Halloween

Miss Madison the Ring Master/Lion tamer with her whip.

Trevor the faceless ghoul

Madison with her ferocious lion!

Grams and Grandpa Skip Casida found this costume for Belle so that she could be Maddie's lion. She's thrilled to be in it, as you can clearly see!

Maddie is cracking up because Belle is rolling around in the grass trying to get the costume off.

Nate helped build and then work in our friend Frank Rodriguez's haunted house. This was his costume for that. They did a great job the haunted house was awesome!

Pumpkin Carving, Take 2

We were popular this year and got invited to a second pumpkin carving get together at Aunt Kamryn's place. :)

Grams (Peggy), Trevor, Todd, and Grandpa Skip (Scott)

Nate and Aunt Ashley

Daddy and Maddie

Grandpa Skip (Scott) and Aunt Kamryn

Future brother-in-law Scott working away on the monster pumpkin that he and Kamryn grew.

So awesome! I love it!

The final products and Tank keeping watch.

Pumpkin Carving at the Shanks

While the women slaved in the kitchen over dinner and pumpkin carving....

(I'm loving that Super Model hair flip Melinda! )

The men were working hard as well doing...well..."man things" I suppose.
Dane and Easton

Jack and Phil

But in the end, we had a bunch of awesome looking pumpkins to go along with these awesome looking kids! Evan, Jack, Brian, Jace

Nate and Trevor

Jack, Brian, Jace, and Nate

Brian and Trevor

Jace and Nate

Madison fell asleep after dinner so she missed out on the photo ops. We love hanging out with the Shank and Stooksbury families, and always have a blast together. Thank you for letting us share in this fabulous night!

School Halloween Parade

 Maddie, our Ring Master

 Trevor, the Faceless Ghoul (or something like that)

 Nate, The Roman Soldier

Madison and her teacher Mrs. Opfer

Maddie's Quilt

After about a year in the making, Nana finished Madison's bed quilt. Maddie was SO excited and loved it!

Madison and Great Nana with her hand-quilted bedspread made by Nana.

It's beautiful! Thank you Nana! Love you!

Apple Pickin'

Well, after a morning of, "Why do we have to do this?", "This is going to be so boring!", "How far is it?", "It's too cold", "Your mother wants to do this so just go along with it." , I was getting a little discouraged and worried that our "fun family day" was going to be a bust. Todd actually had a Saturday off of work, so I decided we would go to Oak Glen and go apple picking. We've been there before, just not during picking season. I thought it was a great idea because my kids are major apple eaters. They go through 2 large bags of apples a week! We got there a little early and the orchards weren't open yet, so we cruised around Riley's Farm and bought fresh apple cider, walked through their little pumpkin patch, and checked out their petting zoo. The kids were perking up a little,but still weren't100% on board with this adventure yet.

Trevor.....being Trevor....

Maddie of course was loving the animals.

We took a little hike on a nature trail we found and ended up here.

And then FINALLY it was apple picking time! We got our bag and box to put the apples in and trudged up the hill to the trees. It was a little slow going at first, but then, lo and behold, the kids actually started getting into it and having a great time. At different times throughout the apple picking, each kid came up to me and told me how much fun this was and thanked me for making them come. Music to a mother's ears!

Maddie got a little carried away with her first apple and got the branch along with the apple.

Trevor

Maddie

Nate

Todd and Maddie were scoring the good apples way up top thanks to a little teamwork.

I had to catch this on film- Trevor and Maddie together, happy, and getting along!

After picking, we went through a corn maze and found this guy along the way. Maddie was a little disturbed that the scarecrow didn't have a face drawn on. None of them were to thrilled about stopping for a picture here.

Nate and Mom

Nate, Trevor, Maddie, and Mom

We made it out!

After all of that hard work, we ate lunch at Apple Annie's where we enjoyed some yummy fried chicken and apple cider. On our way out we stopped at the bakery and loaded up on apple dumplings, an apple pie, and raspberry turnovers. Mmmm!

So I'm marking this trip as a success. Looks like Mom might know a thing or two after all, huh?! You're welcome family!

I Think I'm Beginning to Notice a Pattern...

Ever since Kindergarten, our Nate has received the first Student of the Month award of the year, every year. He's such a good kid and loved by all. We're so proud of you Nathan!

He is on the sound crew at school this year, so he was behind the scenes doing his job when his name was called. He surprised everyone when he stepped out from behind stage to claim his award, rather than coming from the audience like the other kids. :)