Happy Halloween!

Mulan and MuShu the Dragon wish you a Happy Halloween. We had a very full day. Our first stop was Samuel's preschool for a little singing.

Then after a trip to the nursing home to trick-or-treat and a party/craft it was time to go home for lunch. Then it was off to Avery school.... (here are all the girls in her class).Then the kids headed over to the high school (which is next door) for a parade through their hallways. Avery's teacher (Miss Ball) was dressed as Dorothy and her principal was a referee (he is younger than Gavin and I). This was followed by a party of course and graphing M&M's.


Here is the first of our pumpkins we carved last night. Mickey did have a face but when I returned from Avery's school it had fallen off. :(
Samuel wanted a pirate and he thought this was close enough.
Avery's pumpkin is Sleeping Beauty but I have to say I did much of the work.
Here is Samuel after trick-or-treating.
Avery posing with the pumpkins.
Samuel was so cute to watch from behind. His little tail swished back and forth.
Our friends Kylie and Cooper came to trick-or-treat with us because they don't really live in a neighborhood and because it's more fun!! Here's the whole gang (plus Kara's hand).Happy Halloween from our house to yours!!!

Halloween past

Thanks for the idea Kara! Here are the kids from 2004-2007 at Halloween. I can't seem to find Avery's 2003 pictures but she was dresses in the same jester costume Samuel is wearing in the 3rd picture. Sorry for this bad unicorn shot but it's the only one. I have to give credit to my mom for making Avery's Snow White and Sleeping Beauty costumes. She still plays in them regularly! Happy Halloween.

We put it off long enough.....Today was leaf raking time.
We went to Home Depot and bought an extra rake today to spend a couple hours raking the yard.
It is wonderful that we have a half acre... except when it comes to mowing and raking.
After about an hour our next door neighbor (the best neighbor in the world) came home and fired up his riding mower with LEAF SUCKING ATTACHMENT! After doing his yard (in a matter of about 15 minutes) he finished off our yard and mowed it the mean time. I will be baking that man some brownies sometime soon!
All the raking took place while Avery was at school and Samuel was napping.
When Avery came home and Samuel woke up the fun began!

Here is a short video of the kids playing. If you turn the music off you can hear them. There is some lawn mower noise in the background. Our favorite part is watching Avery's dramatic flare.

Rooster update

I have had a few questions about the rooster story. Apparently, I am not much of a story teller because I didn't tell the end of the story.

A lady who works at the farm (the one on the other end of the walkie talkie) was the one to retrieve the tickets from the ravenous roosters. We were given new tickets to replace the ones the roosters took as they were chewed, gnarled and in some cases eaten entirely.

I hope this provides adequate closure for those of you left with questions. I hope you have all learned a valuable lesson about holding on to your possessions when ravenous birds are around!

Fun at the Fair

This weekend our church celebrated its 10th anniversary. We had a "community kids fair" to celebrate. We invited all the kids in the area and had a great turn out. Our small group made a ring toss which seemed to be a big hit. Our sign is made from an old headboard left in our basement by the previous owners. I, of course, cut the cut letters out! The picket fence used to be in Avery's room. What a tribute to reusing and recycling!!

We had several crafts inside. Here is Avery decorating a pumpkin cookie.
The weather was beautiful!!! Here are two handsome men in orange!
The fire department was there!
They also had hay rides. The horses were gigantic.

Samuel painting a pumpkin. He is concentrating very hard!
Gavin and I got a little rowdy and had to be confined. I had no idea the back seat of a cop car was so small and made of hard plastic! Being a criminal is no fun.
Here is Samuel pretending he is driving the fire truck.
This was the coolest game! You got to knock the flames out by hitting them with a water hose.
This was just a sampling of all the events. They had a couple of bounce houses, lots more games, and a ton of food. We had a great time. Samuel summed it up best when he said...."that was a super fun church party." God has really blessed our church with 10 great years (even though we have only been around for 5).

Got a little story for ya...

Sorry it has been awhile since my last update. We went to Binghamton this weekend to visit Gavin's dad and stepmom and I left my camera there. We don't have a back-up and what's a blog post without a picture? Luckily, Sandy (Gavin's stepmom) is on top of things and sent me my camera super fast! Thanks Sandy!

