Pumpkin Carving

All our pumpkin patch-ing done, we sat down to carve two of our pumpkins. Gabby drew out the designs, Robert took command of the carving and I sorted and roasted the pumpkin seeds. I am the only one who will eat them, too. Oh well, I think they are good!

Pumpkin Patch with Gabby

Gabby and I went to the pumpkin patch last Wednesday with her Brownie Troop. It is the same patch Sam went to and they did the same things - petting zoo, hay maze, hay ride, and pumpkin choosing. Both my kids took the choosing of the pumpkin very seriously. They were happy with their choices. The pigs, that were so cutely asleep when Sam was there, found great delight this afternoon in attacking the shoes of those who ventured in to the pens.

Pumpkin Patch with Sam

Sam's preschool made their pumpkin patch trip last week. Don't worry, Gabby gets to go with the Brownies this week. It was a beautiful morning. Sam was a bit picky about his pumpkin, we walked pretty far in to the patch. He loved the tractor and the kittens. He ran through the hay maze and petted all the animals. The preschool trip ended with pumpkin shaped sugar cookies and a juice box.

Pumpkin Factory

I saw these sweet little red apples on a friend's blog a couple of weeks ago. They were so cute and upon finding out how easy they were, I showed the kids how to do them, except we used orange and made pumpkins. Sam made his one and was happy. Gabby made one, two, three...eighteen. She is creating a pumpkin patch for her American Girl. In fact, I need to go rescue a couple from her room - I wanted to decorate my house with them. She took the supplies with her to PWOC and made some for each kid and her and Sam's teacher there. She took one to her piano teacher. She likes making these little pumpkins. And they are cute. Thanks, Mary Katherine!

Corn Maze

We went to the Rutledge Corn Maze on Columbus Day. Both kids have pumpkin patch field trips scheduled but Robert was going to miss both of them and I was going to try to take them separately so we decided the big corn maze would be a little different and fun. The maze this year is shaped like Capt. Phil Harris of Deadliest Catch fame and his boat, the Cornelia Marie. Quite a few of those crab boats and crews come out of the Seattle area. You can see an arial shot HERE . There are two paths through the maze and we did them both. After that we walked around to their pumpkin patch and picked out a couple of big pumpkins. It was a beautiful day!

Ice Skating Progression

Lesson three and she's getting better. More confident. The class is 30 minutes and then the students can stay for the free skate afterward. We have about 30 minutes before we have to go to preschool pickup. She spent almost all of that 30 minutes this week working on following that ice cream cone drawn on the ice and then making the turn back down the line. Unfortunately she had to miss lesson four for Sam's preschool field trip but she'll be back at it this Thursday!

Halloween Houses

Before the assault

We made Halloween houses again this year with the Bakers. The moms got smart this year and got together the night before to assemble the houses and the set the kids loose to decorate them. I haven't taken pics of the finished products yet. I will do that and post them later.

Swim Lessons

Sam's first swim lesson

The kids are taking swim lessons this month. This is Sam's first shot at lessons. Not his first time in the pool but his first real lessons. Gabby knows how to swim so she's working on doing things the right way and learning strokes.

Home Depot Fire Day

I've made it to October! October is Fire Safety month so the Home Depot project is always a fire something. This year it was a fire boat. Very cute. A fire truck showed up while we were there. The kids met the firemen and sat in the truck. Who doesn't love a fire truck?

Don't you wish you slept like this?

This is how I found my booger boy one morning. Can you say sleeping hard?
I had to wake him up. He got up, stumbled to the stop of the stairs and collapsed back in to sleep right there. Poor guy. Don't you hate to wake them up when they're like this?

Artwork

Gabby made this card for her friend's Rock N Roll birthday party. She cut the CD shape herself and drew this inside. I thought it was pretty good!

Football in 3D

Without glasses

With glasses (sorry it's wonky - it's hard to take a picture through glasses)

Crowd shot without glasses - that's enough to make you dizzy

Sporting the glasses

We have gotten to see two Auburn games this year in 3D. First Clemson, then South Carolina. I forgot to take my camera to the Clemson game so these pics are from the SC game. Gabby was at a sleepover that night. The Seattle Auburn Club found the one bar in Washington with 3D TVs and then managed to convince them to move them out of the bar and into a room for the club so that we could bring kids.

It's crazy to watch football in 3D. It really does feel like you are there, especially the end zone shots. You can see the shakers from the stands in the foreground. It looks like you could reach out and grab one! During commercial time ESPN had some footage of other sports in 3D. The X Games type stuff looked really cool.

I never went up to Seattle last year to watch games with the Auburn club - too far for me by myself with the kids. Much easier to watch at home. It was fun to get together and watch with other Auburn fans, though. We had about 50 for the Clemson game and about 35 for the SC game. It's a great group of folks, of course! War Eagle!

Skating Lessons, Take Two

Second lesson and she's already looking better!

Ice Skating

Gabby has started taking ice skating lessons once a week. She is in the beginner class but learning every week. These pics are from the very first class.

First Day of Preschool

My handsome boy went off to his first day of preschool in September. He had the benefit of having Daddy here - Robert missed Gabby's first day of preschool. He went right in and started playing without so much as a goodbye. He was happy to see us at pickup but had a great time at school!