Fall Fun

pretty leaves in our own backyard

All 3 kids still went trick-or-treating this year...but not all 3 kids went with me. Braylen's entering that phase where he'd rather be with his friends than his family. I think this phase might last a while. Like for the rest of time. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I'm happy to see him growing up. I'm happy to see he has some good friends. But part of me wants to hold on to those days when I was all he wanted or needed.

Originally, my 10 year old son wanted to trick-or-treat as a member of The Beatles. I was wondering how to turn him into a Beatle. Then he saved me from that task and told me he just wanted to be a hunter. How easy! Now, what goes with a hunter? A deer and a turkey of course! Aaron volunteered to be the deer. Kaleb said he'd be the turkey, and then he said no way. He went as a football player. Oh well--it was easy! :) We had a beautiful night for trick-or-treating, and I realized Ginger needs a costume next year. This year I'm sure she'd just try to eat it.

Halloween 2009

our little deer

wearing real antlers from one of Daddy's bucks!

We built our house in a new neighborhood 6 and 1/2 years ago. Therefore, we've never needed to rake leaves. Well, this year we finally had enough leaves on the ground to rake! I know, someday soon we'll wish we didn't. But this year we had fun with the leaves! The boys even fought over our one pitiful looking rake. I felt pretty silly telling them to take turns with a chore!

proud of their leaf pile

This past weekend Braylen brought his classroom hamsters home. To bad he forgot to bring their food. :) I diced up some carrots and apples Friday night and they gobbled it right up! The boys loved playing with Smokey and Midnight. Saturday morning I found them in their room, letting the hamsters run through a maze they'd built with colored duplo blocks. Braylen even covered the carpet with paper towels. I can't believe how much entertainment 2 small rodents could bring to our house. Then again, I loved my hamster when I was growing up. Nothing made them laugh more than watching those hamsters run around the house in their ball. We had some sad fellas on Monday morning, when Smokey and Midnight returned to the 4th grade classroom.

Braylen with Smokey

All smiles as they wait for me to tell them they can play!

The cage is taped because Smokey escaped at school and was missing for 3 days. He's quite a Houdini!

To wrap up this post I have to say "Happy First Date Night Anniversary" to my husband. 15 years ago today, we went out on our first date. 15 years! How can that be possible? Last week at a coffee shop the girl behind the counter saw my high school sweatshirt and asked me if I had kids at the high school. Aggghhh! Whatever happened to the days where people like that thought I was a high school student?! I told her my husband works there, and my kids are in elementary school. I wanted to say, "Do I LOOK like I have high school kids??" But I'm afraid of what her answer would be! :)