Happy Halloween!

Halloween was a busy day! First we went to Auntie Terry's house for some fun, then we went trick-or-treating (sort of) at Grandma Ericksen's house.
Here are Tyson, Erin, Conner and Grayson playing in the leaves in Aunt Terry's back yard.

They had fun throwing leaves on each other.

Then we played "monster mash" but Erin wasn't too into it. She didn't get that you were supposed to stand on the plates when the music stopped, but fortunately, no one else did, either.

When we got to Grandma Ericksen's house, all of Erin's cousins had already left, so we didn't get any good pictures of my little bat. Here are the best ones.

She loved the smoke and bubbles that Grandpa rigged up.

Ready for takeoff!

Here we go!!

Here is Erin and her cousins walking down the street off to trick-or-treat!!

We ended up only going to a couple houses before it rained, but Erin had a good time knocking on doors!! Hopefully next year won't be so rainy.

Fabulous Fall 6

I have been wanting to go to thanksgiving point all year, and I finally got there two days before it is going to close! It was a tad chilly, but we did okay! We started out on the pathway and Erin kept saying "oooh, pretty". It was so darn cute!! Love it!!

When we got to the Monet bridge, she decided she wanted to get out of her stroller and check out the water.

It's hard to see, but there was what I think was a blue heron right there in the pond, about 3 feet away from Erin.

She tried to get him, but he kept running away. They always do. Smart birds.

He finally decided that it was safer from her on the other side of the pond.

Then she found some snow, and decided to eat it! It was funny! Hopefully she will like the snow this year, we won't make her wear a snowsuit that is too small this time.

She loved the fragrance garden, these columns were fun to take pictures of. Erin just kept running around all over the gazebo and the tall cement planter boxes.

There are benches about every 10 feet, and she went around sitting on all of them.

Chairs, too.

I think this plant next to her was anise, it smelled so good! She is actually standing in a flower bed, my girl is not one to stay on the path. Unfortunately.

Then she decided she needed a rest. She wanted me to get down on the grass with her and rest a minute. Cute!

Then she found all these tables and decided it was time for lunch.

When we got done with the gardens, we went to the barnyard, which she absolutely loves!

This little donkey was curious about Erin, she kept saying "donkey" She got that word from "Shrek".

These are the cutest pigs I've ever seen! They were so active and curious! Their ears were so perky! We did a lot of oinking.

Erin absolutely adores all animals, even flies.

I love this picture so much! She was not remotely afraid of these huge "Horsies". They were really calm and friendly.

She even fed them some corn. I think her whole head would fit in their mouths, but it didn't bother her! The signs say "please don't feed your fingers to the horses".

Chickens! She loves em!

The pheasant really wanted some food. We were all out.

The main thing we came here for was a pony ride, which we did, but I didn't get any pictures, cuz I had to hold her on the pony. Way fun! Someday I'll have to get her a pony.

I love Thanksgiving Point! If I lived closer I would get a season pass. It is so much fun! You should go.

Jack-O-Lanterns

Since the pumpkins started showing up around here, Erin has loved them. She has tried to pick up the big ones, and carted the little ones all over the yard. She says "punkins" so cute! She points them out all over the place and gets really excited at the grocery stores when they have big displays out front in the parking lot. We went to a craft store and they had a huge foam pumpkin right in front of the door, and the whole time she was in there she kept saying "big punkin!" It was so funny.
I was hoping she would love the whole carving thing, so here's the experience! This is Erin's first time carving pumpkins, she was too little last year, so we didn't even do it. Let me first say that it has been a while since I carved pumpkins; I'm sadly out of practice. Here are some lessons I had to re-learn. Lesson number one: don't buy cheap safety knives at the dollar store. It's worth it to get good ones. Lesson number 2: let the pumpkins warm up inside for a while. They are cold. Lesson number 3: remember to cut the top big enough for your hand and the tools. Duh.


Erin wasted no time in getting right in there. She's like that. She just grabbed the knife, but I wasn't worried, cuz they are safety knives, right? We'll see.

She said "oooh" when Tyson pulled the guts out. I love it.

She smiled really big when he first put the guts in her hand, then she dropped it immediately. I think she didn't like how cold and slimy it was. Funny!

She also helped me scoop some guts out.

So you were all thinking it would be Erin who learned lesson number one, right? Nope. It was me. Trust me to cut myself with a "safety" knife. The problem was they were so cheap that the blade broke off the handle, causing me to cut myself on the jagged snapping point. Of course. I broke three of the four that I had. Needless to say, after we were done, I threw the last one away, too. This is a picture of my owie. Erin is not really as concerned about it as she appears, she's trying to see Lightning Mcqueen on my bandaid.

She got really excited when we lit the candle! Sorry the picture is fuzzy, but it was cute.

Here are the finished "jacks"! We tried to get her to say "jackolantern" but it was too many syllables. She only does one. Cute!

Fall Festival!! (or- fabulous fall 5)

So I decided to throw a fall festival in honor of how much I love fall. We had five activities at our fabulous fall festival:


Eating:





Erin plopped herself right down at the home made rootbeer cauldron and stole Grandma's cup. She really loved that rootbeer.


Tyson being his usual grumpy self.


a Fish Pond:


Grow your own mummy is always popular!

Pumpkin Throwing:

We just chucked pupmkins across the yard. We will have wild pumpkin plants all over next year!

Dancing:

Erin absolutely loved the dancing. We played a game where we stop the music and everyone has to freeze, she got it and froze with everyone else, except she was laughing her head off while she was "frozen". It was really fun.

Bobbing for Apples:

This was my favorite activity. It was hilarious watching the kids try to get those enormous apples without touching them. Of course, there was some cheating involved, I do believe.

I think Erin took a bite out of every apple, then put it back in.

Annie says she got this apple with only her mouth. The jury is still out.

This is my favorite picture, Brett is completely soaked, all to get an apple. They must have been good apples!

We had a blast at our fall party! Thanks for coming everyone!!!

Funny!

Okay, this is so funny,

October 2009 (Tyson dressed her...)



October 2010