Gratitude

Need a pick me up? People on the streets of Manhattan tell what they're thankful for.

big think

I happened upon this interview of John Irving on a website called bigthink.com. It was interesting and well-made. To be honest, I can't vouch for the content on the rest of the website, but if you click on the "experts" tab at the top, there's a huge archive of interviews you can delve into. They have everyone from Nobel prize winners to the guy who owns Magnolia Bakery. I know this might be boring to some, but I could watch these all day.

Speaking of Magnolia, we finally tried famous the banana pudding. Wow.

Halloween

Halloween is a big deal in the King family. We've been talking about costumes, practicing Trick-or-Treating and looking at Halloween books & catalogs since August. The boys decided to be Pixar characters for Halloween and LOVED dressing up–
Sawyer as Mike Wazowski and Hudson as Buzz Lightyear.


We had our ward Fall Fest on Halloween, where there was food and fun, including trick-or-treating for the kids, a mini-carnival and a photo-shoot by Cameron of all the kids in their costumes. Check out how cute they are.

Hudson loading up on candy...


Cameron and me at the Fall Fest. Unfortunately we broke tradition, for a multitude of reasons, and didn't dress up this year. But don't worry– we'll be back in full force next year...



After the Fall Fest, we headed over to 69th, where they block off the streets just for trick-or-treating. We were all pretty much zombies by this point, but we managed to make our way down the street on our way home.


Sawyer cruising 69th:

carving time...

we're finally getting around to posting some halloween :). we'll start with pumpkins:

sawyer was so excited he wouldn't stop rolling his hands and laughing.










the boys wanted to make a "flying dinosaur pumpkin".

Hudson's Photo Shoot

Hudson stole my phone and went on a photo-shooting spree. He took 153 pictures and videos while I was doing the dishes. Here are some of our favorites:

to Cameron

You mean more than everything to the three of us.

We love you so much.

Happy Birthday!

day tripper

Yesterday was our annual fall foliage tour :) Last year we explored Connecticut and upstate New York, so this year we headed west through NJ and into Pennsylvania. We almost canceled due to rain, but it turned out to be beautiful and overcast while we were out of the car and only rainy while we drove.

This is what a lot of the roads looked like:


Peak time for leaves in PA is next weekend but they were still really beautiful:


We stopped here for some apple picking:





Then went to Dilly's, a little diner Cameron remembered from one of his Martha photo shoots back in the day.


After lunch, we drove along the Delaware:


And passed such cute towns as Frenchtown, PA. Does this not look like a movie set? Stars Hollow, anyone? In my opinion, charming little towns like this are one of the coolest things about the East...



Our last stop was the Crayola factory in Easton, PA. They have a demonstration about how they make crayons and markers + lots of fun crafts and activities for the kids to do. Does anyone else remember this? We were hoping they would play that awesome music but unfortunately they didn't...



This is Sawyer coloring on a glass wall. Don't worry, he's supposed to.


Hudson painting with melted crayons. Don't worry, he's supposed to. :)


A small canal museum is housed in the same building as the Crayola factory and comes with your admission. Each kid gets a boat that they take through a series of waterways and canals. Kind of random but the boys loved it. Sawyer's actually turning a wheel to move the boats up this ramp:


The end!

Where the wild puppies are...

The boys' favorite thing to do last week was to wear my fuzzy sweatshirts inside out and pretend they were puppies. Hudson named himself "Salty" and Sawyer "Pepperoni". After a while puppies got old so then they were "wild things". They've been a little obsessed about wild things since seeing the trailer a while ago. There was a period of time when we had to watch it at least once every day and Hudson was talking about wild rumpuses and commanding us to "Be still!" He's been excited to see huge signs for the movie popping up all over the city the past few weeks. If the movie is anywhere near as good as the trailer, Mr. Jonze will do us proud. I'm not lying when I say I wish I had this.

what the boys requested for breakfast:

"toast with jam and fruit snacks on the top."



"what's wrong with fruit snacks on toast?"


the creative mastermind...

teaching the boys important life skills...