Cake

I don't think I took too many pictures on Thanksgiving and have not had a chance to upload them yet but I have to post this one my mom just sent me ASAP because it is too stinkin cute!  I made a cranberry upside-down cake (which, by the way, was delicious) and the boys, as always, brought over a chair to help! I love the fact that not only are they wearing matching outfits, they are sharing the chair and the beater! Such sweet little boys!  

Gobble Gobble

Noah has been so excited for Thanksgiving this year, I love it!  He has been learning a lot about it at school and we have been doing all kinds of Thanksgiving crafts and preparations around here too!  Silas is still a little too young to totally understand what is going on but Noah did teach him that turkeys say  "gobble gobble" and that is pretty stinkin cute!  I walked into the kitchen tonight to find them both sitting at the table gobbling and laughing hysterically, priceless!!!

Noah's Fall wreath he made at school!

Noah and I made a few of these hand print turkeys!
He was in heaven, lots of gluing & cutting!
 (thanks for the idea Sara W :)

Silas wearing Noah's pilgrim hat he made at school.  Noah
cut the whole thing out and glued it all by himself!

Noah being silly with his hat!  I was lucky to get a picture of
him in it.  He flat out refused to wear his Native American
paper bag vest he made at school...

The other hand print turkey we made!  Noah painted all of his
hand prints in "Thanksgiving colors" and again got to use
lots of glue and scissors etc.  I love that he loves doing
crafts and projects so much!

Welcome Home

Oops, I almost forgot to post the super sweet posters the boys made for us when we got home from our trip.  Noah was so excited about his!  He told me about it as soon as I got out of the car at my parent's house!  He also told me that Silas was eating all of  the crayons and markers and was "totally out of control"  :)

Color Time

Something tells me Silas is not ready for markers yet...

Misc. Puerto Rico

Here are a few other pictures from our trip, there is really no rhyme or reason to them but I figured I would share them anyway.

Big reason to be thankful for where we live...
Almost all of the houses have bars over the windows, doors and in some
cases the entire porch/garage/house.  We asked some locals we met
about it and they said if you don't have bars your house WILL get
robbed, no question about it and anyone who does not have bars
on their house is crazy.  

Pasta y Pueblo
We went here for my birthday dinner and had the best time!
It is this little shack on the beach owned by a local surfer and his family.
The atmosphere was like nothing we had ever experienced and the food was
seriously amazing!  The owners came out and sat with us and we ended up
chatting it up with them the entire evening!

Rio Mar (where we stayed)

The back of the resort overlooking the ocean, the
landscaping was beautiful!

The view of the ocean from the pool, and another
thunderstorm rolling in...

There are iguanas everywhere.  They will climb up on your lap and
steal your food if you are not careful.  This one was eating a man's
salad off his fork...

Ryan having an 8 a.m. swim.  No, it is not foggy, it was so humid that
morning that the camera lens steamed up every time I turned it on.
  Humidity example - Our room had four mirrors
in addition to the bathroom mirrors and if we opened the sliding glass door
for just five minutes, every mirror including the bathroom
would be completely steamed up...

They groom the beaches every morning like they would the snow
up on the mountains!  

Total Tourist...

Ryan had a conference two of the days we were in Puerto Rico so I decided to be a total tourist one of those days.  I signed up for an Old San Juan Historical Tour and got to check out some of the local history, food and sights (along with some shopping)!!  The tour group consisted of eight ladies all of whom also had husbands at the conference.   I met a super cool girl from Atlanta who has a boy that is one day older than Noah and a girl that is 10 days older than Silas, needless to say we had lots to talk about!  Our driver was amazing, by the end of the day I felt like I knew everything there is to know about Puerto Rico (and his family).

This is the ceiling inside the capital building.   You can't really tell
from the picture but the entire thing is made of mosaic tile.  It is so humid
there that if it were painted they would have to redo it every couple years.

The Castillo San Cristobal.  

Looking out over Old San Juan.  The buildings are absolutely beautiful.
 They are all painted in bold & bright colors with amazing iron balconies
 looking out over the cobblestone streets.  

Looking towards the Castillo San Felipe del Morro.
I am usually not much of a history buff but it was amazing hearing all
of the history for this tiny island that seems to still be in so much transition.

Inside a fire tower in Castillo San Cristobal.
Again, breathtaking views of the ocean and city!
Interesting fact (or at least I found it interesting)   -  All of the walls and
castles are made of concrete that is at least 7 feet thick in most spots. 
There are lots of tunnels running under and between the two castles
 but they were pretty dark and my pictures did not turn out too well.  

