Pumpkins

Matthew and his pumpkin.

Exploring.

Megan with her pumpkin.

Spunky, meet pumpkin. (Spunky is quite popular these days. She goes a lot of places and meets a lot of people. Or pumpkins.)

Sarah and her pumpkin. (The downside to being photogenic and sitting still is that, while your brother and sister have lots of pictures taken in hopes of getting one good one, you just get one. But it is good!)

The kids with their pumpkins.

Sarah had so much fun decorating her pumpkin that she decided to decorate Megan's and Matthew's as well.

Our pumpkin man.

Spider Girls and Bunnies and Birds! Oh My!

The Great Pumpkin Festival

The Saturday before Halloween, we went to the Pumpkin Festival at the Desert Botanical Gardens. Always a lot of fun. We rode out to the pumpkin patch, successfully navigated our way through the hay bale maze (even Matthew, who when he was almost out, decided to go a different way and basically led U through the entire maze. I guess he just wanted to see all of it...), danced to music, petted animals and picked pumpkins.

The beginning of the hay maze.

Through the tire.

Can I lift it???

Sarah and Megan building a pumpkin man.

Petting the pig. And what's that eating her hair?

Megan really loved petting the animals. She loves animals a lot.

Matthew and daddy.

Matthew, Megan and the chicken. Megan may have loved it a little too much and pulled its head up by its comb. Ouch! Thankfully there was no pecking involved.

Sarah held this chicken. She was really excited about it.

Megan and Matthew and the pumpkin man.

 Megan and Matthew survey the pumpkins and ask themselves the big question: Which one do I pick?

Matthew pondering the meaning of life.

Sarah and her decorated pumpkin.

On the way back from the pumpkin patch.

Megan digging for buried treasure at one of their game booths.

The family.

Serious Strolling

This is how Megan and Matthew went on our walk this morning. As you can deduce from the necessity of wearing helmets, we do some heavy duty strolling on those sidewalks of ours! Ha ha! For some reason they have both really liked putting on "hats" as they call them and wearing them around the house lately.

Bonus: Can you tell which child put their helmet on themselves and which had mom's assistance?

What a cute kid!

I just love this picture! And I love this kid even more!

Here's a cute story about what a helper Matthew can be. The other day, I was going upstairs to gather the laundry and trash and Matthew wanted to come along. While I was in our bedroom getting our stuff, Matthew went (unbidden) to the kids' bathroom, got their trash can and then brought it to me. He then carried the upstairs trash downstairs without any help (took him a minute to figure out how to get the full trash can down the stairs without spilling, but he did it). He helped me get the rest of the garbage on the main floor and then take it all out to the curb. Then he carried the trash can up the stairs and put it away. What a helpful kid!

Fun Run and the Zoo

A couple of weekends ago, we started our day bright and early with a one mile Fun Run. Intel put on the event and there was lots of fun. Besides the race, they had breakfast and some bounce houses. Radio Disney was there, too, with lots of activities and prizes.

Megan and Matthew before the race

U and Sarah running

Megan, Matthew and me crossing the finish line.

Matthew doing the hurdles. He earned a pencil for his efforts.

Matthew loved playing in the bounce house. He started asking to go into it almost as soon as he saw it. I wasn't sure if he'd like it but he did. A lot.

Megan climbing into the bounce house. She enjoyed it, too.

 Silly Matthew:)

Sarah and U sporting their Gravity Falls (aka gnome throwing up a rainbow) shirts they won. (No, we don't understand it. No, we haven't ever watched the show.)

After playing for quite awhile, we went home and had an early lunch/quiet time so that we could head to the zoo for Boo at the Zoo. They had some Halloween activities and Radio Disney was there as well.

Matthew riding the horse.

Megan riding the horse.

Sarah in the hay bale maze. We successfully found our way through.

Posing for a picture in the pumpkin patch.

Me posing. I'm much less wiggly....

Megan and Matthew found comfortable seats for eating their snacks.

Sarah on the carousel.

Matthew, Megan and me.

Sarah playing at Yakulla Caverns. She was really excited to bring her swimsuit and play in the water.