Last night (most) of my family performed in Broadway Beware, a fundraiser for our church. It's a night of Broadway show tunes performed by our talented church members and some guests. We sang a 15 minute medley from Les Miserables, complete with costumes and choreography. I think the best part was the practicing we did for the performance- every Sunday for the last month or so we got together at my parent's house and sang, ate, and just hung together. It was like all of our favorite things put together!! Eating, singing and being together.

Hudson turned 10!

For Hudson's 10th birthday we had a "reverse surprise" party. He knew it was his birthday party.... his friends did not. I just thought that since we invited kids over last minute (less than a week from invite to party) that it was rude to expect people to bring a gift. And also, he has so much stuff as it is.. and doesn't really play with most of it. He plays with legos, he plays outside with toy guns (yes, we allow him to play with toy guns!), he plays soccer and in his tree house, he draws and watches movies and reads and plays computer games.... but he doesn't really play with toys. So why put people through the extra expense and errand running of getting him a gift?? So to celebrate his 10th year we promised him a trip to Dick's Sporting Goods to let him pick out some camping/hiking supplies, and let him have some buddies over after their soccer game for pizza and a sleep over. Grandma and Papa, Grandma Chickie, Aunts Megan, Kristin and Dawn and some cousins (Dom, Frankie, Harrison, and baby Gianna) joined the fun too. Reilly came later on. It was a good day.

Orange Belt (edited)

High block

side kick

bowing to the parents after his test

listening intently to his teacher after his test

Ethan tested for his orange belt in tae kwon do on Wednesday and received it yesterday at his class. We got to go watch his belt testing. It was pretty interesting. I don't know much about tae kwon do, but Ethan seems to really like it. He told Justin and I this morning that he wished he went three days a week instead of just two! We are so happy that he has found something he's excited about! I'll have to get a picture of him in his fancy new orange belt!

Ok- got a picture with my phone as we headed into the Y on Wednesday. (I forgot to tuck his drawstrings into his pants- whoops!)

Hudson Plays Soccer

He loves this picture!

Saturdays are Hudson's busy day. He has dance from 9-10:30 and soccer practice 2-4. He's usually pretty tired by Saturday night. His 3rd game of the fall soccer season is tomorrow. Last week they had a double header, and they played on a smaller field so only 9 players could be on the field at a time. The coach decided to split the team into 2 teams for those two games. The first team lost their game, but Hudson's team won theirs. Hudson has been playing left wing pretty regularly and last week he scored and had a nice assist.

Tomorrow Hudson turns 10! I can hardly believe it. I always feel so lucky to have him knowing how close we were to not having him.... a long story if you don't know it. Maybe I'll post it tomorrow. He is a kind, fair, outgoing kid. He has tons of friends, does great in school, is loved by his teachers, is (for the most part) loving to his brother.... and tolerates his sister (we're working on that). He can be competitive, sometimes a little too competitive, but is a gracious loser too. Tomorrow for his birthday he invited a handful of boys to come over after the soccer game. Because we didn't invite them until late this week (because mom and dad are lame- sorry!) we didn't even tell the boys that it is Hudson's birthday. I didn't want anyone to have to scramble to get him a gift, and honestly the kid has so much already and doesn't even know what he wants! But when I told him that there would be no gifts from his friends he was totally ok with it! What 10 year kid would be ok with that??

other updates: Alex got a leading part in the musical. They are doing School house Rock Jr. and she is Dori. She has quite a few songs. Very exciting stuff!

Fall Update

Sorry it's been so long between updates here.... I have to admit that I post most of these pictures (and more) over on my facebook page... so if you want to be kept more up to date, friend me!!

Anyway, school has been in session for about a month. Alex is in 7th grade. Hudson is in 5th and Ethan is in 2nd. The boys nearly missed the bus on the first day because it comes 10-15 earlier this year than last year! Ethan ran down the driveway with no shoes on yelling, "Hudson tell her to wait!!" Not the greatest way to start off the school year. So, as you can probably guess I didn't get any pictures of the boys before school, but this one is from when they got off the bus.

Ethan has started tae kwan do! He goes twice a week at the Y, and so far he really enjoys it. So add to Ethan's 2 lessons the 9 dance classes that Alex and Hudson take between them (well, Alex demonstrates for one of those- her first paying job!) we are in the car a lot!! Ethan has four more classes before he goes for his next belt (orange).

