What do you get when you combine a cute kid in a panda costume, a hilarious speech for trick or treating, and rainy weather that kept the number of ghosts and ghouls down?  A metric ton haul of candy.

Isaac Anthony had a very good time despite the bad weather.  In part it was because trick or treating is fun and in part it is because he definitely got the hang of it.  He understood the give and take--he'd be adorable and they'd give him candy.  But Isaac took this process to the next level, I-man style.

He'd walk up to the door and ring the door.  When they opened up he'd say trick or treat.  They would then put out the candy dish and he'd pick something.  Then they would pull the candy dish back in and he'd go into super kid mode.

Isaac: "Do you like my costume?"
People: "Oh yes, you look adorable!"
Isaac:  "Thank you, thank you very much.  You have a beautiful house."
People: "Oh my goodness...here take some more candy."

By the end of the evening Isaac had collected roughly his body weight in candy from about 15 houses.  And really could you resist this kid?

One day we came home from work and Isaac hopped out of the car and ran around.  Then he asked to rake leaves.  For reasons I don't quite understand he LOVES to rake leaves.  So we busted out the rakes and went to town making big piles.

As I was raking I saw Isaac drop to his knees to examine something.  He was crouching down and being very still and very quiet (which never happens, unless he is fascinated by something).  He told me to come over.  "Daddy, Daddy!  There is a catepillar."  I wasn't sure if he knew what a non-Eric Carle catepillar looked like, but it was definitely possible he did.  I walked over and saw him staring at a black fuzzy on the ground.  It was round and definitely NOT a catepillar.  "See Daddy, that's the catepillar!"  Just as I was about to tell him that it wasn't a catepillar, but black fuzzy stretched out of its ball and revealed itself as a wholly bear catepillar (of the weather predicting variety; the brown stripe was as thin as a penny--cold winter folks, sorry).

Carefully we removed it from the raking path and put it over by the stairs in the front of the house.  It inched along towards the leaf litter and the whole time Isaac watched it like this:



Pretty darn good eyes to spot the little booger and excellent memory to correctly ID the creature at age three. I didn't teach him that and neither did Bianca. He had to have learned it and remembered it from school.

Oh, by the way, the catepillar's name is Isaac the Catepillar.  Just in case you were wondering.

As Isaac's spelling powers are growing so to are his math powers.  Fortunately he got his spelling abilities from me and his math abilities from his Momma.  Had it been the other way around he'd have to get by on his good looks for the rest of his life.

Proof of his math abilities occurred on our weekly trip to the grocery store.  Mom and Isaac were sitting in the back and I was driving.  Isaac announced to us "There are three of us in here."  We agreed and then he continued.  Pointing at the two empty seats he said: "If there was a person up there and right there there would be five of us in here."  We were both impressed, but still skeptical.  Bianca raised the ante and quizzed him.  "What if we put someone in the back of Subbie too, how many then?"  Isaac thought about it for a second and then said: "Six Mommy."

Holy Arithmetic Batman!  This kid's a smart one.