him:

"Jared is a charming young man and an outstanding classroom citizen. He listens carefully, follows directions, and is respectful. Jared is always kind to his peers. He loves coming to school and is an enthusiastic learner. It is a great pleasure to be his teacher. Jared is truly a golden boy!"

Jared was featured with the other golden book winners on the closed circuit television program at school and got to sign his name in the Golden Book with a golden pen.

Jared we are so proud of you! Keep up the good work!

Sweet Sunday!

Yesterday morning I woke up to Jared holding a bag of bread in my face and asking me to close it back up with the twisty-tie. When I asked him what he was doing he smiled really big and just said, "Last Sunday in Primary class we talked about how we could show our moms and dads that we love them and Marissa said, well she wasn't the first person to say it, but she said that we could make them breakfast in bed. So I thought that I would make you toast because cold cereal would be too messy in your bed." (Scott was already gone to early morning meetings.) After giving him a really big hug I told him that I'm pretty messy with toast too so I'd come eat it with him out at the kitchen table. He put the bread in the toaster all by himself and buttered his own slice (I buttered mine - he likes a little more butter than I do :)). After eating breakfast together - something we almost never do he got all ready for church and still had time to make Halloween cards. Just had to share - it was too sweet to keep it to myself!

Sunset after the Typhoon

The Little Known (to tourists) Kamakura

Our last Saturday excursion left us with a few new memories and stirred up some old ones...like what it feels like to sit in a car for 6 hours! We were searching for a cave and a shrine but missed our turn and ended up in Enoshima (but that meant we got to have apple mango vanilla swirl ice cream cones). When we turned around we found that we couldn't take the road that Scott googled because it was a one way so we ended up on the "two way" street previously shown on the blog and tried a new route. Our valley excursion was a dead end - no cave and no shrine but there were tangled thorny vines and 6-12" grass all over the valley floor to climb through (I was wearing flip-flops - smart I know) and every single leaf on the vines seemed to have a red and black caterpillar hanging from its underside!

There really was no trail but at the top of the valley there were some mysterious cave like cut outs in the cliff wall and a sign explaining that the valley belonged to the Hojo Clan. So a few mosquito bites and scratches later (did I mention the enormous spiders and their webs?) we turned around and headed back for the car but not before we also found these awesome velvet flowers. Mom, could you identify them for me?

This little jungle valley was given to the Hojo clan in the 1500's for their service to the government.

The Hojo clan (北条氏) in the History of Japan was a family of regents of the Kamakura Shogunate. The family had actual governmental power, rather than Kamakura shoguns, who were merely legal symbols.