Two Officially Over

The end of the season soccer party says it all. Fall Soccer is over!(above, Natalie on the right; below, third in from the left on the front row)
Natalie's team ended up winning both tournament games to finish first in their bracket!They celebrated a couple of days later over pizza and trophies.Then there was the signing of the tournament shirts as a finally reminder of the girls on the team.
Way to go girls!
But, watch out girls, next season - you'll most likely be playing against each other.

Cross country is over as well, for Alyssa. She had a great season and continually bettered her personal record. The last two races she didn't run at her peak (running sick both times) and her team (the girls) just missed making it to the state meet - disappointing, of course, but a great season over all.
(Alyssa is on the left and wanted to make sure that I put in that she ended up passing the girl ahead of her.)

Hats off to great seasons for both girls.
This is the last week for baseball.
We'll then be done with sports season craziness and get back to just normal craziness.

Second Havest Salad and a Crazy Driver

When the weather started cooling down, the tomatoes and bell peppers in the garden got a second wind.

My second planting of lettuce has taken off, minus the corner that Izzy keeps digging in, and we got to enjoy a fresh garden salad for dinner the other night.

The bush beans are flowering,

and even have some bean starting.

I'm excited to get in a second harvest this year. Last year I replanted when it was still too hot and the second planting didn't work out.
I think I'll have to look into the plants that I can do over the winter.

I mentioned a crazy driver in the title of this post.
Driving down the road toward town, the other day, we got behind an antique car with a bit of a surprise hanging out the trunk on the back.

Maybe more of a cool driver than a crazy driver.
We love it! and had a good laugh.

Every once in a while you fall behind -

Our calendar has been packed and when I find a moment I take a nap!
So, I'm finally putting in some of the activities we had all in one weekend - a couple of weeks ago.
Friday was the elementary school's Fall Festival. It was great. The kids got wrist bands for unlimited play.
(The playground was free.)

They had a couple of inflatables - one big with an obstacle course and the other smaller with a slide. The big one was a favorite and our meeting place.

We brought one of Jake's friends with us and met more while we were there.Logan loved seeing his friends from his kindergarten class and counted to see how many he said hello to. Whenever he would spot one, he would run to say hello.

There were plenty of games to play to win tickets for prizes. Even the girls took turns - here at the horse riding - I think it was like a red-light green-light.

I held a spot in the bungee jumping line for Natalie and Logan. I was waiting for Alyssa as well, but she felt bad cutting back in - in the end she missed out as they closed the ride while she was waiting later.
She did help Logan bounce a little higher.

Natalie got daring enough to do some flips. One of the rubber bands broke on hers while she was jumping . It's a good thing there are multiple bands on each side, but it did make her a bit nervous.

Natalie also ventured up the rock climbing wall.

It took her a while - she was on the more difficult side.

But, she finally made it to the top and rang the bell.

Whenever a break from the activities were needed, some time on the playground was a perfect distraction -

especially when there were friends to play with.

We stayed until the very end and went home happy and tired.
The next day was Jake's first Cub Scout Loop-a-rama. Two of my other wolf cub scout from our den were there as well.
Jake did archery (at the same time as the two others - it was fun having friends in the same class),

BB shooting,

marbles, and geography.

During the Loop-a-rama, I ran Logan to his first Pump-It-Up party, for a girl in his class. He was so excited. I dropped him off and went back to get Jake. When we got back they were just finishing playing. He had a blast.
(He is in the green striped shirt on the left side of the picture.)Over this weekend we also worked on Jake's Greek project. He made armor for a soldier. He loved spray painting it gold!

We keep busy and I try to stay on top of things.
Sometimes Robert and I have to divide and conquer. This weekend was one of those times. Alyssa was at a cross-country meet, I had the boys, and Robert took Natalie to soccer.
Our weeks have stayed busy as we continue with three sports seasons and church and scout activities. The sports will be over in the next few weeks, but then the holidays will be near.
We can't wait!

Another Black Dress

Natalie decided to sing in chorus in middle school and had her first concert last week, donning the black chorus dress.Usually the 6th graders need a few months to mesh and get into it, but I was very impressed with them.
They sounded great!
Here is Natalie (second in from the left on the front row) singing "The Silence in the Song" - her favorite from the concert (minus the first verse I edited out).

We're looking forward to many more concerts.

Play BALL!!

Much to everyone's excitement, especially Jake, baseball games started this past Monday!
The first one started at 7:15pm, so it got dark and chilly.
This picture, of Jake in his uniform, was taken before the Thursday game (they have two games per week).
Much warmer and sunnier and I could actually take pictures.

Logan took this shot of the bats - he thought they were pretty cool hooked into the fence like that.

Here they are listening to the batting order - first game.

But maybe we do like later games - the sun can cause problems.

They run through the batting order about three times during the game, which is great.
Here is Jake at bat.

They will sometimes move the boys around in field positions, but the last game Jake stayed out in right field.

At this age and skill level, if your team can hit, you'll get some RBIs - fielding isn't really strong yet. Jake's team won their first game 12-3 (his team was better at hitting), they lost their second game 7-12 (both teams good at hitting, the opposing team had some stronger hitters that got it out of the infield more often).
In the first game Jake hit a home run (the video below) - the ball was thrown, or I should say overthrown, to many parts of the field, allowing him to round the bases.
Totally exciting!

We are looking forward to the rest of the season!

Skipped a Year

Last year we celebrated Robert's birthday a day early - his last day of being 39.
This year we jumped right to 41 - skipping 40 completely.
I made a great (yes I'm bragging, it did turn out delicious) chocolate raspberry cake (substituting hot water with raspberry extract for the coffee). I got distracted when I was putting on the chocolate ganache and it cooled faster than I thought making it a bit lumpy (still yummy).Sticking with a "39 again" theme I decorated the cake.
The game was to figure out the meaning of the candles.
Natalie got it in the first shot.
We love birthdays here - cake, gifts, and wishes.
Logan helped wrap the gifts and wrote Happy Birthdays (and his name) on each one.
A tool for his lathe, iTunes gift card, peanut m&ms, baseballs, and a Lego game (the boys have loved playing it).
We love Robert and all he does for us!
Happy Birthday!

242 . . .

The number of BoxTops collected since spring -81 . . . (80 for Natalie)
The number of BoxTops the boys got to take into class -An easy way to help your school receive money! If you don't have children needing BoxTops clip them anyway and give them to a neighbor's child, niece, nephew, friend's children, or just turn them in at a local school. They come on 100s of products you already buy.

Support Education!