We have been doing all the fall things lately, and today I decided to share the three most recent. As I always say when I get the wild whim to blog, this year is flying by at a rate that makes me happy, but also sad (because the babies are growing!) and tired. But it's all fun! So often lately, I keep looking around and realizing how blessed we are with this home and community full of friends and family that we get to do life with. I really couldn't ask for anything better. It's nice being able to laugh with our friends about embarrassing our kids when they go to prom together and actually being serious about it.
Yesterday morning we went to The Orchard in Idahlou with MOPS and I got to enjoy watching Hayes pick apples. He was very into it and for some reason it was just the cutest thing to me. He's such a rough and tumble boy, but also very tender and cuddly and loves to show off how big he is and what a good helper he can be.
Hayes does not actually like apples, by the way, but I'm going to make some apple crisp with our haul and serve it with ice cream and see what he thinks. He also loved the hayride. I have this secret dream of him being a farmer when he's grown, mostly because he is the kid who yells about all tractors, animals, and windmills we see off the road. I kind of love it and am thinking we need a farmer in the family so it really would be perfect.
Last night we crashed the Shallowater High School Homecoming game with our Maxwell friends. We made it to half time, which I'm calling a personal win. I still remember the first time I drove out to Shallowater with my friend Kaitlin. We were 18 and had just met at LCU's cheer camp (a very short-lived venture on both our parts...long but funny story) and had become fast friends. Anyways. Shallowater is cute; true small-town-Texas like so many of the towns that surround Lubbock. My friend Alli has a cousin who plays on the team so we got to sit with her whole family (Whom I always love! Sweet ones, that bunch. And very hospitable should you ever need a family to have Easter with, like me and Bryan did about seven years ago.)
The kids have not been very well educated in high school football or Homecoming festivities ("MOM, why are there racecars on the football field?", when referring to the convertibles used to parade the Homecoming court around the track), so I have deemed that problem to be remedied here in the next few years.
We ate a lot of snacks, and then went to the concession stand for more snacks, and then listened to Lily ring a cowbell to the point of obnoxiousness, and then Hayes pooped so we left. ;) It was really fun though, and I'm glad we went!
Tonight we ventured to The Pumpkin Trail, which takes place at our town's arboretum and is adorable every year, and actually quite impressive. I read that there were over 2,000 jack-o-lanterns donated this year. After looking at them all, Parker is bound and determined to carve an "Angry Birds Transformers" pumpkin and donate it next year.
We met Jenny and Jude and talked and laughed at/with our kids and took lots of pictures, and the boys studied their favorites along the trail and Lily was perfectly content the whole time.
There was also a weird storm right before we got there which left the prettiest sunset behind.
