Decorating
Lorelei's love for decorating took over for Halloween this year. Both kids had been preparing decorations for months. They had to keep a file in her room of all the creations they came up with throughout those months. I eventually just gave up attempting to care whether creations were taped all over my house. (I have put my foot down on Christmas, though, which the kids say is fine because we have plenty of Christmas decorations, unlike our lack-of for Halloween apparently.) It was pouring as we left school, but it stopped when we got home, so they had time to quickly decorate the front yard as they had been planning for months. The neighbor girls came and helped as well.
Carving
Each year Brad and I can't believe how much easier this gets! We love our Saturday-before-Halloween tradition. This year we blared Kidz Bop Halloween. The only added time-consuming task was that Mrs. White gave us the optional, but highly encouraged assignment of predicting the amount of pumpkin seeds in Makin's pumpkin, then counting them. We thought it would be fun and he was excited. Just a few more dishes for mom. ;) (His pumpkin had 536 seeds!)
Makin is officially the most patient scooper in the family, which he attributes to his perfectionist tendencies. He was cleaning out Brad and Lorelei's pumpkins quite a while after they had "finished" before cutting out the faces.
Trick Or Treat!
This year Lorelei chose to be Moana and Makin chose a medieval knight.
This girl toughed it out wearing this on quite a chilly Texas Halloween!
The moment where your realize boys are just wired to take this protection stuff seriously.
"Get one with the sword coming at the camera."
The reality of wearing a knight's helmet.
Our Goofballs
Brad took them around the neighborhood this year, while I stayed home to pass out candy. (Mostly doing the dishes and tidying up...) It was much slower this year because it was in the 50's and Texans just don't want to be cold. :) The kids actually had a ton of fun when they got home and loved passing out candy more than they did going to get their own. They even had Halloween music playing outside. They loved hearing comments on their decorations. Lorelei would often compliment people on their costumes.
Her reaction to the comments on the decorations being scary.
Park Time With Jaedynn
(The next week we met a couple of Makin's old soccer teammates at the same park,
but I can't get that picture to upload!)
Coffee and Breakfast At The Lake
Another Lake Saturday
(This one was a little chilly, but still had fun!)
Backyard Cushion Fort
Drone Flying At The Park
We also had fun with a giant Frisbee this day too, but no pic.
Fitting in some more sand time.
We always have to have plenty of sidewalk chalk.
GCA Fun Run/5K
We enjoyed helping with our fall fundraiser.
Filling the bags for the run is quite the organizational task!
Pre Run - Cheering Posters and Opening Ceremonies Song
So, Brad caught them finishing, but only got videos, so you just the pics I jogged out for at the "buildings" station. This year it was a super run, so they are leaping over buildings. There are windows on the other side, but I was going for faces. Makin asked to run the 5K this year but I wasn't feeling great about him running it alone. Both kids asked about running next year, so we will see, but I was reassured this year that there would be plenty of people along the run who would help if they needed it.
Bubble Machine Fun
So I am basically the whatever-you-need girl at this event. We joked that next year I will just be Sonya's personal assistant. (She is mostly in charge of organizing the run.) Apparently for quite some time while I was cheering and guiding runners on the 5K (there are several laps so the route is a little confusing) the 1st graders had a fun game of football going. Makin commented on the drive home that "Julia's dad is really nice. He played football with us and says he like how I throw a spiral." I just caught the end of the game when most of the kiddos had already gone, but it was still fun to see. Apparently watching Husker football has Makin working on his quarterback moves. :)
Nayeli got first place in her age group for the 5k!
(A batch of 3rd graders. Lorelei, Nayeli, Jaedynn and Maddy)
We have a shoe drive during the Fun Run/5K as well. We headed to Buckner Shoes Friday to pitch in getting shoes ready for the children who need them. Although it felt like a busy week, I was glad for the opportunity for the kids to serve. As we picked out shoes this year Lorelei commented, "I think these will be good for walking on rocks." She remembered the Barefoot Experience from last year where you take off your shoes and walk on the ground of various countries with your bare feet.
Tour of the Warehouse.
The Buckner GCA Group Of Kids
Pumpkin Painting
We had our third annual GCA pumpkin painting event! We have decided will have it every year until our kids thing they are "too cool." :) Maybe then the moms will just paint. ;)
Charlie and Makin
Lorelei was very proud of her paint job and making her pumpkin scary. The other side says "boo."
Another football game. Makin and Charlie are in the huddle! So cute!
I was so excited at such a big turn out this year. We extended the invite through all the grades by letting the room moms know this was an option for a class event. We had K-6th represented. This picture is even after several families left. Such a big growth from our first event that had to be in our house because it was pouring rain and was about 4 first graders!
