Fall Colors, A Play Date, Hiking at Frances Slocum. and Birthday Party at Whistle Pig Pumpkin Patch

Samantha: 100 Months, Week 5
Aedan: 66 Months, Week 3
Owen: 24 Months, Week 5

The day we leave Upland is always a sad day. The kids had such a fun time staying in Upland, and Samantha and Aedan were even able to sleep in Ema and Papa's room while we stayed there. The weekend was full of excitement, fun, and family, and the kids definitely didn't want to leave and go back home. We had a nine hour drive ahead of us, which no one was looking forward to, but we got on the road as early as we could and just powered through. It was definitely a long day, and we even had to go through a drive though Wendy's to get some food for dinner because we were going to get back past dinnertime, and we didn't want to push the kids too much. The kids played colored, looked at books, and played on their LeapPads. The boys both took naps that afternoon. Aedan actually ended up sleeping longer than Owen did. I just had to take a couple pictures of him sleeping so soundly. I love his sweet face that still has some remnants of baby-face to it. Plus, his little hands folded softly in his lap. I love this boy so much, even if he does have big emotions that are hard to handle sometimes.

After getting back home just before the kids' bedtime, we worked on getting everything in the house and piled on the floor in the basement while we let the kids run around and play for awhile after being cooped up in the car all day. The kids weren't too excited about going back to school the next day, but it was back to reality after a fun weekend away.

Here is some work of Aedan's that I took out of his folder as I was getting everything ready for school. I'm not sure who this green monster is supposed to be, but it's pretty cute.

Monday morning came faster and earlier than anyone was ready for. We were all still a bit tired from the weekend, and I had to get the kids showered and ready for school while Ben left a little after 7:00 to be ready for his 8:00 class. Samantha talked about her tummy hurting when she first woke up, but she said she felt better after eating breakfast.

After getting the big kids dropped off at the van, Owen and I went to Walmart to get our groceries. I decided to try grocery pick-up for the first time, and it was definitely an interesting experience. Ben and I made our menu and list on Sunday night, like we usually do, and then I went online and put everything in my order. I chose a pick up time, and then they notify you when your order is ready, you update with when you leave your house, and they have everything ready to bring out to your car when you pull up at the store. It was pretty amazing actually. They loaded everything in the back of the van, I signed for everything, and then Owen and I were on our way back home again. So it saved me at least an hour of walking around the store and finding all the items myself. I didn't find this out until later, but there were a few things that were not included that I ordered, that we then had to go out and buy later, sometimes meaning that we couldn't make a certain recipe, so that was a little frustrating, but overall it was a positive experience, and it was free, so I will probably try it again sometime.

When we get home from grocery shopping, I always let Owen play outside in the driveway while I bring all the groceries in and put them away. It was just a beautiful day outside, and the colors of the trees were just gorgeous. It just love where we live, and it's so wonderful having these amazing views of the mountains surrounding our house.

 

Our pick-up time for the groceries was a little later than I would have liked, so Owen was falling asleep in the car on the way home from the store. That's the hardest part about having to drive almost half an hour to get to any decent grocery store. Because of that, he was having a hard time napping that afternoon, and I had to go back into his room to get him to sleep, but luckily I got him back to sleep because I had a lot of work to do to get things put away from our trip and get started on our mountains of laundry.

The kids had a good day back at school and were able to turn in all the work they worked hard on over our time away. Here is some work they came home with in their folders that day. Aedan is working on the letter S, and he did some nice work on these papers.

Aedan also got this Unit 1 Benchmark Assessment back, and it was interesting to see how he was doing. I was proud of the scores that he got and how well he is doing on letter naming, rhyming, high-frequency words, listening skills, and writing his own name. I was a little confused about what he drew for a picture of himself, but we were proud of the report he got and how well he acclimating to kindergarten.

On Tuesday I had a play date at my house with the pastor's wife, Heather, and her two girls. They came over around 10:30 and Lucy and Owen and a great time playing together. He talks about "Luhee" all the time, so he was really excited to have her at our house. They got along well, and the baby, Emily, even took a nice, long nap in our extra bedroom in the pack and play, so Heather and I had the chance to talk and get to know each other quite a bit. I was glad that I took the initiative to invite them over, and I feel like she and I have quite a bit in common and could be good friends. It's hard moving to a new place, trying to make new friends, and putting yourself out there, but Tuesday was definitely a good first step for that. They had lunch with us, Emily was taking such a long nap, and the kids were playing so well, that they ended up staying until close to 2:30, which was perfectly fine with me because I love having people over to our house. I got Owen down for his nap around 3:00, and then I had about forty-five minutes before I had to go pick up Samantha and Aedan from the van.

Tuesday was infant and pregnancy loss awareness day, and it reminded me of a conversation I had with Aedan about a week ago, about how people call the baby after a miscarriage a rainbow baby, so I told Aedan he is my rainbow baby. From then on, for the next several days, he kept walking around and calling himself "Rainbow Boy," while giving me the cutest little grin you can imagine.

