Halloween

It was really nice to have a Halloween on a Saturday. The weather was beautiful, although it did rain a bit when it was time to trick-or-treat. Dominic and Papa made a great scare crow in the afternoon while Samantha slept. Dominic was so excited about being scary and scaring everyone. Once we were out in the dark though he decided he may not be quite ready for that. He stopped trick-or-treating early after we went to a house decked out in cob webs but we convince him to go back out for a couple of houses. After a talk we decided that next year, we'd bring a flashlight!

Pumpkin!

Dominic did a great job deciding on how we should carve the pumpkin and did a lot of the carving himself with the little pumpkin carver. It did however take a couple of weeks to convince him to carve the pumpkin. He was not a fan of the pumpkin daddy carved last year!

4th Birthday Party!

Dominic wanted a Monster Truck birthday party. I'm not really sure why since before he told me he wanted it he wasn't that into monster trucks. He was so excited before his party, especially since it was the day after his actual birthday. On his birthday I told him he was 4 now and he was thrilled. He insisted I measure him on the wall and kept saying "really?" with a satisfied little grin. When we got to Laura's house she said good morning and Dominic immediately responded with "I'm four now!"

He had a fantastic time at his party, especially running from "monsters" with Jorja and playing with Ahmad after the other guests had left. He keeps insisting now that he wants to have a sleep over with Jorja and Ahmad. I told him, maybe when he was a bit older.

Princess Party

Dominic was invited to his friend Megan's Princess party. He was excited at first and then he told me that he didn't want to be a princess. I told him that he didn't have to be a princess, that he could be a prince. He said that he didn't want to be a prince, he wanted to be King!

Toy

One thing we promised Dominic was that after Italy he could get a hamster. The entire time we were in Italy we hear "Can we get a hamster now?" So the week after we got home we went to the store and got all the things we needed plus a baby hamster. He had originally said that he wanted to name his hamster "Rocky." When the time came though he named her "Toy." I was pretty surprised he chose that because that was the name of our cat when he was a baby. When we got home he was such the proud little parent, it was adorable! He made sure she had everything we needed and the next day he was horrified that we were going to leave her home alone. "But she's just a baby!" He said. Apparently we did a good job impressing on him what a big responsibility it would be to have a pet. He's been wonderful holding her and checking her water, and he helps me to clean the cage.

Italy - Sorrento

We had another great apartment in Sorrento which was a really cute town way up on a cliff. From there we went to a beach at Meta (which was perfect for the kids), the Amalfi coast (bus ride from hell but nice boat ride back) and Pompei (which the kids LOVED!). Dominic kept looking for cats at the apartment but there weren't any like there were in Tuscany. Dominic had commented off an on about the people talking funny and we explained that they were speaking Italian. When we went to the beach in Meta, a bunch of kids were playing together and Dominic said "I want to go play with them but I don't know their names." I felt so bad because normally I would encourage him to go meet them and find out their names but it was a beach of locals and the kids only spoke Italian. Overall, we had a fantastic time in Italy! Definitely a wonderful trip with the whole family. Dominic keeps saying "I wish we were in Italy." :-)

Italy! -Rome

Rome was pure craziness. It was great to see the Collesseum, the forum, St. Peter's, and the shops by the Spanish Steppes were amazing but overall it was a CITY! Lots of people, lots of traffic (where apparently walk signals mean nothing) and lots of stuff that were overpriced. It was still quite the experience, although we were all ready to get to our apartment in Sorrento.

Italy- Tuscany

Tuscany was a wonderful place for kids. Our apartment had lots of place to play inside and outside and lots of cats to chase. The walled cities of Lucca and Volterra were great and with limited traffic the kids had a good time looking at everything. Tuscany is also about where the kids fell into the time change!