All Hallows Eve

 This Halloween Grayson and Rowan seemed to have a lot of trouble deciding what to be.  Grayson had been planning for months to be an evil scarecrow from Dr. Who, but once I had the costume about 1/2 done he realized that burlap is itchy, and changed his mind.  Rowan was lacking in inspiration, and I think ultimately decided to be a knight since that would require me buying him a new sword.  Neither one came to a final decision until the weekend before Halloween.

 Grayson decided to be an old school gangster.  He said, "I'm a gangster, not a gangsta."

 We had to make him a money bag to collect all his loot in.  It only seemed fitting.

They made an awfully big haul.   I tried to talk Fuller into staying home with me and passing out candy, but he opted for going to a friends house to watch a scary movie.  Can't say as I blamed him, there were going to be girls there, and pizza.  But, it is kind of sad to have holidays go by with so little participation from him.  He didn't even want to carve a pumpkin this year.   Makes me glad Grayson and Rowan are still into all the fun stuff!

A Little Birthday Trip

 

Have I ever mentioned that I have the absolute bestest husband ever?  A few weeks ago Paul and I both had birthdays.  The numbers of our birthdays are not exactly exciting anymore, but boy was this birthday awesome!  Paul planned a surprise trip to Seattle for us, no kids included.  (Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!)

 

We visited some of the places we usually go to with the kids, but it was so different being there without them.  We had as much time as we wanted to look around.  No one complained and we didn't have to worry about losing someone in the crowd.

  

We ate such good stuff!  The doughnuts are always a must for us, and the Pike Place Chowder may just have been the best bowl of chowder I've ever had.  We figured it was going to be good when we saw the line that stretched out the door and around the corner, and we were glad we stuck it out and waited.

 We also enjoyed having a much bigger selection of shops to peruse than our town has to offer.  We found a neat hat shop and Paul had fun checking out some different styles and buying himself a birthday present or two.

 Then is was on to our hotel.  Paul had reserved a room at the Ballard Inn, which is a cute little "boutique" hotel in a trendy neighborhood.  There were lots of neat shops and restaurants within just a few blocks.  We had so many great options to chose from for dinner and breakfast.  Our taste buds were not disappointed!

 We woke up in the morning to a farmers market right outside our door.  So much beautiful produce and gorgeous flowers to chose from.

We had such an amazing time!  Even though we knew a great family birthday dinner awaited us at my parents house, we had a hard time making ourselves leave.  Now that we've gotten a real taste of time away as a couple I think we will be doing this much more.  At least I hope so!

Halloweentown 2012

 Around here it just wouldn't feel right if we didn't take a trip through town to appreciate all of the scarecrows.  While some places are putting up the same ones year after year, there were some fun new ones this year.  This is a local tradition that I really like.  I know it looks a little cheesy, but it's all for fun, and helps get us excited for Halloween.  We even got Fuller to go with us this year!

Halloween Prep

 This last weekend we finally got around to carving our pumpkins.  Fuller decided he is too old/busy/cool for such things, but Grayson and Rowan were excited about it.  It's fun having kids old enough to do it all by themselves, and I can just sit back and watch their creative juices flow.

 Then of course comes the impossible task of trying to get a decent picture of the two of them.  This series of pictures is such a great visual of their personalities.

Simply the Best

 These two are so awesome.  They have been to every birthday my kids have had, sat through talent shows, music programs, pinewood derbys, baseball games, basketball games, countless cold wet soccer games, track meets and cross country meets.  They are their grand-children's biggest fans!  We love them dearly!

Love you Mom and Dad!

Beginning

I'm happy to report that we all survived the first week of school.  Grayson is in 6th grade and Rowan in 4th.  Rowan gets to start the year off with his arm in a cast.  He fell off his bike and broke his wrist.  Other than that I am feeling like it's going to be a great year.  We are loving that they are both back at the school near our house this year and can walk or ride their bikes to school.  I really like that we are all in  the same building.

Fuller is a sophomore this year.  He is taking some  challenging classes and is already very busy with his cross country schedule.  It's funny to hear him talk about the freshmen- like he is so far removed from that.

 

In honor of the start of a new year I put together some little gifts for some of my favorite educators.  I hope they all have a great year!