Fall is beautiful when you live among the mountains. Here is a picture Ben took of the trees changing colors across from the Lakeside Skillet.

Wednesday was one of those days that did not start off great, but ended much better. The kids had the day off of school, and I had these grand plans in my head of what we could do together. We originally were going to do something outside, like go to Roba Family Farm, or something like that, but it was supposed to rain pretty much all afternoon, so I knew that wasn't going to be an option. Instead, we talked about going down to the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia, but the kids just weren't listening well or helping that morning. Samantha was acting very tired, and we just left a lot later than we should have if we really wanted to go all the way to Philadelphia. We started driving, and then had to go back home to get the lunches I made because I told Samantha to help put the bag in the car and she didn't. We also had to stop by Ben's car on campus to get the iPass so we could pay for the turnpike, and by the time we got on the road it was already just so late, we wouldn't get there until past lunchtime. I was trying to get Samantha to do some of her math homework as we were driving, and she was just giving me a hard time. I got almost all the the way to where I would get on the turnpike and just pulled off at a gas station, sitting with my head in my hands and tears brimming my eyes, trying to figure out if it was worth it to even go at this point. After thinking for a few minutes, I decided it would make much more sense to just do something closer to home, so we turned back around and drove to Frances Slocum State Park instead.

Ben took the kids there over the summer when I was in Florida, but I had never been to Frances Slocum before, and it ended up being a good decision to go to the state park instead. We got outside, explored, got some exercise, and enjoyed each other's company, while not having to spend two hours driving just to get there. The trees were beautiful at the park, and it was fun walking on the trails and listening to the leaves crunch beneath our feet. The kids even got to play on the playground when we first got there. Here are some pictures of us exploring the trail near the playground. It was a little chilly and windy on the playground, but not as much in the forest because of the tree coverage. The kids had a blast hiking through the woods.

I love these pictures of the kids posing on the rocks. Samantha's hand on her chin is so cute, Aedan is making his funny, squinty face like normal, and Owen is trying to show me a leaf or a stick that he's holding in his hand. These pictures display their differing personalities perfectly.

They found trees that tipped over and exposed the root system very interesting, so they asked that I take their picture in front of this tree.

Owen asked me to take a picture of this tree that had fallen over.

We were the only people on the trail, and Owen was very interested in being independent, so often Samantha and Aedan were pretty far ahead on the trail while Owen trailed behind. He did a pretty good job watching out for rocks and roots though. He is definitely much more sure on his feet than either Samantha and Aedan were at this age. Samantha and Aedan were just up ahead, chatting away, and talking about everything they saw around them in the forest.

Once we had our fill of walking, and I could tell the kids were getting tired, we turned around to go back to where we had parked. I ended up having to carry Owen most of the way back because he kept refusing to walk or was spending too much time looking at things or picking up rocks and sticks. But, we made it back to the beginning of the trail, and then we got our lunch from the van, sat at a picnic table together, and enjoyed our picnic lunch outside among the colorful trees. I knew rain was coming that afternoon, so I checked the radar, and we only had about twenty minutes before the rain was going to start. I told the kids to eat as much as they could, and once we started feeling sprinkles, we would run back to the car, and that's exactly what we did. We were in the middle of our yogurts when it started raining, so we finished them up after getting in the car out of the rain. Then, we headed back home to spend the afternoon inside. Owen took a nap, and I let the big kids watch a movie. I even popped popcorn for them, which they appreciated.

Here is a science test and social studies test that Samantha brought home. She is doing so well, and we are so proud of her. She loves seeing this high grades!

And here is some of Aedan's work practicing writing his sight words, the letter S, and all the letters of the alphabet.

As Wednesday was getting better and better, that night Ben and I got to go on our first date night while the kids were at AWANA. It felt like it had been awhile since we connected in this way, and it was so nice. We went out to a local restaurant that we probably wouldn't take the kids to, and it was fun to sit and catch up with each other, eat good food, share drinks, and just relax. I'm looking forward to having this night once a week where we have all the kids taken care of. A date night was definitely welcome, and it was the perfect night to be able to spend one-on-one, remembering the man I fell in love with fifteen years ago, the man who knows me better than anyone-my faults and all-and still loves me.

Thursday morning I had Bible Study again, and it's been nice to have one morning a week where Owen gets to play with other kids, and I can sit and have adult conversations with other women. Plus, he really enjoys going into the childcare room and gets excited anytime he sees Lafe (the man who watches the kids during Bible Study) around. It's sometimes a bit of a challenge keeping Owen awake on the half hour trip back home (one of the disadvantages of living up in Harvey's Lake), but it's definitely worth it to go. I have really been enjoying the study, plus my chance to meet other women that go to Restored.

Here's some work the kids came home with on Thursday. Aedan took his first math test and got a 97%, which is great!

And here is a spelling test and book quiz that Samantha got 100% on. It's fun to see this work coming home so we know how they are doing and what they have been learning about in school.

