Pumpkin Patch

HAY FIGHT!!

They were all jumping, Zach was doing cannonballs at one point...

We had our annual stop to the pumpkin patch this week. This is the first time in a long time we did not go with friends, but we had fun as a family picking out our perfect pumpkins. The kids found the hay stack and went crazy throwing , jumping and diving! Syd had so much on her head at one point it looked like her hair. We have not carved them yet with the kids, we will do that at the beginning of this week. Dan and I however, did carve ours for our pumpkin competition. We did win a lovely prize for the "scariest" but we did not get the overall 1st place ribbon. It went to our friends Pastor T and Noelle- who won first place the only year Dan and I were not entered- so we were a little bummed- but they did a great job! We still love our creation and we have it in our front yard for all to see. I think it will be an added accessory for the coming years.

Kings and Queens

The Royal Family

Our Burlap Flags we sewedAshley's Castle
Sydney's Castle Zachary's castle
Ashley's armor
Sydney's Armor (it's pink of course)
Zachary's Armor Our Vocabulary Words



Queen for the day! Ashley's 9th Birthday party.

10 girls...what was I thinking??? was I thinking??

Rock climbing at the Y

Zach didn't want to climb, so he played Star Wars instead.

Our Homeschool Group

"All About Me" presentations at our Homeschool Group activity

Syd playing soccer with Upward- she is scoring machine this year!

Ronald McDonald House 5K

ran with my friends Lauren and Noelle.

Well we have been very busy this past month. We started our new Unit Study on Kings and Queens, we celebrated a birthday, we have done some cool things with our homeschool group, and all the while I have been running- literally!

Our king and queens unit has been pretty good- we have made crowns, scepters, drawn castles and armor. We have been reading the "classic" - 'Door in the Wall'- the kids are struggling thru this a little :) but we are getting thru it. We have read biographies, Ash wrote her first paper on Queen Victoria- exciting stuff I tell you! The next two weeks we will be focused more on knighthood, and medival feast. We will be having our own feast, dress and all at the end of our two weeks.

One of the pictures above, of the drawings on the dry erase board, Ashley drew those after I put Vocab. words on the board for the next day. I walked in and saw the drawings and thought to myself she already knows what they mean! It was so cool. The drawing were in such detail- it was crazy.

Some of the other pictures are from our homeschool group we are involved with. Every Friday there is an activity planned we may choose to go to. The first activity was the "all about me" presentation. The kids had to make a poster about themselves then get up in front of the group and speak about it. I was so proud of all of them! They only know a handleful of kids in the group and they were all very brave and spoke very well- even Zach!

We had the most fun so far rock climbing at the Y. The girls did great- Ash made it to the top a few times and Syd kept on trying. I loved watching them trying to figure out what to do next, seeing them determined and not giving up! Zach on the other hand wanted nothing to do with climbing. That surprised me, but he still had a good time- he eventually found some boys who had enough, and ended up playing Star Wars with him.

Then, stuck in the middle of all that, Ashley celebrated her 9th birthday. She was "Queen" for the day, which went very well with our study, and had her first sleepover party here at the house. There were a total of 10 girls and 9 slept over. We thought we were a loud family- but NOTHING is louder than 9 screaming 3rd graders :) Thankyou to my friend Michelle that waded the rough water with me! She was a trooper. Ashley had her mind set on hairdos and fancy nails, and thats we did. Ashley loved every minute of it and that is what counts. The girls stayed up til about 1 am and we wide awake by 7am easily! Then we had a day full of soccer games.

Our Soccer season is almost over and all 3 kids are doing awesome. They are all scoring goals almost every week. Ashley is beginning to really understand positions and technique, Syd is beginning to even find the basics work- along with being aggressive. Zach has come a long way- last year he hardly put a foot on the ball- he just ran around it and fell because it was the cool thing to do. But now- he is a scoring machine right along with his sisters- he is making purposeful plays and man can he run! Dan and I love watching them- we get a little excited. Dan is helping in the coaching of Zach's team, and I am helping out with Syd's. It has been a lot of fun.

Well, as you know we have been consistant in our daily workouts. We go to the Y 4 to 5 times a week. So I have begun to concentrate on running again. In a matter of no time it will be time to get serious- training again for the River Run in March which is a 15k. So in doing so- trying to get ahead of the game a little I want to get some 5ks under my belt. I ran a feew weeks ago with some good friends in the Ronald McDonald House 5k. It wa great. The weather was perfect, and not only did I get to run with friends but as a family we able to serve the community. Dan got Clearwater involved and the kids were busy the whole time handing out water! It was so great to do something like that as a family. We will hopefully be doing more of it very soon.

We can't wait for the weeks to come- we have lots of things planned- we'll be visiting a corn maze, of course Halloween, so a trip to the pumpkin patch, and finding costumes, and Community Fest at our church. OH and we can not forget our friendly annual Pumpkin carving competition at the Zelenkas! We can't wait!