When your favorite season is fall, it gets a little sad living in the south, particularly in October. It is one of the biggest things we miss about living in Nebraska, second to the people!
We miss the fall weather, as well as one of our favorite places, Vala's Pumpkin Patch (which just completes the fall package of course). As I was missing fall one of the last couple of years, I had the thought about traveling north over Columbus Day weekend. GCA does not have a fall break, so it seemed like the chance to get our fall fix without making up too much school work. Brad worked very hard to make it happen for us this year, and we were so thankful for a special, fun, family weekend.
What Google says should take 10 hours, actually takes us at least 11 with stops, so if we do this again we are strongly considering flying instead. :) But, it wasn't too bad.
We got a bit of a head start after picking up the kids from school and headed to Heather's place, knocking out 3 hours of the drive. A.J. recently moved to Edmond as well, so we loved getting to see them both during our quick stop in Oklahoma.
What I like to call Fun Aunt Cereal
(Yes I'm really regretting my choice not to primp a little more on our "just driving" day after seeing these pics!)
Between the tween clothes, bangs and headphones she looks way too old.
We settled in Friday and had to fit in a Runza supper and a quick swim in the pool even though it kept us up late!
We headed out bright and early so we could fit in every minute we could at the zoo. We were excited to see the new areas they had added (specifically the elephants) as well as our "old" favorites. We loved getting a chance to see Michelle and Alea as well.
Oh the penguins!
How we love the aquarium!
We ate lunch overlooking the indoor rain-forest and got to watch the monkeys play.
Checking out the new elephant exhibit with Michelle and Alea.
Sting Ray Beach
Interactive kids area - playing in a giant tree house play area, pulling the rope to make our raft move, twirling in a chrysalis and checking out a giant bird's nest.
Oh how we miss these ladies! Thankful for the afternoon together.
(And you know how much I'm kicking myself for forgetting to get a picture until the parking lot in the sun!?)
As we were contemplating this trip, we weren't sure if it would be a good opportunity to see the Sr. Stahls because Omaha is a 6 hour drive from their place. However, God totally worked things out! They had already planned a trip to Lincoln that same weekend to see a Husker game! (This also meant they weren't in bed until about 2 AM before their outing with us! Boy did they play hard this weekend!) So, we loaded up with Grandma and Grandpa and headed to Vala's Pumpkin Patch! I love that we have now had the opportunity to take both sets of parents, I just love seeing their reactions. You can read about it plenty but seeing it in person is a whole 'nother story! :) The kids remembered A LOT and had plenty of requests for the day. There were also new places they added that we enjoyed checking out. We definitely missed out usual week-day lack-of-crowds but still had a great time.
(I would apologize for the amount of pictures in this post...but if you read this blog you probably know that this is just the way I am!)
One of the first requests were "the giant Lincoln Logs" so we had to oblige.
It was quite the project but they got their house built! Great team work!
They loved feeding the animals.
Rubber Duck Races
The Egg Scrambler was a new addition. It is now one of Makin's favorites. When I told him it was time to go to the next activity he said, "But I love this place!" Just picture three levels of mass chaos, balls shooting everywhere from every direction, and kids having a total blast and you pretty much have it.
We had fun in the sports section. The boys played here while L and I took on the corn maze.
My little photographer in the making!
Lorelei and I were quite proud we made it out of the corn maze without getting turned around once!
Maybe I've been away too long but the corn seemed extra tall to me!
I had always wanted to try The Pie Barn, so I got my wish for lunch. You can see the apples being sliced, cored and cut for the pies as well as the pies being made. The ladies making pies said they had already made 100 pies so far that day.
I just love barns.
Eating out on the Pie Barn patio overlooking the corn field.
Yes it was yummy. :)
We had to go on The Big Slide Ride of course. So fun!
Both the kids and the grown men had fun shooting apples from these apple cannons. I don't really get it, but it was on the top of the boy's lists of best parts of Vala's when I asked. :)
The only perk to being there over the weekend: entertainment! So fun!
Had to include a video glimpse.
Our hayride to the pumpkin patch!
While the idea of agreeing on one pumpkin seemed like a good one to me, it was hard to actually make it happen. L consented to a smaller pumpkin for now, but is ready to choose a bigger one soon. :) Makin's choice ended up weighing in at 22 pounds. He insisted that he had to find one still on the vine and actually cut it off for it to be real pumpkin picking.
Why does my seven year old look like he could be posing for senior pictures?
The whole family!
So happy.
Thankful for this guy for working so hard to make this little dream come true!
We wrapped up a busy day with pizza and America's Funniest Videos. :)
This was such a great weekend and we are so thankful for our special little fall getaway!
As I look through all these pictures my heart just swells with happiness. So blessed.
