Twick or Tweat!

Joshua the Monkey ready to trick-or-treat sorority row on campus. 
(We made it to 3 houses when Joshua said, "I'm ready to go home." So we did.)

 

Pumpkin carving
We carved Lightening McQueen into our pumpkin and Dad made a funny face jack-o-lantern.

Halloween night
Joshua finished trick or treating at the houses around ours and agreed to take "one good picture" as long as...

...he could make a "funny face picture" too.

"Look, I'm a monkey climbing the tree."

It wouldn't be complete without tackling Dad in the yard before going back inside.
Joshua had more fun passing candy out in our yard then going to get candy of his own.  He especially liked chasing down parents who stayed back at the street to offer them a piece of candy.

We hope your Halloween was a barrel of monkeys!

Rosco T. Robot

The last few nights at dinner "Rosco the Robot" has been joining us.  Here are a few video clips from last night. (Of course I didn't think about grabbing the camera until he had already had us laughing hysterically but I think these clips will give you an idea.)

 

 

"Affirbative, all-symptoms a-okay"

The truth of the butterfly

Many of you may remember our pet butterfly Jar.  Jar had an entire blog post dedicated to her earlier in the year.  Here is the link to that post.  A couple weeks ago Joshua became aware that Jar had been sitting quietly on the buffet in the dining room, not moving, for a long time.  It started with a question or two every now and then, "Mama, why is Jar not moving?  Do you think she is asleep?"  Then it progressed to full out concern that something was wrong.  "Dad, do you think Jar is sick?"  The final blow was the heart wrenching "Why did Jar have to die like other animals?" 

Ok, ok, so it is obviously time for the truth to be told.  I was nervous of the ramifications of the long believed omission of the truth that Jar was not real.  The following conversation took place:

Dave: "Joshua, I think Jar just needs new batteries and then she will be just fine."
Joshua: "Batteries?  Why does she need batteries?  For energy?"
D: "Yes, the energy has run out of her batteries and we need to put new ones in.  Joshua do you know that Jar is not a real butterfly but kind of like a robot?"
J: "What?  You mean I have a ROBOT BUTTERFLY?!?  That is so cool.  Can I take her to show and tell and tell all my friends about my robot butterfly?"

Friday we got a note from Joshua's teacher that said, "Everyone loved Joshua's robot butterfly!  Thanks for sending it to share."

Thankfully, as cool as it was to have a pet butterfly now it is even cooler to have a pet robot butterfly that requires energy from batteries to work....disaster avoided.

Happy Birsday

Dave and I celebrated our birthdays last weekend.  Coach and Nana were gracious enough to come keep Joshua Friday night so we could go our to eat.

Joshua was really excited about the possibility of having a "birsday party" so Coach and Nana took him to the grocery store to buy the necessities.  Joshua picked out a zebra print cake with lime green border and Thomas the Tank candles.  He was so proud of his choices and loved getting to help Nana "make fire for the candles" so they could sing to us.

Joshua talks a lot about how "Coach looks like me because we have the same hair."  Every time we comb his hair he wants us to "brush it like Coach's."  So Saturday the two dressed alike from head to toe and Joshua could not have been more pleased.

 

Coach is pretty sure he would have made this face when he was 3 too.

Drum Circle

Dave is friends with "Mr. Bob" (aka: Dr. Damm) a percussion professor on campus.  You may remember Mr. Bob from an earlier post...he gave Joshua a drum.

Dr. Damm and a Starkville community group hosted a drum circle last night in a park.  Joshua loves Mr. Bob and loves drums so what could be better. 

 

There were different percussion instruments in each chair.  After each performance everyone switched chairs to play a new instrument.

Joshua and Dave took a turn on a bass drum.  Their job was to keep the beat for everyone else to follow.

Dr. Damm prepping everyone for the next piece to be played.  He was great at keeping the energy up and leading everyone in playing together.

Joshua tried some unconventional methods of drumming throughout the night.

He especially loved playing this shaker (forgive me for not knowing the correct name for the instrument).  He would shake it so hard his whole body shook.

Below is a video of a portion of the last piece performed at the drum circle.  You will notice that Joshua is playing a gas can in this piece.  There were all kinds of cool instruments.  Some were shaped like frogs, there were cowbells, tambourines, various drums, shakers and noise makers.

As usual the video will not load (even after 2 hours of trying).  I will try again in the morning.

We had a great time.  The weather was fantastic and fun was had by all.