So here's the story...On Sunday, we arrived in Binghamton shortly after 2:00 and loaded the kids back into the car to go to a Pumpkin Festival (more Fall fun, I love it). We had a fabulous time and the weather was great but as usual these places are a money pit. You had to buy tickets and everything cost between 1 and 3 tickets. Gavin and Sandy purchased 25 tickets for $20. They were a dollar a ticket but if you bought 20 you got five free. What a bargain!! The kids immediately went into a bounce house with a fancy slide for 2 tickets each. For those of you not doing the math, we were down to 21 tickets. At this point we did the only free thing there (or so we thought) which was visit several farm animals (ducks, chickens, pigs, a calf, goats and last but certainly not least the roosters). The roosters were in a typical pen with chicken wire surrounding it. There was a large hole in one side where the wire had been cut, broken, pecked or something. Apparently, Samuel had his tiny fingers through the wire and the roosters were coming toward him. Superdad stepped in to protect his boy from these ferocious beasts. The next thing I knew I heard Gavin say "Hey that rooster stole my tickets." Avery and I were at this time looking at the calf. I looked over and sure enough one of the roosters had our 21 tickets!
These pictures were taken after they pecked them for a while and ingested a few of them. Gavin went to one of the employees to tell them what happened because we weren't sure if eating paper was good for roosters and we wanted our money back!!! The guy came over to see for himself and then called someone on a walkie talkie laughing the whole time. He said "You're not going to believe this but some guy got his tickets taken by the roosters." Person on the other walkie, "What?"
They then decided that someone needed to go in and get the tickets from these Oh-so-charming birds. Apparently, no one wanted to volunteer. I told Gavin "I have experience with roosters." He assured me these birds were not like "Ned" from the dude ranch we visited two years ago. Here is Ned and I.

Fall, Fabulous Fall

It was a cold and somewhat rainy fall day...but we had a blast (literally, but we'll get to that in a minute). We went to a new farm this year to celebrate fall. It is called Wolf Acres Farm. They had so many fun things for the kids to do and aside from the extraordinary amounts of mud we had a great time. There was a area for the kids to jump in over one ton of dried corn. It was a blast! Avery is showing us how to make a corn angel!
If only my grandparents knew they could charge for people to do this at their farm! They could have made millions!
It was the warmest place on the farm so I, of course, had to join in the fun. Gavin was afraid to because of his allergies.
My kids and a stranger tried to bury me in the corn. The best part was seeing how much corn you could dump out of your pockets when you were done. Avery had more than a handful in her underwear when she got home. Yikes!!!

No good upstate NY farm is complete without a corn maze! Yes, Gavin intentionally stood next to the "ass."
Here they are posing for a picture with "flat Alex." It is a project for my 9 year old nephew's school. We hope to have "Flat Alex" travel to Australia.
Which way do we go??? Too many choices!!
The kids got to ride on cows pulled around by a tractor. This is the first year this place has been open to the public so all the tractors were brand new. Samuel rode Bessie and Avery rode Daisy.
Gavin rode on the pedal carts. They weren't all they were cracked up to be because of all the mud. He does look like he's enjoying himself in this picture.
Here is another with "Flat Alex" and the kids in their Halloween shirts...But wait....What does that sign mean?? Yep! You guessed it PIG RACES!!!! We decided this and playing in the corn was the most fun.
Sorry for the blurry picture but these little oinkers were fast! Bacon won the race, followed by Sausage, Ham, and last but not least was Pork Chop. I don't know if the kids understood the significance of the names.
Here are me and my little blessings awaiting the 15 second race.
Avery rung an old school bell from 1889.
We also raced rubber duck using old fashioned water pumps.
Avery with her game face on!
Remember at the beginning (I know that was a 100 pictures ago or so) when I said we had a blast...literally? Well, we got to shoot corn out of a cannon. It was pretty fun! The kids were afraid to because it was very loud. Oh yeah, we missed the targets and didn't hit anything but the ground but it was fun watching corn soar through the air that fast.
My turn!!!
Daddy and Avery on a hay ride!
Me and Samuel (who is a little smile impaired at this age. Avery was too around this age but has come through it beautifully I might add).
Lastly...Gavin trying to rope a steer. This is harder than it looks. Luckily, I took a lesson from an expert at a dude ranch in Texas when we celebrated my sister's birthday a couple years ago. Sorry about such a long post but I just couldn't eliminate anymore pictures...Yes there were more. Now stop playing on your computer and go enjoy the fall!!! We're available to visit if you don't have fall in your area!