The Pumpkin Mania Continues

Now that we had our pumpkins from the patch, it was time to make them worthy of standing on our front porch.

The Spud was especially excited to be allowed to use all the interesting tools for this activity. The ice cream scoop was definitely his favorite.

The Beast could not wait to open his pumpkin and get all the guts out; we caught him stabbing his pumpkin repeatedly with his carving tool.

The Drama Queen was quite intent on carving her own this year; and she did admirably well with little help from Daddy.

What can I say? We really get into our pumpkin carving around here!

The next day, we hosted a pumpkin party for our friends from our Faith and Family Sunday School class. The table was covered with dozens of pumpkins, all blank canvasses for the party guests. Caramel apples, kettle corn, and pumpkin cookies waited in the kitchen to be served along with an assortment of apple cider and soda pop.

Once the guests heard there would be prizes for the pumpkin carving, they jumped right in. Everyone chatted away while they busily used knives, measuring cups, spoons, scrapers, and. . .

. . . even a power drill. It takes all kinds.

For the younger guests, an assortment of toys was waiting in the boys' room as well as our new Toss-Across game. Note here that the Drama Queen has already set herself up for the perfect win. :)

Many of the guests enjoyed Mario Kart on the Wii. Yes, that is popcorn all over my carpet.

I finally got a chance to carve a pumpkin too. (with a little helper)

The boys discovered how fun it was to use the power drill to make various holes in the pumpkins. One boy put so many holes in his pumpkin I was afraid the whole pumpkin would fall apart.

All in all, after the bags and bags of pumpkin guts and debris were cleared away and the last guest finally went home, I realized that I had thoroughly enjoyed myself. Pumpkins are fun, but friends are the best!

Pumpkin Fever

Lately, the small fry of the house have been all about those jolly round orange harbingers of autumn. The Spud and the Beast in particular will shriek "Puuumpkins! Puuumpkins!" whenever they see the colorful gourds. Adding to the pumpkin frenzy, a local store has put up a giant inflatable smiling pumpkin. Whenever we pass it, I think the only thing holding the boys back from launching out the window and giving it a big hug are those 5-point harnesses on their car seats. :)

So, it was with no small amount of excitement and joy that we headed out to the local pumpkin patch last week. The sun managed to poke its head out for one day here in rainy Oregon, and we took full advantage. When we first arrived, I realized that the eagerness of the kiddos would not be contained for long; therefore like any good mother I forced each child to pose and smile graciously at the camera before outfits got ruined or meltdowns ensued.

The Drama Queen did a beautiful job of course - showing off her new fall boots.

I was just thankful to get the Beast to sit for a second. He was a little overwhelmed by all the activity.

The Spud lent me one of his famous charming smiles before running pell-mell throughout the farm.

Seriously, that kid barely stopped for a second. It took him forever to decide on a pumpkin because he couldn't stay still long enough to choose. Grandpa had the fun job of keeping track of the Spud. :)

Meanwhile, the Beast saw his chance to make a break for it and gave Daddy quite the workout during the chase. I was the photographer; so I left the heavy work to the guys while I snapped some photos like this one:

and this one:

One of the reasons we like Lee Farms so much is that they sell some killer warm cider donuts! The promise of these tasty treats was enough to get all three hooligans on the straw at the same time, finally providing an opportunity to get a photo of them all in their matching outfits:

Well, we tried, anyway. The outfits will be reappearing in a future family photo shoot, so no worries. The kiddos wolfed down their donuts and begged to go in the hay maze/tube slide. I was more than willing to allow them to work off their sugary donut rush.

Somehow the Drama Queen managed to end her slide in a perfect pose. :)

And if you are wondering if the Beast suddenly grew an extra pair of legs, that is not the case. It is merely the Spud forgetting to wait his turn and literally coming down right on top of his brother.

We ended our pumpkin patch trip with a very large and perfectly round pumpkin (the Beast's); a tall and skinny pumpkin (the Spud's); and a squat white pumpkin (the Drama Queen's).

We still had plenty of pumpkin fun coming up though: pumpkin carving with the kids, a pumpkin party with our Sunday School class, and pumpkin bowling. But that's another story for another time...

Changes

So.

Apparently I am not as good at juggling school, family, therapy, housework, exercise, church, and extra activities as I thought. As you can see, my poor blog has been sadly neglected. It certainly isn't for lack of blog post fodder - the posts keep piling up in my head. It's just finding a solid time to sort out all the random thoughts and get them published in a coherent post.

But.

I'm not giving up! I do love blogging and will persevere to find that magic time to do it. There is way too much happening in our little family that needs recording for posterity. :)

One of the things that has been keeping us pretty busy is our new gym membership. We have been talking for a long time now about getting healthier and setting a good, positive example for our kids. Of course, it was all talk and not much action. The truth is - we are both pretty unhealthy, with the Nerd needing to lose a lot of weight and myself needing to change some bad habits. We finally found a gym that really works for us. It is completely family oriented, and our membership fee includes childcare (huge benefit for me!) and racquetball (huge motivation for the Nerd.) Since we joined, we have been at the gym almost every day. I am still amazed at how motivated we are this time. I actually look forward to going every day! It makes me smile when the kids eagerly ask if we get to go to the gym each day.

Along with exercise, we have been slowly changing our eating habits as well. The Nerd and I keep track of our calorie intake on our I-phones each day, and I have been making extra effort to get the kiddos to try new, healthier snacks and meals. We even celebrated the Beast's half-birthday with chocolate bean cupcakes (cupcakes made with pureed black beans and whole wheat flour). Amazingly, the kids loved them!

Our results at the end of our first month of healthier living? The Nerd lost fifteen pounds and is playing racquetball competitively in a league. His extra energy has helped him get a lot more things crossed off his "honey-do" list. :) I have lost eight pounds and have noticed extra energy as well. We are so excited at our progress and are determined to make this next month even better!

And part of this healthier lifestyle is getting a decent amount of rest; so I am going to log off and get under those covers. :) happy Monday all!

Wordless Wednesday - drummer boy

Davey. always marching to the beat of his own drum...

Friday Funnies

Just to let everyone know, we have a genius in the house. The Drama Queen is learning much more at school faster than I ever anticipated, and it's so fun to listen to her tell me all about what she learned each day (well, that, and who was naughty and got their name on the board).

Okay, she may not be a genius, but she is super smart (gets that from her momma, naturally). The other day we were driving to church, and I mentioned to the Nerd that she had been learning about opposites in school.

"Really? Let's see how much you know." he challenged her. "What's the opposite of cold?"

"Hot!"

"Okay, what's the opposite of happy?"

"Sad. Too easy, Daddy!"

"Well, what's the opposite of down?"

(big sigh) "Up."

(trying to be tricky) "What's the opposite of below?"

(no hesitation) " Be high!"

Yep, that's my girl! Have a wonderful Friday everyone!