Ryan's Costume Parade

This morning was Ryan's costume parade at his pre-school. All the kids dressed up and trick or treated around the Haile Village Center where Ryan's school is located. The shop owners were great, oohing and aahing over each costume, and the kids had a great time. Ryan chose to wear the pumpkin costume for the 3rd year in a row. Gotta love that. He will tell you that the hat is "a little snug" this year. Usually it's still hot this time of year down here, but we've had a cold snap this year. Yesterday and this morning, it was in the 30's when we left for school! This is why you're seeing all the long sleeves, pants and jackets on the people in the pictures.

This video below is Ryan is saying Trick or Treat. Soooo cute since he doesn't pronounce his "R"s...Sorry this video is sideways...um just tilt your head.

Pumpkins

A pumpkin patch is hard to find here in Florida. On the day we had scheduled to go to the pumpkin patch as a family, the pumpkin patch was almost out of pumpkins, and we didn't get any good pictures. The next week, we tried a different pumpkin patch, and luckily, they still had some pumpkins left. But the best part for the kids was that there was a free bounce house as well! Ryan was not interested in carving the pumpkin as he felt it was "too yucky." Rebecca was a good helper though, and enjoyed each step of the process this year.

Rebecca lost a tooth!

So- the dentist pointed out the wiggly tooth to us at her 6 month appt on October 8th. It was barely moving. I mean you had to use a little imagination to see any movement.

It hadn't made much progress 10 days later on the 18th, and I didn't give it any thought when I gave Rebecca an apple for a snack. After 6 or 7 bites she told me her mouth was hurting and that she was bleeding a little bit. I took a look, and that tooth had gone from barely moving to a full board wiggler. She played with it non stop for the next 24 hours and then the next night when she brushed her teeth, she spit it out with the rinse water. Luckily we caught it before it went down the drain. She is VERY excited about it!

Yard of the month

Yup- we won this month! And the same day we won, my perennials decided they were all donw for the season...

More fall fun

Here are some random pics some several different festivals...

Tractor boy. He rides a tractor any chance he can get.

Rebecca gets her face painted any chance she gets. She chose a unicorn this time.

Both kids got a kick out of getting their hair sprayed...Still haven't gotten it all out after 3 shampoos...

These are kids from Rebecca's dance studio performing Thriller in the street in front of the ballet studio for Oktoberfest. I thought it was a riot. The kids were very confused about the concept of zombies...

Grossology

So- we headed over to Grossology. If this exhibit comes to a museum near you, be forewarned that it is indeed gross. There is one area where you prime a pump and a nasty smell comes out and you have to guess what it is: stinky feet, an armpit, bad breath, or poop. So gross. The kids favorite part was climbing into a mouth, sliding down the throat and then crawiling into the intestine and coming out as poop.


Can you see Ryan in that gigantic nose?

This was fun- a giant Operation game.

Rock wall of skin problems...

And here, you can make this attractive dude burp and belch.

Butterflyfest

Next great event is the Butterflyfest at the Natural History Museum. The kids get to make a mask, some wings, and antenna for a complete ensemble. Ryan chose butterfly wings and antenna but opted for a bat mask, so we decided he was a "bat-erfly." Not a lot of picture here, because...at the Natural History Museum, there is a traveling exhibit called, "Grossology" based on the series of popular books by the same name. One has to walk by this exhibit in order to get to the free butterfly crafts and childrens area. Well, Ryan got a sneek peek, and that's all he could concentrate on. He sat down and worked on his butterfly wings for about...2 minutes and proclaimed that he was ready to go see the gross stuff. I explained that we needed to stick together and wait till Rebecca was finished before we could go see the exhibit, and maybe he might want to spend more time on his butterfly crafts/ costume. So, he sat down and worked on it for about 30 seconds more and announced he was done, and wanted to go see the gross stuff. Since he wasn't getting anywhere with me, he sought out the nearest grownup for assistance. Happily, this happened to be a museum staffer. Here is the conversation that took place...

