Halloween fun

For Halloween this year, Hannah decided to dress up as a pirate and Ethan dressed as a knight. Caleb didn't really have a costume, but looked quite cute in his borrowed puppy dog jacket and outfit with puppy dog feet. Of course, being the smiliest baby alive (NO KIDDING!!), he generally looks cute no matter what he's wearing. Okay, I have to digress into a little Caleb sharing....he really does smile and laugh ALL the time. (Except in the car!) Even if he's dead tired, you can generally get a smile out of him. He just loves people, and loves being talked to. He's really started to love interacting with Cullen over the last few weeks, which has been fun to see. He sees him from a little way away and watches him, to see if Cullen will talk to him or do something to make him laugh. He especially loves being naked and having us kiss his belly and neck. He cracks up laughing. He sort of does this wierd screech.....I call it his "constipated" laugh, because that's how it sounds. :)

Anyway, back to Halloween. We got together with small group friends again. A few of us met up at the Maynards' house to walk their street for trick-or-treating. the kids had a lot of fun. Hannah and Ethan are the oldest of the bunch. Ethan was always the first at each door....he was also usually the last to linger. I think he hoped they would come around to him again and forget they had already given him candy ;).






The pirate and knight in action poses.









Daddy and his kiddos.







Aren't they a cute pair?
Trick or treating with our friends (that's Lucas Brown to the left and Juliette to the right).


The moms and babies!! (Heather was borrowing Hannah's pirate hat. Doesn't she look cute?)















Lily and Juliette looking adorable in their Little House on the Prairie outfits.

At the Farm

Well, we've managed to go to TWO farms this October for pumpking-buying, apple-picking, apple cider-drinking, etc. At the beginning of the month we went with some of our small group friends---our "cousins" in Wheaton. We bought two big pumpkins and carved them, which was fun. Only the pumpkins rotted after a week or so. Oh well. Then last weekend we got to celebrate with our literal cousin LUCAS and his daddy Brad (who share the same birthday!) by going to another farm. Hannah and Ethan got to experience their first ever pony ride!! They loved it! Enjoy some pictures below.


Small groupies:














Cullen and our adorable friend Lily.



Todd and Hannah


The kids had fun on the "apple train". . . . .
























our other adorable "cousin," Juliette. . . .



LUCAS' BIRTHDAY:

Ethan and Lucas playing on the wood train

















Hannah and Isaac




















Pony rides! Hannah had Freckles, and Ethan had Black Jack.






























My beautiful sister and her husband Brad (it was his birthday too!)

Caleb at three months

Well, as Cullen says, we have "finally entered the 21st century" and have high-speed internet. YAY!!!! so I will actually be blogging more now, since I can upload pictures a little faster than 5 minutes per photo :).












Caleb is such a fun, sweet baby! He is SUPER talkative. He loves complaining to you when he's getting tired. Think of "ah-oh"s in varying tones. He loves to be held and snuggled and talked to. He HATES the car and screams like nuts most of the time. Thank goodness Nana and Grandaddy are helping us fly down to Georgia for Christmas this year!

So here are a few pictures of Caleb, just in his little baby seat and his swing. The last one is the best smile we have so far on film. Enjoy!

Caleb looking a little serious

What a cutie!!

Caleb James has arrived!

Caleb James Rodgers-Gates arrived on Saturday June 30th at 12:02 pm.

Caleb means "faithful" and is taken from Caleb in the Old Testament--he was one of the 12 spies sent out by the Jewish people to scope out the land God had promised to him. While 10 of the spies said "The people are huge and there's no way we can take them down", Caleb (along with Joshua) believed God and trusted that He would give them the land He had promised, that He would enable them to overcome the people of the land. I've always pictured him as a fiery old man, who wasn't afraid to say it like it is and go against the flow.

James is a family name. Mandy's uncle Jim has been a caring, supportive presence in her life, as well as somebody who can always make you laugh! Also, Cullen's dad Ron goes by his middle name--his first name is actually James! We pray that Caleb can grow to be full of love and laughter like his great uncle Jim, and that he can grow to love and trust God with the kind of strong faith he sees in his Grandaddy Gates.

