monster and a smidge of pumpkin patch part 3

As I look back on the pics, I think a third visit to a pumpkin patch may have been overkill.  There's not many pics where the kids don't look bored.  Perhaps I'll have to remember that next year.

When we got back from the pumpkin patch that day, jake wanted to do an art project.  I love art projects.  As he gets older, it becomes more and more fun to do them.  I just found this blog, Brightest Crayon in the Blog, and I'm super excited to use her ideas for jake.  I'll have to modify things a bit but, its inspiring.  I'm excited to do these projects when anna gets a little older.  I think she's really going to be into the art projects. 

Its not uncommon for jake to say he wants to do an art project.  Sometimes I have things planned out.  Sometimes I don't....like this day.  I remember scrambling.  I grabbed a rock from outside and washed it off.  While it dried, we went on a nature walk and grabbed some things for a monster.  I took inspiration from Family Fun's Instant Friend Kit and grabbed the googly eyes, too.  He really liked making the monster.  It fell apart after a week or so because he kept touching it.  

I set anna up with some play do in hopes to instill my "don't eat the play do" philosophy.  Yes, I'm singing the "Don't Bite Your Friends" song by Yo Gabba Gabba while I say, "don't eat they play do."

pumpkin patch part 2

Ok.  Yes, I know Christmas was 5 days ago but, I have to go in order or its going to freak.me.out.  When I finally make this blog thing into a book for our family, it will haunt me for the rest of my life that I went out of order.  Yes, jake and anna, your mother is a freak.  Sorry.

We've gone to this pumpkin patch as a family since before jake was a year old.  I told Trev that we HAVE to go back this year so that I could get a damn picture next to the "How tall this fall" sign.  Its the only picture that I've done with a consistent background.  Odd.  I know.  There's all those good mothers that do those pictures on a chair with a cute little bunny.  Not me.

So I begged Trev.  We went.  Now, the sign is on the free part of the patch but, its right next to the not free part with all the really cool things to do.  Sigh.  It was expensive.  Trev says we're not going back.  I'm not entirely sure I can give up the "How tall this fall" sign.  Maybe I should make my own?

Anyway, the kids loved the expensive part.  jake loved bouncing on this....thing.  He loved the hay barn.  He loved the big pipe slide.  Not sure he loved it enough to justify the entrance fee.  Oh, and he loved feeding the goats.


































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2011

pumpkins part 1

Nothing says Merry Christmas like a visit to a pumpkin patch!

Every year I tell myself that there is no sense in going to more than one pumpkin patch.  I mean really.  I don't think I'd even gone to a pumpkin patch until I went with jake.  Each year it seems that I continue to go to more than one patch.  One day I'll listen to my rational side.

So this was the first pumpkin patch we went to in October.  It was nice because it wasn't crowded at all.  The had the pumpkin patch standards.  There were goats to feed.  The price included a hay ride, the pumpkin and some corn.

anna wasn't too happy about the weather.  It was wet and chilly.  When we got to the actual patch, she found one pumpkin and pointed to it.  She really didn't stray from that one too much.  Apparently, it was love at first sight.  jake really didn't stray from his pumpkin either.  Guess my kids aren't really the huntin' for pumpkins kind of kids.  Odd since their mother takes them to five hundred pumpkin patches.

We fed the goats before our group got there.  jake LOVED it.  LOVED it.  It kind of grosses me out when I look at the pictures and see the goats' tongues all up in his hands.  ugh.  There was hand sanitizer.  I'm like shuddering as I think about it.

pumpkin projects

I try to do crafts with the kids on a daily basis.  It doesn't always work out to be daily but, I try.  Oddly, I hardly ever do crafts that are holiday themed.  A couple of weeks before Halloween, I decided to take my friend Andrea's lead and have jake make a jack-o-latern out of some construction paper and a paper plate.

I set anna up with a dry erase marker and board.  Ummm, yeah.  I know.  I'm nuts giving a 1 year old a marker.  Yes, she still likes to shove things in her mouth.  Yes, she doesn't always stay on the paper.  Yes, I am an idiot.  She enjoys it, though.  The marker.  Not the fact that her mother is an idiot.

I let jake cut the pieces of paper himself.  I figured it was good fine motor practice and I was too busy making sure anna didn't end up with a face covered in marker.  I cut out the mouth, eyes and nose shapes for him.  This is where I should probably follow Andrea's lead and make an example for him.  The kid went all rogue on me and ended up making an orange car.  He just glued a bunch of orange on a plate then took two black circles and plopped them on that sucker and called it a day.  For some reason, I didn't take a picture of the end product.  I have it hanging on the wall, though.  I like to say he was thinking outside of the box.  Not that his mother was too lazy make him an example.