Elivs is in the Building

My youngest boy Andrew has very few inhibitions.  I am not used to this in a middle school student.  It's like he has no self conscious side.  This characteristic is admired by his mother and makes his older brothers uncomfortable for him.  But it sure is entertaining!

This morning he is proving this once again with his whole hearted-desire to go to his new middle school dressed up as the King.

The King is not as full of himself as you might think.  Here is was spotted loading the dishes.

The King made his own bed and ate a humble meal of Rice Krispies for breakfast.

The King obediently wore his rubber bands on his braces this morning claiming that "Elvis is nothing without his band(s)!"

Oh thank the heavens for this child!  He cracks me up!  And he has promised to tell everyone who bedazzled his thrift-store pleather jacket with this awesome star....

"His Mama!"

"Thank you very much!"

PS: The engagement ring in the last post is Marcy Whatcott's

Guess that engagement ring!

Thanks for playing 'guess that baby' with me.  You must have all been scratching your heads on that one eh?  That cute sleepy guy is none other than April Whatcott Kimball's baby Thomas.  I hear he had a fussy night last night so let's hope things get better soon.  We all know how tough being a new mom can be!

Speaking of new events, I am aware of two recent engagements in our family.  Here is a ring for you to shield your eyes from and then take a guess at who's ring it is.  There's no prize for the winner but just sheer pride in the fact that you know who's getting married to who in the family.  Maybe I could get Dad to part with a can of bacon from the basement for the winner if you guess it right.  I do have some pull there...

Now here's the sparkly ring.

"I've always wanted a sparkly of my very own"

                                                                     Jeremy, Secret of NIMH

Now for how to guess:  Click on the word "comments" 

and type your answer in the box.  

Then hit return...

Guess That Baby!

One of the more recent additions to Keith and Gwen's long list of great grandchildren 

Costume Discussion

In our household we LOVE Halloween.  I actually start talking about possible costumes over a month early.  I know, call me crazy, because kids change their minds so much about what they want to be so I should probably not open my big mouth yet.  But if you want great costumes (and you have 5 kids) you gotta give it more than a week to think about (in my humble opinion).  Ebay is one of our favorite places to costume shop and the good ones go first, so we like to get a jump on things.

So yesterday afternoon I was having a casual chat with Audrey (age 7) while she colored with sidewalk chalk.  Eliza (3 yrs) listened in.  Eliza and I have already had conversations about her costume.  At one point she and I had decided it would be fun to go as Miss Nelson and Viola Swamp.  I would love to dress up like Viola Swamp.  I even have a great swampy voice I can do for her.  However, surprisingly Eliza was vying for the role of Ms Swamp.  I guess I could go as Miss Nelson.  It's much less fun though.  I gotta say my hat is off to Eliza for wanting to branch out into such a deep character at the tender age of three.  In the end we thought re-cycling an excellent Cinderella costume for her this year would be the final answer (for now).

So my conversation with Audrey was also surprising.  I wonder sometimes if she isn't growing up a bit too fast.  That happens when you are surrounded by older siblings I suppose.  Or maybe I am just screwing up as a mother.  That could also be the case.  It turns out that my 7 year old teenager wants to be something "dead."  When I suggested a pretty harmless mummy perhaps she said "no like a dead cheerleader or a dead bride or something"  We started kidding around a bit and I suggested we take one of her old costumes like the gypsy from last year and just add our skeleton hands and call it a dead gypsy.  Or perhaps we could invent dead Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz.  Of coarse I was kidding.  People would think we are nuts (we are).  Then the funniest of things happened.  Eliza who had been taking this all in got up and came over to me.  She put her cute little face right in mine and whispered "are you sinking what I'm sinking?"  I confessed I didn't know what she was 'sinking.'  Then she said with a serious tone "dead Cinderella!"

I could have died from laughter.