Hello Family and Happy Halloween!As I said in my original entry at the bottom of this page, the Bough Family now has it's own blog. For the sake of not repeating myself, I think this will be a great way to keep the family informed of our activities and it is really easy to do versus putting together a dotphoto album with picture labels. You will still get the dotphoto invitations which will contain ALL of our pictures and you can read through the blog and view our favorites.
The blog is organized with the most recent entry first so you will be reading in reverse chronological order. Have fun - WE SURE ARE!!
These pictures were taken over the last week and show everything that we have done in preparing for our big Halloween night. The first night was reserved for pumpkin carving. Tom and I fully prepared the kitchen to get slimmed since our kids, especially Rhea, love to make a mess. Much to our surprise, neither kids was interested in sticking their hand in the pumpkin. Tom, once again, was stuck with the dirty work since I strategically took on the photographer role. I did give them the opportunity to help me sort the seeds from the safety of a bowl the following day, and they showed minimal interest. Rhea sorted a few and Stephen didn't want to get his hands messy. Like everything else, Rhea decided to give a seed the taste test and looked at me as though she did something naughty. Much to both kid's surprise, I told them that it was OK. I don't think they would have attempted such an adventurous task if I would have told them to do it on the outset. I meant to look up on the Internet if raw pumpkin seed would case any ill harm, but the activity was too short-lived.
Everyone had their own pumpkin and told Daddy their desired expression to be carved. Stephen wanted a sad face and watch very intently during the carving process. As you can see, he was very proud of the finished product. He was determine to carry it outside all by himself, but quickly gave up. Maybe next year.
Rhea was very interested in the Sharpie Tom used to draw the faces on the pumpkins. We luckily convinced her that is was best for her to use a washable marker. You might see a black mark across the bridge of her nose and several marks on her arms. I have found out that washable marker ARE washable, but only over a period of time. Oh well, I at least already took their fall portraits without any scrapes, bruises, or black marker. I just looked at the picture again, and I guess this was taken before her marker bath.
We then took the pumpkins to find a home on the front porch. Tom had ordered a bail of hay when he ordered our mulch this year. It was originally meant for the dog pen, but I convinced him that it would be fun to lay it on our front side walk leading up to the door. He saw how excited I was about the idea knowing that he was going to be the one to pick it all up to take it to the backyard the day after Halloween. I am 
glad he loves me as much as he does :-) Stephen and I had fun throwing hay at one another and looked pretty shocked when I threw the first pile at him. He had a great time after I told him that it was OK to throw it back. Rhea wasn't really into the hay fight just thought is was weird and a bit uncivilized. I think our suburban neighbors probably think the same thing.
Trick-or-treating was a BLAST. Tom was able to come home by 4:30pm and the kids were ready to go. Stephen woke up from his nap around 4pm eager to get dressed in his fireman outfit. I had put together a Diego outfit for him out of odds and ends, but he insisted on being a fireman again this year. You will see that he had black shoes on in the first pictures, but changed into his white ones. He told me that he wanted to wear fireman boots and I convinced him that his black shoes would suit the role. He quickly took them off when we came back into the house after taking pictures when I realized that they didn't even come close to fitting his foot. I wasn't sure what to expect out of Rhea. The Pooh costume lives in the dress-up box and she has put it on many times only to quickly take it off. She really likes it, but never wants it on for too long. After I made sure Stephen was fully dressed and photographed, I went into Rhea's room with costume in hand. She immediately said "oooooo", like s
he knew what was going to happen. I gave her a break down on what was going to happen next- pictures, of course. She responded with her sweetest "ok". So far, so good. I then took her into the bathroom for her nose job. She thought it was really weird at first, but changed her tune once I told her that I was giving her a Pooh nose. She repeatedly said "help" meaning that she wanted to help color on her nose. You can't tell in the picture, but 
she actually has a sable colored nose instead of a black nose. I figured that no one would be able to tell the difference once it was dark. We then made it down the stairs and out the door with the costume still attached to her body. As you can see, she was very excited and showed no signs of distress. Tom came home during Rhea's photo shoot and after convincing Stephen that firemen where tennis shoes (the ones that actually fit), we were soon on our way down Lansdale Street. Since the mean age on our street is between 4 and 6, many people just leave a bucket of candy on the front door step. Stephen was a pro this year as he ran through everyones yard/landscaping while showing his sister "the ropes". He would even bring candy back to her if she was moving too slow or wanted a break in the stroller. It didn't take her too long to figure out what we were doing, but had the delima of getting more candy or eating what was in her bucket. More people were home as we went around the corner to Providenc
e and I think the kids enjoyed knocking on doors. Stephen made a friend along the way and the two boys enjoy uprooting flower beds together as they ran to each door. I pretty much ran after Stephen while Tom carried Rhea since she didn't want to be in the stroller too long for fear of missing out on something. She insisted on walking most of the time no matter how tired her little legs were. I was about one driveway away from Stephen when I saw he and his friend stop cold in their tracks. They were on their way up to someones porch and almost stepped on a skeleton that was laid on the sidewalk. Once they realized that it wasn't moving, they kept going. I am not sure what they were thinking, but it was pretty funny. We looped back around to Hillsboro when we decided to start letting the kids know that it was time to start heading home. There was little resistance since they were very tired and knew that they would not only be rewarded with candy, but pizza and soda would also be waiting for them. The evening could not have gone any better with the exception of the usual night time sugar high meltdowns. I hope your Halloween was as wonderful as ours!! HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Stephen's project began as a very controlled and organized work of art. He chose his own colors and was very neatly tending to his work. He enjoyed using both the brush and the mini-roller to create the desired effect. Rhea, on the other hand........................
.....has a different idea of "art". Her art project began by smearing all of the colors together that were given to her; unlike Stephen's very organized color palette. Some of that paint actually made it to the paper before she realized that there was a brush sitting there. She then proceeded to paint her hand with the brush while occasionally experimenting with painting the paper.
As you can guess, our morning ended with both kids needing a bath before nap time. Rhea is still small enough to fit in the bathroom sink. I wish I had pictures, but that would have been difficult.
The kids LOVE to cook! As you can see, the favorite ingredient of the month was flour. Just for the record, I did not put flour in their hair. They were 100% responsible for doing that to each other.
Stephen talked abou
