Autumn

I just love this time of year. I find myself frequently staring at the trees and it is not like I haven't lived in this area of the country before. It is just so beautiful!

With that time of year, brings lots of fun things. Preschool, playing in the leaves, cute kids, hiking, running races...

So here we go again, a photo dump. This is really the only way I can get these things recorded these days.

Sam does the cutest thing when you pull the camera out. You tell him to say cheese and he makes and makes a nose that sounds a lot like humming, but in reality is him saying cheese. And he keeps saying cheese until the camera goes away. Then we get priceless pictures like so...

Jimmy was making the face with him, which looks a little sillier on him...

Poor daddy...

I just love that Lucy can write some letters now. Although that does mean she is growing up. But she is getting really good a writing her name, mom and dad and some letters like H and T, and P. I will blink and she will be reading chapter books.

We had a week, two weeks ago where the weather was amazing, every day. So naturally the kids wanted to be outside. This is where they spent most of their time, in the dirt. I took everything out of this garden bed the week before so the dirt was perfect. I got to read books while they played. It was a win-win. I have read six of the Lemony Snicket books. Cute little books I must say. Cute, dirty little kids.

The last weekend in September we went to a Medieval fair, King Richard's Faire near the cape. I have never been to one, and Jimmy likes fantasy kind of stuff so we went. Lucy rode a pony, we saw some animals and a jousting contest. It was fun, but expensive. So it was nice to go, but we probably won't go every year.

Lucy was a princess and Sam was a dragon. Thank you Costco for a $10 dragon costume. And yes, these are their Halloween costumes. We do recycle!

One of Jimmy's work friends dressed up as a fawn. I think Lucy was hoping he would have a scarf and an umbrella so he could be Mr. Tumnus. But he assured her that it was too warm for those things. They are best buddies anyways.

This is just a cute picture that occurred before church one day.  Look at that cute sweater vest....

And honestly, could these kids be any cuter?! This was right before we went on a hike near our house. Lucy has been very insistent about wearing her princess dress. So it came with us on our hike.

My kitchen looks like this more often than not....oh Sam!

So here is the hike. Seriously this trail is 200 feet from our house. And my kids are holding hands. Precious...

Lucy wanted to know what happened to this tree and was sad to hear that it had lost its bark.

And this is right next to our place. You could probably see our house if you squinted...

I tried to get some nice fall photos of the kids. Sometimes they cooperate. Other times, not so much.

About a week ago, Jimmy decided it was time we do another Iron chef competition. So when he got home, we packed up the kids and headed to the store. Our plan was to get a store flyer, tear it into the different foods, have Lucy pick our secret ingredient and then go and buy only $5 worth of extra stuff to cook with. Lucy picked halibut filets and Jimmy and I both spent less than $4 on extra food. In the end we came up with interesting dishes.

And this random picture is Lucy riding the horse right outside the grocery store.

And these are the dishes. Jimmy made a seafood stew with veggies and I made halibut patties with plantain chips. Both were not perfect, but it was fun anyways. Lucy was our judge and said she liked the patties while she was stuffing her face with the stew. We will call it a draw.

This last week I took to the kids to the Children's museum in Easton. We met up with a bunch of our friends from church and played. Lucy was able to go to a music class while I chased Sam around. I was told she had a lot of fun by one of my friends who stayed with some of the older kids.

I also lived vicariously through my children while they played in the "space ship."

 

I mean seriously, doesn't she look like the cutest astronaut?!

Sam really got into steering this ship.

 

Last but not least, I ran a marathon yesterday. The Hartford Marathon. This was my training schedule, which was not all filled out because I took this picture on Wednesday of last week. I should fill it out some more, but needless to say I made it to race day, and finished. 

Here I am, after the race. Jimmy didn't get any of me running, which is fine. He only saw me at the beginning (miles 2-6) when I was happy go lucky and at the end (mile 25) when I looked very tired and spent. Probably better that he caught a picture when I was done and had a few minutes to recover. It went well. I ran 3:35:02, which was just where I wanted to finish, though I wouldn't have minded if it was 3 seconds faster, then I would have qualified for Boston again.  But really, I was only 1.5 minutes slower than my last marathon and it rained the entire race.  I ran 23 miles very even paced and then kind of hit the wall at mile 23. It took all my strengthen to finish those last 3.2. But I did. And I got a nice medal and some soup and I can walk today. So marathon in the future? You bet!

 

 

So until the next photo dump, happy autumn! Go make some apply crisp and watch the leaves fall. And if the leaves aren't great where you are, at least make the apple crisp. Life is always better with apple crisp. Believe me, I made some today :)