Legos, Chili and More

Posted byNatalie King
Hudson is 10 months and Ruthie is 8.5 months old and they are maniacs. They barrel through the house, chasing each other, wrestling, biting and playing. They are trouble makers who continually steal things off the end tables (the remote controls, the ipads, books, a box of kleenex), and who stand directly under my feet while I cook dinner (if I end up with a broken neck, it will 100% be because of them). But they are our sweet babies and while we would certainly have a cleaner house and yard without them, I’m glad that they are part of our family. 
We are 6 weeks into kindergarten and on Friday we had conferences with Xander’s teacher. It was really fun to talk to her about how he’s doing. We didn’t have any concerns, and she was very complimentary of how well he gets along with other kids and his academic progress. She showed us samples of his writing- his letters and numbers are looking good. Her updates are LONG and detailed and I love them. I love seeing videos that the art, gym, french, drama and music teachers share. It is so fun to see him learning and growing. Augustus had bug week at his school and did a lot of fun projects with insects. 
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Xander got a super cool gift from Aunt Kara and Uncle Jud (and baby Nell)- a lego hat! You can make your own designs with tiny little pieces. He spent a long time on the perfect design and was very proud of himself. 

On Friday, Xander had his first day off and so we took a family trip to the Lego Store at the Mall of America. Augustus picked out a lego set within about 3 minutes. Xander shops the same way I do, which is to say he looked at and touched every single lego set in the store and then agonized over the right choice. 45 minutes into our shopping trip, I was fully prepared to buy the 7000 piece Millennium Falcon set just to get us out of there, but luckily, Nate was able to help him find a great set for 6 year olds. We went out to lunch and then headed home, where Xander spent 2.5 hours totally focused on building an underwater sub station. It turned out super cool! 

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On Friday night, Nate and the boys had happy hour with the whole neighborhood, but I missed out as I was volunteering at a YMCA fundraising event. I have hosted trivia night for CYC for many years and several years ago, I started also hosting the YMCA trivia night (with the same questions I use for each CYC night). It was a super fun night and I got to see some of my Y friends, which I always enjoy. 

Saturday was another neighborhood marathon of fun. We started the day with coffee, hot chocolate and donuts, as well as a Bags tournament. The littlest of the kiddos have recently been stripping down as soon as they get together and running through the neighborhood in just undies. I will be reminding all of them about that when they are about 14 years old. Gussie and the girls literally spent the whole day in underwear, but if the weather cooperates, I am happy to let him run wild and free. We all hung out until lunch, at which point we all went home to eat and rest. 

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At 4, we all started heading back outside and at 5, it was time for the chili buffet- not a cook off, because no one wanted to criticize anyone else. We had 4 kinds of chili, cornbread, cookies, chips, grapes… it was a full buffet of food. I tasted all 4 of the chilis and they were all excellent. We had so many people outside and even one random neighbor who happened to be walking her dog and we lured her in. It was quite a spectacle! We stayed outside until it was completely dark and then we dragged the children inside for baths and bedtime. 
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Sunday was another gorgeous, unseasonably warm day. The boys spent the day with my mom, and then came home and ran right outside to play until dinner and then after dinner. We are loving this gorgeous fall weather and I hope it continues let us be outside for weeks to come! 
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