Zombie Apocalypse Survival 101

The boys are really growing up.  They used to all get excited about going to the library to sign up for  Summer reading, and they looked forward to going back to get their prizes and to participate in the activities.  Now Rowan is the only one who really has any interest in participating, and he mostly just wants to earn a free book.  I can't say as I blame them for not wanting to go to a lot of the activities, as most of them are geared towards younger kids.  But this Summer there was one activity that both Grayson and Rowan were excited about: Zombie Apocalypse Preparation.  This was something right up their alley.

First step- choosing your survival gear.

Second step- learning to identify Zombie body parts- a useful skill should you ever have to perform a Zombie autopsy.

Step 3 was Zombie camouflage, but neither of them wanted to put makeup on their faces and look like Zombies.

Step 4- Obstacle course.  The librarian timed them, and reminded them that you don't have to be the fastest, you just have to have one person that's slower than you that the Zombies can get first.

Step 5- Target practice.  They had to try to hit a cardboard cut out of a Zombie with nerf weapons.  It was funny how seriously they talked about how more effective it was to hit certain parts of the body.  Apparently head shots are the best.  Kids have an amazing "wealth" of knowledge about such things.

And it's a good thing to have a helpful brother around when your gun jams.

I'm very thankful to the librarians for doing something a little "outside the box" and in doing so getting my kids interested participating.

Steens Mountain Running Camp

 

 This Summer Fuller got to go on a big adventure.  We sent him to Steens Mountain High Altitude Running camp for a week.  He was both excited and nervous about going.  He had heard a lot about how hard the week was going to be from other runners who had gone, and I was glad that the high school coaches were going to be there all week to keep an eye on him.  The first day was about getting used to the altitude,  being at camp and getting a tour of the area.

 

 DAY 2:  BIG DAY  Day two of camp is simply known as "the big day".  They get the campers up very early, eat a good breakfast, make PB & J sandwiches for the road, and head out.  They spend the rest of the day hiking and running 22 miles up and down canyons, across streams and through some beautiful country.

Fuller stubbed his big toes so many times this day that they turned deep purple an stayed that way for weeks after he got home.

 

After finishing the 22 mile event the  campers have the option of running another 7 miles back to camp, or riding the bus back.  Fuller chose the bus.

 DAY 3:  Lots of stretching, recovery runs, and camp life.

 The guys of tent 3.  Twenty smelly guys living together in a tent isn't exactly my idea of fun, but Fuller enjoyed it.  They had a ton of fun and laughed a lot.

 

 GATE-GUESS- GALLOP-      This was a team event where they had run up and down a mile long hill as a group for a time.  Then they had to run it again and try to get the time that they guessed they could do it in.      The team that got closest to their time won.                  

  

But first they had to get pumped up!

                                         Fuller's team came in second among the guys teams.


DAY: 4  The day started out with the counselors waking them up by banging metal trash can lids in their tents.   I don't quite know how Fuller slept amongst all those smelly running shoes, but he didn't even seem to notice.

 The event of the day was another team event called Cross Canyon.  This was an 11 mile event where they were given a quote to remember as they ran, and someone from their tent had to be prepared to recite it later.  The quote Fuller's group was given was : "I asked myself, Harland are you going to let fear run your life, let fear make every decision for you?  I decided to face my fears head on."  Harland Yriarte

 DAY: 5  Steens Olympics-  A series of several events- including the Uphill 5K-  Fuller said this was the hardest, worst day for him.

 They also competed in the super muddy tug of war.

Other notable things- skits, inspiring (but sometimes long) talks from the camp directors and college athletes, and the Basque dinner.  The Basque dinner was apparently a "boys ask girls to be their date" dinner.  There were more boys at camp than girls and Fuller's counselors were determined that everyone in their tent get a date.  Fuller apparently took a nice girl from Idaho.  The boys had to be gentlemen and get their dates dinner for them, provide them with nice conversation, and take care of their dishes afterwards.

Fuller's main thoughts on his experience at camp were 1) he suffered A LOT ,  2) running at high altitude is not fun, 3) living in a tent with 20 guys IS fun, 4) he's dying to go back!

(I am so thankful the camp has a great photographer, who documented the week so completely!)