Four Jingle Bells

 We go to a once a week music class with our church friends.  One week we replaced music with the field trip.  It was so fun to check out a working dairy.  This family was really neat.  They all work together on the farm and some of their children even moved back to help out with it.  They have a big barn where they have dinner together and it just seems like such a neat life out in the country.  We got to go on a ride to the farm.  The kids loved it!  They had kangaroos too.  Brooke got to pet some cows and man, did they stink!  But the babies were so cute.  This is kind of gross but they got to "milk" a cow and they thought that was pretty awesome!  We got some ice cream there too.  I love William's little tongue sticking out there.  It was delicious!  This was the pond outside of their house.  They had a dock and would go swimming there in the summer.  Brooke wanted...

 Brooke being cute at soccer one day.  She loved going to watch because they can run wild and play on the playground.  Note her mismatching shoes.  Spencer did a great job at soccer this year.  It was a 6 week course and just practicing skills. I like these better because they are low pressure.  He loved doing the push ups!  It was also nice because we got to see the changing leaves while we watched soccer.  I love Fall!  William loves balls!  He had to get one every time and throw it.  He looks so chubby here!  Spencer practicing dribbling.  He got some gatorade chews on his last game.  We will definitely keep going with soccer.  Brooke got on a kick where she would get William a snack.  And try to feed it to him.  He wasn't thrilled about that. William always needs to see what I am cooking and he loves watching the mixer spin.  I love having his help.  As helpf...

 We watched the Masterchef kids show on tv and that fired Hailey up on cooking even more!  She helped me make dinner one day and I noticed her pursed lips are the same as mine when I am concentrating. so cute.  Brooke and Hailey put on a performance one Sunday morning with all the dress up stuff.  It was so cute.  They are a good time.  And Brooke has some really buff legs!  They would do a costume change and come and do more dances.    This is our load from apple picking.  I was doing apple things for two weeks!  I got all crazy and let the kids do a flour project off of pinterest which turned into a flour/water gummy mess. I was scraping it off the floor for weeks, but they were entertained for an hour while I worked on the apples.  Blake turned 34 and for the first time EVER! took his birthday off.  He walked the kids to school.  Then he watched tv, took a nap and hung out all day. I think...

We were going to try to find an apple farm to pick at, but our friend's the Diezer's down the road invited us to get some at their house.  It was a great time!  Such generous and kind people. We had two full boxes, I think.  The kids really got into it and were eating them like crazy! Blake was doing a shoulder ride till Brooke dropped an apple on his head.  Then, that ended but it was still fun! Hailey loved the tree shaker.  They had a trampoline too, so we had to bribe them out of their yard.  There is nothing like the smell of apples in the fall! I can see, now, why most people out here love the fall!

Hooray for Saturday birthdays! All the kids had them this year.  Makes the day so fun.  We had chocolate chip pancakes, Spencer's choice. Then opening presents. He even let Brooke open one.  He has come so far in his temper control and sharing.  Doing the happy dance over his Lego forest ranger set.  He loves Legos! Getting started on the legos.  He was very into it and pretty mad when we went to Hartman Reserve (his choice), but we had a great time. This was Blake's first time there.  We explored a different route and tried to find a lake, but we would have been there all day!  We took some snacks and it was a great time. I thought this was a neat shot.   The kids have mega personality! Hailey loves holding William.  I think you can see how William feels about it!  He probably weighs close to her weight! These two are best friends and worst enemies.  But they are sure funny! Wililam was o...