Black Friday

The phrase you are looking for is "cacophony of colors".  I told the boys to get dressed for a short hike with Nana this morning (OptOutside) and this is what Isaac came up with.

A fun age!

Ben, on the other hand, went the other way - I call this Seattle camouflage. It's almost like the people here don't want you to be able to see them in the dark, rainy season.  

Michael has found a new use for his hoodie - tie it tight and he figures I won't/can't take pictures of him.

I did sneak in a couple of pics of Nana (heh, heh). Isaac found a painted rock that had glitter on it and he wanted to show it to her - the perfect distraction for me to swoop in and take a pic.

I was having a difficult time getting Michael to show his face so I yelled "Look! There's PewDiePie!" and that did the trick.

We have a budding dabber.

After forcing them against their will to expose their bodies to fresh air and sunlight, I did return my children to their comfortable rooms with their relaxing electronic devices. After they played video games for a little bit (to take off the edge), we hauled the Christmas gear into the house so I could torture them with more family time.

The teen years are such a special time.

Getting the Christmas decorations out is, for Isaac at least, about as much fun as Christmas morning. We have to keep him from unpacking all the bins at once and creating chaos in all of his excitement.  It is pretty fun as all the Christmas-themed toys, books, and movies are packed in with the decorations.

But this hard work has to be done by somebody, so we all pushed on.

Despite the general lack of interest the older boys showed in participating in the setting up the tree etc, they did all fight over who would get to put the top on the tree. I came up with what I thought was a pretty sneaky plan - I sent them all to the den and told them we would call them down one by one to let them know who would get to put it on. So we called them down one at a time and told each of them they could put the top on but not to brag to their brothers. Then we'd take it off and do the same routine with the next child.

It worked pretty well until Isaac spilled the beans that he had put it on. Honestly, I didn't think it would take very long for them to figure it out, but it was entertaining for Jason and I while it lasted.

Let the Christmas season begin!