Child labor?

One of Eliana's daily chores is to empty the dishwasher after it has run.  It first it was a novelty; that wore off weeks ago and it is now...a chore.

Tonight, she has come up with the bright idea of conscripting her little brother to do this chore for her.  She feels especially proud because he has agreed to do this for a sum of money.  When questioned how much--exactly 10 cents!

She is lucky that poor Gabey does not understand the paltry amount that he is being paid...

As you can see, she could not be more proud of herself.  Maybe someday, he will come up with a way of getting back!

Haircut!

Even though Xiao Yu has been with us for almost two years, we have never taken him to a barber shop for a haircut.  Elvin has been cutting his hair, for better or worse, and we have decided that sometimes it turns out to be closer to worse than better.  For that reason, we decided that a trip to the barber was in order...

First, the spray bottle!

And then the clippers.  Part of why we have not taken him in, in the past, was that he would sometimes start crying uncontrollably with the clippers.  Perhaps he had some negative association with them in the past.  But over the part few months, he has gotten over his fear of them and did fine in the hair salon.  He did ask to hold daddy's hand (under his hair sheet) the whole time.

Once his sides were trimmed, Elvin considered leaving his hair like that, since then he had a resemblance to a famous Brazil soccer player.

Is there a resemblance?

And finally it was time to trim his bangs.

 All in all, we thought he got a good hair cut and he was happy with getting a dum dum.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  This year we had a smaller than usual gathering and so were able to host it at our house.  Elvin made roasted chicken and Emily's sister family brought smoked turkey that they made on the grill. We also had ham, biscuits and other goodies.

 The cousins had lots of fun together.  Here they are all "stacked up".

 When it was time to dig in, Gabriel helped himself to the olives.

 Yum yum!  Xiao Yu really likes his cousin Anders and wanted Anders to sit next to him.

After dinner, it was wrestling time!  Anders is quite tall now, as you can see, and he towers over the other kids.  That doesn't stop them from climbing all over him like monkeys.

 And then it was dessert time.  We had cookies and pumpkin pie, as well as lemon meringue pie.

Gabe loves electronics and was glued to Anders' iPad whenever it was turned on.

 And when the iPad was NOT on, then it was back to wrestling with their cousin!

Happy Halloween!

As we entered fall season, we also got into the Halloween spirit.  Our first autumn-related activity was that Gabey went on a field trip to the pumpkin patch with his preschool.  Elvin took the morning off of work to accompany him.  They rode on a yellow school bus together.  Riding the school bus on the preschool field trips is a highlight of our kids young lives!  Lots of other parents went as well.

 At the pumpkin patch, Gabey enjoyed running through the hay bale maze.

We went to the animal petting area...except that Gabe refused to touch any of the animals.

 The goats do look sort of eerie with the vertically slitted eyes.

 The kids all climbed on top of the hay bale pyramid.

And then off we went to the pumpkin patch.  The rule was that whatever pumpkin he picked, he needed to be able to carry it by himself.

 So far so good!

Here is a picture with his entire class.  Mrs. Nuce, his teacher, is in the middle.  She is a saint and has the patience of Mother Teresa.  Overall it was a successful trip!

Later on in October, cousins Jace and Julia came into town from Colorado.  Julia has done a bit of growing up--the last time we saw her she was still a little baby.

To give the other kids a chance, that weekend we went back to the pumpkin patch.  There was supposed to be a huge storm with gale force winds.  Instead, it was quite nice and it was barely raining.

 Xiao Yu enjoyed riding on the pedal tractor.

 So did Gabey.

 And of course, Eliana couldn't miss out on it either.

 There was an apple cider press station.  Jace enjoyed drinking a cupful.

 It was really sweet cider.  Gabe had about 5 cups.

Then we moved on to the corn husking and grinding station.  This gizmo separated the kernels from the cob.

 After grinding the kernels, Karina grabbed handfuls to give to the chickens.

 And the kids had fun in the corn bin, burying their little cousin!

We headed off to another part of the farm with the pumpkin patch on a hay ride pulled by a real tractor.

 There were so many pumpkins!  As far as the eye could seen.

 Here is a picture with all the cousins.  We took about 60 pictures and this one sort of turned out.

 Julia wanted this pumpkin!  Bigger than her...

After bringing them back, we scrubbed them and washed them.  The kids "helped".  It was a 6 to 3 kids to adult ratio, so Elvin had to do most of the wheelbarrowing of the pumpkins by himself. 

Xiao Yu wanted to see how tall he is.  He has grown a lot in the past two years and is almost as tall a Gabey, who photo bombed this picture.

Then we went to the pumpkin launcher, where you launch pumpkins about the size of a softball.  Jace needed a little bit of assistance so that he did not get launched himself!

It actually requires a bit of strength + weight and even Eliana needed help.  If you got your little pumpkin in the large 50-gallon drum about 40 yards away, then you would win a prize.  After helping all the kids, Elvin had the launcher just about calibrated on knowing how far to pull back and where to aim, and got one in on his last try!

As a final stop, the kids played at this duck race where you hand pump water to push the rubber duckies down the ramp.  It turned out to be one of the kids' favorite activities!

The cousins left (and left their pumpkins behind) and then it was time to carve them.  Where to even start!

The kids decided that they needed to wear gloves when pulling the slimy seeds out.

 The girls, being older now were able to do quite a bit by themselves.

And here is the finished product!  Gabe wanted an elephant and giraffe on his, and on his other pumpkin, he wanted the Apple emblem from our laptop (he likes to eat apples.)  Karina got a carving of three cats sitting on a Jack-O-Lantern, and also she carved one by herself with a more traditional face.  Xiao Yu got a Thomas the train and Eliana carved one all by herself--an owl and a bat.

On the Friday before Halloween, Elvin's work had a party for kids.  The kids eagerly dressed up as they knew that candy awaited.

They had fun doing activities and getting their faces painted.  And after coming home, they were examining their spoils.

And on Halloween night, they dressed up again!   Eliana didn't trick-or-treat with the other kids because she was away at a class.

 They had a fun time going from house to house collecting more candy.  Here is Gabey holding up what he calls a "Reese's peanut butter cupcake".  Hope you had a good Halloween!