I'm not sure why, but that Thursday night as I was putting Owen to bed, he convinced me to take some up close pictures of him and monkey. I love the smile he gives in pictures when he can see himself. He's such a little cutie.

On Friday I convinced Ben to take advantage of the playoff game at Yankee Stadium, and go ahead and go by himself. He had mentioned the idea on Thursday night in passing, and I texted him on Friday morning, encouraging him to buy a ticket, go to the game, and enjoy himself. I was able to spend a day enjoying myself at Disney World over the summer, and I know he has been longing to go to a baseball game. It's just not feasible for both of us to be able to go, but there's no reason he couldn't go by himself. I know he felt weird about it, but he had a great time, and I was so glad he was spontaneous and went to the game. He said it was one of the best games of baseball he has ever experienced, so I think he was happy that he went. Here are some pictures and videos he took of his time at the game.

While Ben was at the game, I decided to take the kids somewhere to do something fun. Samantha has been begging to go ride bikes somewhere, and she has only ridden around our little driveway in circles since we've moved to Pennsylvania. Aedan hasn't even touched his bike since we moved, so I knew it was time to find a place where they could ride on relatively flat, easy sidewalks. (That's another disadvantage of living on side of a mountain. There is very little flat land around us, unless you ride on the road around the lake, and the kids are definitely not ready for that yet.) So, I decided to load the bikes up in the van, and we drove ten minutes away to Misericordia University. The kids were SO excited to ride bikes around, and this common area was the perfect place to ride bikes because there were sidewalks off in spokes from a central area, so I could see them ride around in every direction. They had a blast zipping around the sidewalks, going up and down the hills, and remembering how fun it is to ride bikes around. (That is definitely one thing we really miss about being across the street from Lake State's campus, for we would go over there quite a bit for bike rides and walks with Izzy.) Here is a picture and a couple videos from our time riding bikes. Owen was getting around pretty fast on his little giraffe bike!

Once the sun started going down, it was getting a little chilly out, so we decided to put the bikes back in the van before going to Chick-fil-A on campus for dinner. They actually had kids' meals, which I was surprised about, and even though the kids were tired and spacey, after all, it was Friday night, they ate their meals well, stared at the TV a lot, and I even got them small ice cream cones for dessert. It was a fun night together, and I'm glad I decided to take them out to do something fun.

Saturday was a busy day with fun, fall plans. Samantha had her play practice in the morning, and then in the afternoon Samantha and Aedan were invited to Julian's 11th birthday party at Whistle Pig Pumpkin Patch. They sit by Julian on the van to school and have gotten to know him pretty well. They were really excited about receiving his birthday invitation. Ben went down to pick Samantha up, and I brought the boys along with me, planning to meet up with each other once there.

After arriving at the pumpkin patch, we found out where we were supposed to be, and then the boys had fun jumping off the hay bales and playing with the corn table. We then took a tractor ride back to the pumpkin patch where everyone got to pick a pumpkin. The first activity they had planned at the picnic site was decorating the pumpkins. They had all kinds of materials for the kids to use to decorate, and Samantha and Aedan took it very seriously. Samantha made hers look like Rapunzel with long, golden hair, and Aedan took a long time making his look just so. It's amazing how focused he can be when he wants to be. He has really been enjoying arts and crafts a lot more lately. Here are the kids decorating their pumpkins.

After they were done with that, the kids had free time to roast hot dogs over the fire, eat snacks, and finally, roast marshmallows for s'mores. It was a beautiful, fall day, as you can tell by the bright sunshine and clear blue skies in these pictures. Ben and I originally thought about having one of us bring Owen back home to put him down for a nap, but he was doing well and having fun playing with the older kids, so we just all stayed and had fun.

Here are Samantha and Julian hanging out, with Owen and Julian's cousin inside the car in the background.

Here are all the kids posing with their decorated pumpkins. I didn't realize this until afterwards, but Ben said that Samantha and Aedan were the only kids there that weren't related or family to Julian in some way. I thought that was really sweet that he invited Samantha and Aedan, even though they are so much younger than him.

The party ended with another activity. The kids had a chance to make a scarecrow. They had extra clothes for the kids to use, and they had huge piles of straw to use to stuff them. This project also took longer than anticipated because Samantha and Aedan chose adult size clothes, meaning they took a lot of straw to stuff them, but they had a great time doing it (with a lot of help from me) and were very excited to set them out on the front porch as fall decorations.

It was a fun, full afternoon, and Owen was definitely losing his ability to be happy by the end of our time there. In fact, I hoped he would fall asleep in the van on the way home, but instead he just cried the whole way. However, as soon as we got back home, I took him upstairs to lay him down for at least a little bit of a nap, even though it was late. After getting Owen down, the big kids and I worked on putting the pumpkins and scarecrows up as decorations, and Daddy started his job of mowing the back yard. The kids even played outside again that evening because it was such a beautiful, fall day, and a wonderful way to spend a Saturday.

(Blog about October 13-19, 2019)