October flew by!

Today we mark that Delaina is 15 months old, it's Halloween, and it's the end of the semester (last week) for the kids with homeschooling.  This was week 19!

For Halloween we started off the day with Kristopher going up to my mom's church with her to hand out candy to the kindergarteners from the nearby elementary school that were trick or treating there this morning.  At the same time I was getting 8 other little people together and we headed out the door to the therapy center for OT, PT and Speech therapies.

When we arrived at the therapy center I quickly put on everyone's "Super Capes" and brought them inside.  We headed back to the 'gym' room and were soon met by two of our therapists, who were ready to take the kids around to the trick or treating at the different offices around the center.

We made it to three doors before there was an overwhelming amount of small children all walking the halls in the OPPOSITE DIRECTION, along with a door with a woman holding... a dog.  On that note, Aleksa wanted whatever the person was going to give her enough to walk near the door, however Emma had the biggest breaks on you've ever seen!  She's not a fan of dogs... even the kind that fit on your lap, or in your shoe even... So, our little 'trick or treating' episode ran short and we headed back the way we came, stopped at the therapy center office and went back in to the gym room.  Delaina LOVED the activity and carried her bag and walked the entire way!  Wes held on to his bag as well, and Brianna, Micah, Emma, Aleksa, and Lynae did generally pretty well with it also.  Yes, I left out James, who was sure he wanted to sit on the ground and wanted nothing to do with holding a bag.  Or talking to people.  He was my little buddy for that endeavor, along with Delaina and Wesley :).

Then we began the "incorporating therapy in to handing out goodies" and two by two the kids took a turn with our OT (H) and PT (J) to hand out goodies to the preschoolers in the building.  The first one was returned to me after throwing the bowl of stickers and laughing.  The second when she wanted to kick and hit at everyone-- first her siblings, then random adults and strangers walking by.  The third was brought back because the 'wait time' between groups got to be a bit much and his patience leaves something to be desired.  Lynae stayed the entire time, excited to have gotten "her chance" to be with the therapists, as she attends with us every week yet doesn't actually receive any therapy. :)  Brianna was the 4th to join them and stuck around for the rest of the time, and when it was just Lynae and Brianna with J and H, J came back to the gym and set up a second 'booth' with Wesley to hand out coloring sheets to the last group of kids.  All in all, 6 of the kids participated, and in the middle of the 'handing out', our ST (M) came by and picked up James for therapy.  It was a revolving door kind of morning!

After that 30 minutes of craziness, capes began to come off and therapy resumed!  This morning we had 4 OT sessions, 3 ST sessions, and 3 PT sessions.  This is going to be the new routine (we just added ST in the morning and will be adding a 4th session to it soon), and we'll also be adding 2 more Speech sessions in the evening at the center.  Thursdays we pretty much just expect to be exhausted during!

At 12:15 we head to the car, myself and 8 kids in tow, back sporting their capes and with little baggies of goodies (goldfish, pretzels, and fruit snacks... my kind of trick or treating!) and headed off to pick up Kristopher from his reading class with Grandmommy.

At home we had lunch and iced cookies as a special treat, then some quiet time and play time before the afternoon was gone and it was dinner time!  This year we decided not to go trick-or-treating and instead to do a family movie night.  No complaints from the peanut gallery, so we picked up Monsters University and popped popcorn then added peanuts and candy corn to it.  Our family room became the movie theater and we all enjoyed a movie.

Michael and I enjoyed a couple of slices of home made pumpkin pie, made from scratch from the meat of the pumpkin that we carved over the weekend.  Then, some whipped cream... whipped from heavy whipping cream!  Home made delicious!

We're closing out the month with a busy but great day.  Our family is busy, sometimes difficult and often tiring, but it is such a joy and a privilege to have this be the way we spend our days.