Fall Days!

Fall is by far my favorite season!  I love the beautiful leaves, the crisp air, the sun shining (but me not sweating), new cute boots, sweaters, hats, scarves, AND the kids are in school. :) Plus I love, love pumpkin flavored everything: coffee, donuts, bread, cake, pie, crisp.

This morning was a perfect Fall day to visit Green Bluff!  We loaded up the van and headed North.  We stopped at Walter's Farm.  We checked out pumpkins, apples, the wiggly worm, animals, pies, cider, mazes, who knew there was so much to do?  Kent has lived in Spokane for almost his whole 35 years of existence and this was his first trip there!  I went on Brayden's pre-school field trip for the last 3 years, so I already knew how gorgeous it was up there!  Luckily today it wasn't windy and the sun was shining bright!

Pumpkin patch

Apple orchard

We picked Granny Smith apples so I can make apple crisp.

 There wasn't a ladder in the orchard where we were picking and all of the lower apples had been picked. 

 Good thing you don't need too many apples for apple crisp.

Happy Fall everyone!  Kent just made cheese chowder, I better get started on the crisp, what a perfect Fall, Sunday evening!

2 hours and 15 minutes!

2 hours and 15 minutes, two mornings a week these two darlings go to pre-school! Which means I have 4 and a half hours a week by MYSELF! Well, technically I will be working one of those mornings, BUT the other morning I can be all by MYSELF, if I so choose. :) Oh yeah, they had a great first day, they love school and Ms. Jenny! But I already knew that would be the case. :) Elizabeth First day of pre-school!

Danielle

Homework already!

Decorating for Halloween. Making "spiders."

It's a DONE deal!

This stubborn little girl is: Potty trained!

She decided one week ago that she was going to wear panties... end of story, no accidents, like it aint no thang!

Orlando cont'd

Cousins, cousins and more cousins...

EPCOT

Danielle

Ellie and Brayden visiting Mexico at Epcot.

Cocoa beach! Ellie riding the waves!

Swimming in the pool at our pink house in Orlando. Really, we could have done this all day, everyday and the kids would have been THRILLED!

Hollywood Studios

Grandma, Brayden and Uncle Pete

The green army man from Toy Story. He was hilarious, he was standing as still as a statue and jumped out at a girl walking by. I thought she was going to pee her pants, she was so shocked!


Mike, from Monsters Inc. Dani was not a fan of the characters, this was the closest she got on her own.

There was an animation class that taught us how to draw characters. B loved it! First we drew Tigger, then we HAD to go back and we got to draw Donald Duck. Do I see a career in his future?

The Phillips family with Jiminy.

Ellie didn't grow over the weekend, she is still 39 and a half inches tall, just missing the 40 inch mark. She was such a good sport about sitting out on the big rides while everyone else hopped on. While we were waiting, a nice guy from the ride gave her a triceratops mask since she was too little.

The Tree of Life

Tomorrow is our last day here. I am ready to get out of the humidity, but sad to have our vacation be over. The kids have done an amazing job, just a few tears here and there, but honestly I have wanted to have lots of temper tantrums just because of the heat and humidity. Thank goodness the parks have not been too crowded and we haven't had to wait too long in lines. I guess most of the kids are in school, crazy.

In Orlando....

I took my kindergartner out of school for eight days for this... A family reunion in Disney World!

I sat next to these weirdos on the flight out, notice how dark it is, it was 5:30 AM! They did great though!

Water slides at the resort! The kids could have stayed and done this for the entire week! So fun! (Thanks Saundra and Jason, we had a blast)!

We bypassed this Chinese place for lunch, but I had to laugh, not sure what they are implying here.

Downtown Disney and Buzz! (We missed you Shelby).

Downtown Disney, so much to see!

Goofy's candy shop! Grandma bought some deliciousness. Rice crispy treat, with milk chocolate, M&Ms and white chocolate drizzled on top. A little bit of heaven!

Kent wanted to borrow Brayden's hat for a while, so handsome!

Aiden and Ethan came to visit us at the condo!

Magic Kingdom! The crane kind of detracts from the majestic view, but we still loved it!

Cruising down Main Street.

On Splash mountain! Brayden was very concerned!

Brayden and Ellie. Danielle has not been near any of the characters yet. She stands a fair distance away, or lets me hold her while standing next to them.

In jail with Zurg!

We are having tons of fun! So much fun that we are all totally exhausted and worn out. We still have FIVE more days of fun ahead of us. We have seen lots and visited with lots of family. I think I may use this blog to prove to Brayden's teacher that it IS a family reunion and I am totally justified in taking him out of kindergarten for 8 days! (She didn't have a problem with it, it's my guilty conscience, but we are having too much fun to feel bad about it)!

There will be more posts to come....so many pics. to share!

The latest.....

We went to the fair and Brayden rode a mechanical bull....

He did a good job until it started going faster, then he screamed, "Turn it off!" I tried to talk him into doing the muttin bustin', but there was no way. My nephew, Keegan did, I heard he held on for 3 seconds, we weren't there to see it though. Those kids are brave, and clueless! I was laughing so hard (mostly inappropriately because the kids had no idea what their parents had signed them up for). The ranch guys would pick them up after they flew off the sheep and dirt/poop/nastiness would just flow from their helmets!

We celebrated Auntie Sarah and Great-Grandma's B-day....

Sadly nothing has changed in this arena. Ellie is able to change her twin sister's bum. Isn't there something really wrong with that? This does not phase Dani one bit.....look how tall she is, the diapers barely fit around her. Maybe one day she will look at this and admit that she is the most stubborn thing that I have EVER met!

Last weekend we ventured out into a rain storm! There was a free kids bike race at the park and I thought the kids would love it. They all did great, it went way better than I had anticipated. Ellie and Dani were in the 5 and under group with training wheels. I think there were about 9 girls in the race and Ellie WON! I was cracking up, she took off at the start and never looked back! She had determination and drive on her face, her little legs clad in rain boots kept on pedaling, she crossed the finish line and kept on riding, she had no clue what was going on. She is my competitor though! Dani trucked right along and got THIRD! She went at her own leisurely pace, which was faster than the other girls' leisurely pace and made it all the way through! I was a proud Mama!

Listening to the rules and directions, look at how clueless they all are! Half of them haven't even lined up to race, they're just hanging out in the grass still.

Ellie taking her lead!

Dani cruising behind her.

We waited 45 minutes for the 6 year olds to race next. It was down pouring, but B was determined to race. They had a longer course, part of it was in the grass and they had to do 2 laps. Poor B's tires are so bald and worn, I was surprised he was able to move in the grass at all. There were boys there ready to race. They had the bike gear, and mtn. bikes. Sweet Brayden was thrilled because he had the only bike with fire on it! I was thinking 'yeah, that's because we got it at Walmart 2 years ago and it's way too small for you and any of these kids here.' But he doesn't know the difference and he's just not quite tall enough for the next size.

Tired boy crossing the finish line! YAY Brayden!