After spending a couple days in the "special care nursery" for some rapid breathing, Caleb came home with us on Tuesday July 3rd. Hannah and Ethan are fully enjoying him, as we knew they would. Hannah loves to snuggle with him, and Ethan literally can't stay away from him! Caleb gets lots of kisses and lots of love :). Hannah and Ethan have also been helping Daddy take care of Mommy, as her body's taking a little more time to recover this time around. We're so thankful for our three wonderful kids!

At the hospital....












At home.....

Preschool programs

Hannah and Ethan finished up preschool on the 1st of June. In mid-May they had their end of the year programs--which basically entail singing four action songs (lasting a total of 5 to 7 minutes), while parents and grandparents affectionately and somewhat foolishly videotape and snap tons of pictures. :) Our own two shining starts are pictured below. Ama and Papa (Mandy's parents) made the trip up for Ethan's program. Hannah's was the following night, and Papa graciously made the trip for a second night (Ama was busy). Hannah and Ethan had a great year of preschool with wonderful teachers. We especially saw a big change in Hannah this year--last year we sometimes had to drag her to preschool, and she was very reserved and shy. This year she loved going every day, and the last two weeks of school was getting very sad about preschool being over soon. She said, "I'm going to miss Mrs. Soehren and Mrs. Johnson. I love them." Ethan's teacher Mrs. Spangler talked glowingly of him and said she would love to have a whole class of Ethans. We think our kids are pretty cool too :).
Ethan waving to his fan club.


Ethan in action.


Ethan with Ama and Papa.







Hannah looking back with her beautiful smile.




Hannah singing.



Hannah with Mrs. Soehren.

Everyday Life

Dinosaur Game.....Ethan wakes up most mornings these days ready to go, and his preferred way to start the morning is with a game. It all started with the dinosaur game. Your basic board game, but you win dinosaurs as you go along. Ethan has inherited his daddy's competitive nature and his day is much better if he wins LOTS of dinosaurs. Lately he's gotten in to playing the wild animals version of basically the same game. He also loves Dora Uno--your basic uno card game with Dora characters.

Daddy and Ethan looking a little bleary-eyed in the wee morning hours.




Ethan in action.
Ethan doing his champion pose. He actually really does this, naturally, not just posed for the picture. Quite often :).







Hannah and Ethan are at that adorable age where they actually think cleaning is fun! So we're puttin' them to work til they figure out otherwise :). They like helping me clean the floors, and they're at a point now where they're actually kind of helpful. Ethan used to just play with the rag in the bucket, and not really do much cleaning. Now they both get down and dirty, and I can especially count on Hannah to get some hard-to-reach spots. They love wearing the rubber gloves their Nana has bought and left here during her visits.






















Hannah and Ethan doing headstands on the couch. They LOVE couch acrobatics, and they particularly enjoy headstands and handstands ever since Hannah did gymnastics.

Snow in April!

Of course, snow in April should not be surprising when you've lived in the Chicago area your whole life. But it was still bizarre to wake up two weeks ago Wednesday morning and see snow that had stuck! It snowed lightly most of the day and was generally chilly, slushy, and yucky :). However, the kids did get out to play in the afternoon, and it was surprisingly good snow for making snowpeople. Here are pictures of Hannah and Ethan enjoying the snow--
ready to throw snowballs at Mommy; Ethan with his "snow dinosaur" and Hannah with her snow girl. Hannah held her snowgirl's "hand" (stick) for one picture.

Hannah at gymnastics

Hannah has been enjoying doing gymnastics this year. We have a great teacher at the Park district community center, Coach Janet. She's gotten good at handstands, headstands, balance beam, bar, forward roll....and has made huge steps on her cartwheels and backward rolls. At the end of every session they do a little "show" for the parents. The pictures that follow are from that show, including one of Hannah with her coach.