October Fest...

October - you sly dog you.

You woo me with your weather - your leaves a light in fiery colors - your fall break shenanigans and your carmel apples (I made two batches this year).

And then - your final days approach and I have to Mom so hard I almost want to just jump up and down and gleefully wave "ADIOS!" to you.

Like Pumpkin carving....WHY?!

(Double Why - See Booner fixated on the FAKE Jack-o-lantern?)

Does anyone truly like this?  I dare say no.  But chalk this one up to "we do it for the kids" and when I say we do it - we do ALL of it.  Acey almost barfed gutting his gourd.  Boone shook his head from side to side and said - "NO!  Ucky!"  Which is true, so what do you say back?  And then none of them can quite be trusted with sharp objects so the carving goes to the 'rents.  Lucky us.

Then there is actual Halloween day... you guys, I woke up an hour earlier today so I could get myself ready in order to be able to "costume" all the fellers.  I had to find the missing white glove for Mario, safety pin Harry's robe shut because that shoddy store bought thing wasn't going to do it, help out Indiana whose gun holster was bringing down his drawers.  Sigh.

But We made it.  

For round one that is.

The day is oh, so, young

We marched over to school with them for the costume parade.

Then rewarded ourselves with a Diet Coke after all that waving and smiling.

Fine that was just me.

Then returned to load the washing machine and cut the veggies for the relish tray before we headed back over to the school for the class parties.  Which obviously included over frosted sugar cookies complete with one zillion sprinkles and pumpkin bowling.

Whew.

I'm thinking of dressing up as a cute Grandma this evening so I can roll around the hood in a wheel chair because this day is like a marathon that just keeps going.

But you can't stop say no to little faces like this on a holiday, ammiright?

Happy Haunting to you All...

We will sleep well tonight.  :)

A Hunting We Will Go....

You Guys - HEY!

Just coming to you after the dirtiest - grossest weekend known to mankind - the deer hunt.

 Let me tell you something, the morning started at 3 degrees in the dark with Ace Face upchucking on my lap since the truck windows were frozen shut.  

And now I'm awake.  :)

Next to puke - Kaelster - who ralphed out the side window and created a nice camo pattern down the side of the truck door.  Wow.  On a roll.

Mama missed her first deer.  Let's not dwell on that.

Mama got a deer.  The tiniest two-point on the mountain.  

 Stopped Dax right in his tracks as we were hiking through the trees and he was dutifully watching his every step as he traipsed behind me through the leaves and logs studying the very ground he was walking on.

Daddy-o shot some pine hens that Wyatt spotted and the boys gleefully collected them and held them by their talons begging for him to cut one off for them to add to their "lucky rabbit's feet" keychains.  Ewww.

And Booner snuggled in at Grandma's house while she and Sophie took good care of him and played the whole day long with our little charmer.  The only one who wasn't covered head-to-toe in gross.  ;)

It was quick.  It was fun.  It was eventful.  And it's done.

And that's just how I like my deer hunts.

Thanks for making it memorable little lads.  We *mostly* loved having you around.

 Next year we'll work on volume levels.  Sigh.

You Say Futbol, I Say Football...

We are reaching the close of another soccer season and we are in the midst of flag football and guess what?  This week basketball starts.  And that week where all three overlap?  Well - pray for me.  :)

The boys are doing so well this year.  Dax and Kael have decided it's more fun to be the brick houses at the back half of the field and steal goals away from people.  I think it's a secret (or not so secret) mean streak in them because the dudes take their jobs VERY seriously and I catch them with evil grins after they've stripped some hot shot of the ball and sent it soaring downfield to their own offenses.  I totally speak that language.  Defense - it's our jam.

Ace on the other hand still loves an audience and performing for said audience.  His favorite pass time is to run past defenders and score, then airplane his way back to mid-field in celebration.  I'll tell you what - little man has scored his fair share of goals this year, and his team is really starting to get the hang of things.

In fact this weekend all three Gardner guys scored goals in their frigid games and we cheered our guts out and beamed with pride.  Sometimes in parenting - even through extra curricular activities - you get a little gold star stuck to your forehead.  It was fun.

Kael and Dax started flag football this year and lucky for Ryan and I - they do this by grade so we chase them both from game to game every week.  Note the earlier comments above about defense and times them by 100 because getting to physically yank a flag off of a competitor's belt is right up there with pop rocks and grasshoppers.  :)  Ryan has stepped in to coach more times than he has been a spectator at both football and soccer and the boys are down right giddy when Dad coaches them.

All three of our gents will start Jr. Jazz next week and it will be Ace's first season ever.  Which means I get to wrangle the wild Boone each and every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday evening while a zillion balls bounce his way and he's restrained from getting them. I'm tired already, though I am also stocking my purse with all the tricks this lady knows of for a season full of fewer "toddler runs onto the court in the middle of the game" happenings.  Come on, Booner - we can do it!

In November, wrestling season will start for Ace and our lives will also be dedicated to that for the next four months as well.

And you know what?  I wouldn't want it any other way.  These boys of ours have less screen time than probably any kids in the hood and though it is a little more taxing on us - I'm proud of them and their growing muscles, their strong lungs, their deepening understanding of what it means to be a team player,  their expanding network of friends, and of all the games they're learning to play so well through muscle memory.  And so long as they keep acing those spelling tests and reading - we are the proud parents of a bunch of busy ballers.

On Your Mark - Get Set - GO!!  :)

Of Octobers....

Sometimes fall days are quite literally golden.

Friday was one of those.

We had such a good week full of practices and games and homework and spelling tests.  We attended Parent Teacher Conference and got good reports on each of our boys.  That's all it took to declare a  "seize this fine fall day" kind of moment.  I packed up my little lads and decided to make it an epic Friday, complete with an hour early out from school and a trip with friends to sense all of fall.

I took the boys to the local pumpkin patch and those golden kernels are now ALL over in my mud room floor, in my dryer, in my car.  I'm slightly annoyed with each one I pick up, but mostly it makes me smile as I remember my little happy faced fellers and some of their buddies enjoying the fall sun in the dirtiest, most down home way possible.

The corn maze.  I don't think we got too deep into it but they didn't care because they each found a cob to shuck and they traipsed along in a row for a good while on what they thought was a legendary adventure.  Boone thought this was especially exciting.

There was a pumpkin tower, gaming tables with pumpkins as the game pieces, and a small petting zoo.  There were hay stacks to climb and slides to descend and oh so many pumpkins to be tempted to chuck as far as one could.  :)

The corn pits...

You guys they were a total hit.  There is corn in every possible nook and cranny.  The crew lingered there for the longest time burying one another, filling one another's shirts, taking turns pushing Boone across the surf of gold.  It was a riot and I loved watching them.  

 

 

And if posting a hundred pictures of our fun is wrong - than I don't wanna be right.  :)

 

 I especially loved the white dusting their little faces got as their play got more involved.  And plucking kernels from behind ears and out of diapers (that was discovered a bit later).  And their "beer bellys" full of corn.

 

 

Oh Fall - You sassy minx, you. 

You're a complete show off of the best variety and we're so glad you came to play a bit.