Mommathon

Today was the perfect weather for a trip to the pumpkin patch. Not too sunny, no rain and not too warm. The boys and a friend had a great time picking out pumpkins, jumping hay bales, eating kettle corn and riding on a cow train (which may sound like a kiddie ride, but I am here to tell you I would have thrown up if I would have ridden that thing).

Waiting for the hayride.

This is the one he wanted, but couldn’t have. It was WAY too heavy.

Playing in the maze under the hay stacks.

Jumping on the hay bales

What have we been up to? Well, we had the school carnival where the boys played this game where you have to be the first one to get your donut off the string while keeping your hands behind your back. HILARIOUS!!!

They also had a VERY fun time in the photo booth with their friends at the carnival…

This is what happened to a house down the street from us on Saturday morning. The people who lived here were out of town and somehow the dogs survived.

Hubby brought home these very pretty flowers for me the other night…

Today was National Ride Your Bike/Walk to School Day

This picture does no do the awesomeness of this bulletin board justice. I have a friend who is super crafty awesome and she was gracious enough to make this bulletin board for me for Battle of the Books.

This book made me feel like I was back in high school again. There are some characters in this book that could have gone to my high school. It’s a good story and a pretty quick read. What’s it about? Two boys who are best friends and who don’t exactly have an ideal family life. One lives with his mom who is basically negligent and the other lives with his mom, too, but her choice of profession (no, not THAT profession) is questionable. Where are their dads? Gone. Everything in their lives changes in one night when the two boys go to a party with a girl they just recently met. Do things change for the better? In the end? Maybe.

There was an awesome maker fair in town this weekend at OMSI. What’s a maker faire? There was everything from catapults, to robots, to paper making, to archery, to Steampunk to chocolate art and then some. I didn’t get a ton of pictures, but these will give you the basic idea of the event. The boys had a great time and the weather was perfect.

A ginormous catapult that launched watermelons and pumpkins. Yes, I think this was Colm’s favorite part of the whole day.

Liam getting ready to launch the rocket he made.

Colm launching a tennis ball off a much smaller catapult.

Liam in the Intel tent where you could make your own keyboard with wires and this foil tape-like stuff. You then placed it on a clipboard, hooked it up to these metal clips and then as you played your body became part of the circuit that would then create the music. It’s hard to explain, but it was very cool.

I could not put this book down. It will make you cry, but it’s so worth the tears.

First Day of School Photos

This weekend was also the boys’ first soccer games.

Book club is next week, so I thought I had better read our book club book. We read “A Visit From the Good Squad.” I thought it was very well written, but a little hard to follow since every chapter only has one person in it from the previous chapter. There is some overlapping as the book goes on, but I really wish I would have started a diagram or something after reading the first couple of chapters just to help me keep everyone straight.

After that I read “A Farewell to Arms.” I try to read a classic every once in a while, so I have met my quota for a while now. I thought the story was good, but the dialogue between the main character and his girlfriend was awful. Did people really talk to each other like that back then? I don’t think so.

These are definitely two VERY different books, set in two very different times and places.

View from our room

Haystack Rock

Life is hard

Digging a VERY deep hole in the sand.

This is Sean’s favorite beach activity.

This was a crazy busy week for us. The highlight of the week was that the boys found out who their teachers will be for this school year. They each were placed in a great classroom and I am so happy for them. What kept us so busy? Well, there is an event at our school where everyone comes to pick up forms, pay fees, etc and the boys and I helped set up the event, run the event and clean up. It was a three day affair and I am glad I won’t be so involved with it next year. 🙂

We did have time for fun this week though. You know what they say about all work and no play.

After a fun time of putt-putt, bumper boats and arcade games, we then headed out to Crave. Crave is a bakery that has been on Food Network’s “Cupcake Wars” and ended up in second place on their all star championship episode. Well, since it’s not too far from where we live we had to go check them out. Everyone thought the cupcakes were FANTASTIC!

We worked on this puzzle together. It’s kicking our tush.

We helped a friend raise money for the Nature Conservancy by paying to have a pie or two thrown at us. I paid for extra whip for Colm. 🙂

I took the boys to their first ever Pokemon tournament which was basically heaven on earth for them. They had a great time and can’t wait to go back again.

A Saturday afternoon hike at a new park.