Giving Thanks

We have a lot to be thankful for, not least our five boys. Here are a few specific things we are thankful for:
Good Schools
We are blessed to have a great elementary for Gabriel and Elijah and a wonderful preschool for David John and Benjamin. The preschool had a Thanksgiving play and feast. David John and Benjamin played their parts well.

Kids Night at Tutti Frutti
Family time at Tutti Frutti is always awesome. Since it frozen yogurt and not ice cream we usually count it as dinner and then supplement with a healthy snack when we get home. Of course, the boys always loudly ask while we are there, "Mom! Dad! Is this dinner?!?" Did I mention we are also very grateful for people who choose just not to judge.

Blue Skies, or lack thereof
One thing I LOVE about living in North Dakota are the beautiful skies here. They aren't always blue, but they are always gorgeous.
I love seeing the sunrise from my kitchen window every morning.

I love seeing the sunset when I drive home from a long day in Bismarck.

I love the frequent, beautiful rainbows we get here.

And I love the sundogs when it gets so cold that ice crystallizes in the air.

Elijah
I found some darling papers that Elijah wrote at school about what he is grateful for. I don't think I'll reproduce his awesome spellings but his list pretty much sums everything up.
"I am thankful for God and Jesus and Mom and Dad and love and clothes and food and light and brothers and blessings and friends and family and house and USA and money and school. I'm thankful for everything.

If Wishes Were Fishes

Well, no one asked for a fish for Christmas but what they did ask for is almost as special. You can tell that they wrote these in early November which happens to be shortly after Halloween. For posterity, here are the Ricks boys' Christmas wish lists for 2014 with original spelling.

Gabriel
My Chricmis List
Love Gabe
1. a scatbord
2. a bag of cookeis
3. a box of candy
4. a snoe globe
5. a airplane
6. a robot
7. a monster

Elijah
1. a 400 pes legos at desne land        (400 piece legos at Disneyland)
2. a 700 pees legos                            (700 piece legos)
3. a 100 pes pasl                                (100 piece puzzle)
4. ene star wors legos                        (any Star Wars legos)
5. halwing dinsor toy                         (Halloween dinosaur toy)
6. skre thigs av hlwing book             (scary things of Halloween book)
7. a skletin                                         (a skeleton)
8. is krim tuns                                    (ice cream, tons)
9. kade land gam                               (Candy Land game)
10. ROBOTS                                     (robots)
11. a mot cintrol ras kor                    (a remote control race car)
12. coke robts                                    (cookie robots)
13. choklit dinasrs                             (chocolate dinosaurs)
14. a cling up toy                               (a cleaning up toy)
15. mot cintrl mostrs                         (remote control monsters)

David John
David John's Christmas List
1. Frankenstein monster toy
2. a giant R2D2 toy
3. a giant trash chomper
4. a whole set of duplo blocks
5. a creepy zombie hand
6. Star Wars legos
7. concentration game
8. robot lips
9. robot pencil sharpener
10. a snap and break toy
11. silly monster toy
12. starcraft toys
13. gum
14. Jack and the Beanstalk book
15. Cold Prickly and Warm Fuzzy book

Benjamin
Dear Santa,
I want to tell you what presents I want.
1. a chocolate present
2. a scary blue present
3. a real present
4. a red present that has a ghost and a witch on it
5. a big witch on the wall
6. a big ghost costume
7. a lot of presents
8. a Wild Kratt movie
9. a wild snake
10. a Ghostbuster's snake
11. a real snake
12. a magic paint book
13. a robot toy
14. suction ball
15. car toy like Spiderman car
16. Spiderman toy

Who You Gonna Call?

Ghostbusters! That's right, it's time for the Halloween pictures.

They boys picked out their pumpkins and got ready to carve.

Tobias is still too young to draw, so he used our push-in plastic pieces.

Here are the other boys' carvings. Left to right those are the creative works of Benjamin, David John, Elijah and Gabriel. Lights on...

...and lights off.

The boys LOVE the movie Ghostbusters. David John wanted to be the "smarshmallow man" but we talked him into being Ray Stantz. Here are all of the costumes. The boys helped make their own proton packs and I pieced the rest of the costumes together. I made the Slimer costume out of a green pillowcase, a ball cap and some felt. I'm pretty much MacGyver.

Here they are all geared up and ready to catch a ghost. You've got Egon Spengler (who apparently goes cross-eyed when you take his glasses off), Winston Zeddemore (I already know that Benjamin does not have dark enough skin. The boys told me several times.), Peter Venkman ("Ray, what did you do Ray?") and Ray Stantz ("I thinked of the smarshmallow man!").

Oh yeah, they're packing.

He's small, he's green, he's Slimer! Too bad he's so cute. He's not exactly scary.

The whole gang loved trick-or-treating and our neighbors loved seeing our gang of Ghostbusters. 

They got a sick amount of candy and were on a sugar high for days. I think there was probably as much sugar in those Halloween buckets as there was in the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.