Ryan: You know they have gross stuff here?
Staffer: No way!
Ryan: Yeah! Wanna see?
Staffer: Yeah! Show me!
Ryan: (Runs out of the childrens area and over to the exhibit.) You SEE! There it is! It's GROSS stuff!
Staffer: That's so cool! Thanks for showing me.
Ryan: Want to go with me?
Staffer: Well, I think you should stay with your mom.
Ryan: Oh man, we have to wait for Becca. (Walks away dejected)

Rebecca has become extremely interested in anything artistic lately, was all about the butterfly costume, and wanted to take her time decorating it with markers, stickers, glitter glue and paint. She was happily ensconced at the craft table for 30 or 40 minutes in her own world working on her costume. Ryan and I entertained ourselves by talking to the vendors and scientists, anyone who was interested in having a conversation with him.

Cute kids

Here's a couple of cute pics of the kids...with my poor camera that is in bad shape and has some dust caught on the inside of the lens which causes that flare in the middle of the picture.

Maybe my talented photographer sister could photoshop that out for me when she comes out for air sometime next year...

Corn Maze

Every year there are dozens of fun events, happenings, festivals and must do family activities in October, and we try our best to get to as many of them as we can. The Newberry Corn Maze is a perennial favorite, and we look forward to it every year. Unfortunately, this year it was very very hot, and the kids were restless and excited to be there, so I didn't get many great pictures.


Here is the Corn Hut, where Rebecca and Ryan could spend hours if allowed. In this picture are some of the kids from our playgroup who joined us there.

So, last year we did the corn maze and enjoyed the walk. Last year, the corn was about 3 feet high, and mostly dead. This year, as you can see, the corn was WAY over our heads, and the paths were hard to find at times. The walk was a little treachorous as there were several giant anthills housing fire ants. About 30 minutes prior, Rebecca had been bitten by about a dozen fire ants and had broken out in hives, so she was very wary of them. (Luckily Jocelyn brought her Benadryl cream.) Also, there were some pricker types of bushes which each girl walked into at one time or another and at various times we moms banded together to gently pull the prickers out of their hair, or to pull a girl out of the pricker bush. After the third time this happened, we appointed one of the taller boys to pricker alert duty and moved him to the front. He shouted back to the group when he saw some prickers so we could all avoid them. We got lost a couple of times as well, and it took at least 25 minutes for us to get out of the maze. Needless to say, we were happy to be out!

Ryan and Elyse held hands the entire way. They reported that they were protecting each other from the dangers of the corn maze.

Ryan was so funny (well ok - he's funny a lot.) He was a little nervous about this decorated area. There was an archway that hard to see in this picture, and other kids had just run through it. He was checking it out from a distance, not sure he wanted to get any closer...

Then, he put on his "fierce" face and quickly ran through the open archway. Happily, he lived to tell the tale.

Becca's Birthday Party

Rebecca is 6 years old! I can hardly believe it. We had a Pet Show birthday party this year and asked all the guests to bring their favorite stuffed animal to play with at the party. The weather was so nice, and we all enjoyed being outside. Everyone had a wonderful time.

Here is Becca with "Pup." She received Pup just the day before - a present from Ryan.


Here is the cupcake cake- designed to look like a paw print...sort of

The kids gave their pets checkups

And made sure they looked their best

Later we made collars, name tags and decorated tote bags for them.

Lastly we had a pet show where each guest introduced their pets and told us how old they were, where they had gotten them, why they were special, etc. It was very cute. Rebecca loved every minute of it.

cooler weather

The weather has gotten so much nicer the past few weeks. We had Kaitlyn and Jeffrey come over to play one afternoon and the boys had a great time playing with a hose, a big tub and some soap. What could be better?

African Market Day

Becca's school hosted a wonderful event last week. There were seven "stations." The 7 Kindergarten classes visited each station in rotation. The first stop was African food. Rebecca drank the non-African soda and that was it. On the plate were things like plantain chips, sweet potato chips, mango, pineapple, a jello cutout in the shape of Africa and a mixture of stuff like coconut and chocolate chips. Oh yeah, she ate the chocolate chips too.



This was great. All the kids practiced walking on balance beams with baskets on their heads. Only the little girl behind Rebecca, (her friend, Grace) was able to keep it on her head.

Don't know why she posed this way...here is some African clothes

Here is an African musical instrument. All the kids played different instruments at the same time. A bit loud, but very interesting to watch.

Here's Rebecca's class doing the Conga. I think Rebecca's got the rythym.