80 months

The girls started an outdoor exercise class (Fit 4 Kids) at the community park by our house this month. We had been looking for something for them to do that was outdoors and socially distanced and it seemed like the perfect fit. The coach was one of the former directors at the YMCA from back in the day when daddy did their conditioning class, the girls remembered him but hadn't seen him in years when they were taking tumbling class there. While they were excited for something to do they were a little hesitant and shy to start, they hadn't been around other kids in months and needed some socialization! Once they found their spot on the field, their wild sides kicked in and they had fun, until they realized how hard the class was and how hard they were working! PE in school these days is nothing compared to PE class when mommy and daddy were little, Fit 4 Kids is how PE should be in school and what we did back in the day! They did everything from lunges, situps, and shuttle runs, to push ups and running the field. They were exhausted at the end of the first class and C complained the next day that her legs hurt! I don't think they have ever worked out that much!

We had our first meal out since March and it was so nice to not have to cook or heat up takeout! Our Main Street closed the street down where most of the dining is and set-up tables and chairs socially distanced in the street, we decided to finally check it out since the weather had been a little cooler. It wasn't crowded and people were cautious, it was nice to be "out" and doing something somewhat normal again! The girls were happy to color/draw on their tracers, eat spaghetti and meatball and be somewhere else besides our house or Grandma and Grandpa's. Our neighborhood has a yearly tradition of "Boo baskets" and the girls were so excited when theirs arrived, they ended up finding out it was BH's mom who booed them and loved what all she put in their baskets! We had fun booing two little girls back (one of Cs classmates from Kinder), I hope our new neighborhood does fun things like this but with less drama and cliques!

We celebrated daddy's birthday with another meal out a couple weeks later, this time we headed to Pier 22 in downtown for a late lunch. Having to eat outdoors is making us try some new places, this place was on the river and had a beautiful view, again not very crowded and socially distanced. The girls were excited to finally be able to have somewhere to wear their maxi dresses I had gotten them in the Spring, not typical October attire but in Florida anything goes year round! We had a nice lunch, walked the pier and then headed home to relax and have cake for dinner!

The girls were in their groove for school and our schedules were working out great. By the beginning of October we had to decide if they would be going back for second quarter, we decided to leave them home and they we would most likely send them back after the first of the year. C was a little upset that J got to go to school for some testing and that prompted me to ask the librarian if the kids could some in and check out some books, they had been reading like worms and had pretty much gone through all of the new books they had gotten. She thought it was a great idea and let the girls come up every couple of weeks to check out new books, C was excited she got to "go to school", its the little things made them happy.

C continued to wiz through her work, and would get mad at me when I ripped up her papers and made her start again when she had sloppy handwriting. Her sloppy handwriting pretty quickly turned into very nice and neat handwriting once she figured out it was easier to take her time from the start than to have to write something over again! She looked forward to her live classes each week and getting to talk to her teacher and her friends, she enjoyed reading whatever story they were reading for the week to me prior to their call, sometimes we forgot to read it and were scrambling minutes before her call to get it done, thank goodness she is a good and quick reader! We continued our car date lunches and she got to go on a field trip with daddy and I to cast our presidential votes!

We decided to nix the traditional Halloween festivities this year and instead the cousins came up for a weekend of fun, it was out last holiday in the house before we moved out. . Aunt Boo and I had been planning a Halloween party for "months" according to the kids and needed to make it over the top for them! The girls schooled till noon on Friday and after lunch their cousins arrived! They were excited to see each other, it had only been a couple of weeks since they had last seen each other but you would have thought months had gone by! They did a little scootering and chalking while we waited for Nana to get closer to town, she was dropping her car off for repairs and we had to go and pick her up.  "She was taking forever" according to the kids so we stopped for some ice cream to kill some more time while we waited, they were excited when they saw her car turn at the light and screamed that we needed to follow her and pick her up, well we had to wait for Miss A to finish her ice cream which didn't make the other three happy! They were all excited to see Nana, they hadn't seen her since the summer and had so much to tell and show her to bring her up to speed on Animal Crossing that we had all become addicted too! Friday night after the kids went to bed the mommy's got to decorating, we had expectations to fulfill!

Saturday was Halloween and the kids were all excited when they woke up! We had planned a day full of food and fun activities that started with trick-or-treating in their PJ's and Peachy's donuts for breakfast! We all "hid" in separate rooms and the kids trick-or-treated around the house for goodies and surprises to keep them occupied for the day. They were not fond of the black beans daddy tried to give them from the pantry, ha! We played games (Bingo of course for Nana), colored, and painted pumpkins but the thing they seemed to like most was the scavenger hunt! It took them all over the house and surprisingly they all worked together without any fighting to get to the final prize, the Mousetrap game which they all loved and couldn't wait to play! Playing Mousetrap occupied time in the afternoon and we did another round of bedroom trick-or-treating. No one got dressed up in costumes, they wore Halloween shirts for the day and then switched into their new Animal Crossing shirts they got at the last trick-or-treat stop. Once all of our planned festivities were over it was time for the AC Halloween party to start, this was the first big event AC was hosting since we had all had been sucked into the game, even the big kids were looking forward to the party, Nana still doesn't understand our obsession over the game! We spent the evening trick-or-treating with our residents, visiting each others islands and crafting all of the recipes we got. At the end of the night the kids exclaimed it was the best day ever, in what has been some challenging months keeping them happy and engaged we did pretty well with our Not So Halloween Party! They were all sad the next day when it was time for them to hit the road back to Miami, even though we had our next trip planned to Miami in less than a month there were tears. These kids have really grown a close bond the last couple of months and it makes everyone's hearts happy and full. 

Here are the pictures from the month.