We stopped at a roadside stand for some
mofongo and coconut water (yes, they
actually pull the coconut off the tree and cut it up
right there on the spot).  I am totally in
love with Puerto Rican food!   Everything I had
was absolutely delicious, maybe because
it is all deep fried :)

We have a new favorite...

"I like totally love Elvis" - Noah

Puerto Rico Day #2

Our second day on the island was spent at sea :)  We signed up for an all day catamaran sail, it was an amazing day of sailing, rum, swimming, rum, snorkeling, rum, a stop at an amazing private island and more rum...  We were a little worried as we left the harbor and it started pouring down rain on us but as soon as we got out onto the ocean it cleared up and ended up being the most beautiful day (weather wise) we had while we were there.

Our first island stop!  The water was the most amazing color blue and so
warm!  We spent a few hours swimming and playing around here then
headed back out to the next snorkeling spot.

Not a bad way to spend my birthday!!!

Heading back in from our last stop.  Ryan did some snorkeling but
most people that know me know that I am scared to death of
tropical fish so I stuck to swimming in the deep water.
That was all fun until a gigantic barracuda decided he wanted to swim
around the boat too, so I called it a day at that point :)

Sailing the ocean blue!

El Yunque Rain Forest

I am going to do these Puerto Rico pictures in phases...  We saw so many amazing things and did so much that it would be nearly impossible to put it all into one post!  These pictures are from the El Yunque Rain Forest in the Luquillo Mountains.  We spent our first day on the island checking out the rain forest which happened to be just a few miles away from the resort!  We are pretty spoiled living in Oregon as far as the "green" factor goes but it really does not hold a candle to the green in the rain forest, it was absolutely breathtaking!

Yokahu Tower

View from the top of the tower!  The picture does not do it justice...

I couldn't resist the window picture!

These are the trails to get everywhere.  It rains so
much that any dirt trails would wash away.  They were
a little slippery and made the hiking interesting!

There were rivers, creeks and waterfalls everywhere!

We loved all the giant vines hanging down everywhere.  It felt like
Tarzan could come swinging down at any minute :)

La Mina Falls

Looks like a great place to have a picnic along the trail...  Ha ha!

La Coca Falls
They don't really look that big in the picture but they
are actually 85 feet tall.

Trick or Treat

Halloween was so much fun this year!! Noah was totally into it and was so excited to go Trick or Treating! They both loved all of the Halloween decorations and pumpkins and were continuously making spooky ghost noises around the house!  Noah was practically pacing by the door waiting for it to get dark so he could go out and get some candy!  Our plan was to take both boys to a couple houses in our culdesac and then Ryan would take Silas home while Noah and I went to a few other houses around the neighborhood but Silas was having so much fun we ended up going to way more houses than planned and having a blast!  Noah walked right up to every door and said "Trick or Treat" and "Thank you for the candy" and even threw in a "Happy Halloween" at most of the houses!

Our little Barry Bee Benson and his dragon friend!

I love the dragon tail & stinger!

Ready to go!

Noah at his first house!  He rang the doorbell
and when Milo answered the door Noah sprinted
into their house and fell down with a giant crash...
We had to do a little explaining that we have to
stay outside and not run into everyones houses!

Silas with his candy bar!
He did not have a candy bag so he just carried
this candy bar around and tried to put it into
everyones candy bowls like he was trading it
in or something!

Waiting patiently!

The Grown-up and the Dragon

We had Halloween playgroup at our house the Friday before Halloween and this was the only time Noah wore his grown-up costume...  He had been so determined to be a grown up for Halloween and rocked his full costume for playgroup but refused to wear it after that.  He wore his mustache and dress shirt to his school party that afternoon but refused to wear the tie again and then on Halloween he opted for his bee costume that he wore last year instead of his grown up outfit, luckily I got a few pics before playgroup (then forgot to take pictures once everyone got here, oops)!!

He used his Lightning McQueen lunch box as his briefcase!

I used a eye liner pen to draw on his mustache!

What a sweet little dragon :)

Carving Pumpkins

The boys and I picked up a pumpkin carving kit a few weeks before Halloween and Noah was so excited to use the little knives and scoopers, until he realized how slimy and nasty the insides of those pumpkins were :)  Silas on the other hand wanted to eat everything that came out of the pumpkins...

You want me to stick my hand where???

Silas gave it a try!

Noah decided he would just supervise...

Silas carving his pumpkin piece,
probably not the safest activity for a 19 month old...

Spooky!!!