Alex has had her first dance at school already! The middle school has a dance every month. (Here are a few of her friends at our house on the way out the door to go to the dance.) This week is homecoming and she has dressed up for all the theme days... hillbilly, Disney and geek so far. Tomorrow is "Holiday"- she's going to dress like a funky witch. Friday is Spirit- blue and white. She also auditioned for the middle school musical today. Call backs are tomorrow. Wish her luck!I don't have a picture of it, but Hudson's team won their first fall soccer game of the season... 7 to 0 I think. Hudson scored! Its a good group of boys. I think they will do really well. He is also taking part in a new thing at our school, Lego League, where the kids build and program a lego robot to run an obstacle course. It has just started, so they've only been building so far.

We also have two new babies in the family!!! Cooper Rickart was born on September 15th and Gianna Pearl was born on September 29th!!

ADK Trip

We had a wonderful week in the Adirondacks. We rented a small cottage in Inlet for the second year in a row (but this was our 5th annual trip to ADK) but drove to many new locations for hiking, letterboxing and such. I was telling my sister it may seem like Boot camp to some as opposed to a vacation- lots of hiking, swimming, kayaking, etc. We did a ropes course as well which was the highlight of the trip. (I know that many of you have seen these pictures on facebook, but I thought I should share some here as well.)

Our cottage at Sunset Beach Cottages Death Falls

Letterboxing at Death Falls On a giant rock on the hike to the top of Goodnow Mountain at Ferd's Bog Killing time in Bolton Landing waiting for our appointed time to go on the ropes course Ethan all by himself on the kids' rope course Alex on one of the zip lines Justin and Hudson on the ropes course Eating pizza and wings at the Screamen Eagle Climbing Black Bear Mountain

On top of Black Bear Mountain Alex at Chimney MountainSunset BeachOn top of Chimney Mountain

Funny things

My dad told me I had better write these things down....

Hudson had outgrown his Yankee jersey. I tried to put it on Ethan one day and he said, all aghast, "I can't wear this!! I'm not a sport!"

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The other morning Ethan crawled into bed next to me and asked. "Where is Hudson?"

Me: "In his bed sleeping."

Ethan: "I saw him not."

Me: "Oh, o-kay Yoda."

Our Summer so Far...

We decided to brain storm some fun things to do this summer... between camps and soccer and hanging at the pool and dance classes. I asked each kid for a few ideas, and Justin and I came up with a few of our own. Ethan's big thing was to stay up till midnight watching movies and eating snacks. We finally did that Friday night (check!). We watched Harry Potter 3 and 5, and then went to see the new movie on Saturday at the theater (check!) Alex's were silly- like "eat watermelon out of the watermelon with a spoon like they did on iCarly" which she did (check!) Some things we had to "divide and conquer". For example, Justin took the boys to Grimes Glenn (check!) and I took Alex and Cate to Sonnenberg (check!)

We crossed off Geneseo Air Show (check!) even though we didn't pay to get in, but watched it from the campus grounds after a walk with Grandma Chickie. My sister said we were cheating- but o-well.

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Hudson has been doing really well in soccer this season. His skills and confidence have really improved. He was quite pleased with himself when he scored 3 goals in one game!

I'll leave you with some funny pictures of the boys. Ethan- you're so weird.....
And I don't think Hudson likes his lunch!!

Ethan plays soccer

The picture below speaks volumes about his playing.... he doesn't really "get it" yet. Lots of standing and watching. Some kids at this age (U8) have such an instinct for the game. And some, like my guy, haven't developed it yet.

His "season" so far has been a rocky one.... first week he got a terrible headache and walked off the field in pain, so we left. Second week, I guess he played and did ok- I was at solofest with Alex, so I'm not really sure how he did. Third week he didn't go as we were in the midst of his icky illness. Last week it was pouring rain, but they played anyway and froze. So he really has only had 2 good nights of playing this year.... not a lot of time to get a feel for the game.

And it was hot last night, and I had to drag him out of Grandma and Papa's pool to go to his game, so he wasn't really happy with me. He has next week off for the 4th of July holiday, and a few weeks of games after that. We'll see how he does.

Ethan's Birthday

Ethan's 7th birthday celebration stated on Friday, the day before his "big day".... when he had cupcakes at school ..... ...then (just like his brother Hudson did a few years ago) he ditched his car seat and went to the library to get his library card!

On Saturday he had some school friends, cousins, family and family friends over to Grandma and Papa's house for a pirate party. (Also, must be the theme in the Williams house when you turn 7!) Justin put together a treasure hunt that ended with the kids finding a pirate boat for the pool...which was a lot of fun...

...but didn't last very long.

Then Ethan blew out the candles on his pirate cake and opened his gifts. He said it was his "best birthday yet!"