First Day of Fall

Well, while everyone else was celebrating the first day of fall, we were celebrating the onset of winter!!! We've had the termination dust settle on the tops of the tallest mountains at least once prior, but nothing like this!!! Our highs are barely hitting 50 degrees and Monday morning we woke up to frost on the ground. In fact, the frost was still hanging around when Owen and I headed into town around 10 that morning. It's just a matter of time now!!!

Owen seems to be doing well without daycare, so far anyway. His attitude is definitely improved significantly already and he's being much more independent. With Owen and I both being sick for most of the month of September, we got into a bad habit of letting him watch t.v. and movies all day long. Not any more!! My goal is no more than 2 hours a day, he hasn't even seemed to notice! In fact, I think his last movie was over the weekend some time. Now, if he'd just take a nap, we'd be doing awesome. He has sat in his room for up to 3 hours keeping himself amused and fighting sleep. I don't know what his deal is, but it seemed to start when he switched into the 3-year-old classroom at the beginning of the month. He still NEEDS a nap and so do I! ;O) So, I'm still pushing for it. I may have to start putting him to bed in our room just to keep him away from all of his toys!! Or better yet, make him run laps!

Hope you are all doing well. This was a success of a post as I figured out how to download my photos off my camera and both crop and re-size the pictures!!! I still would like to have Photoshop, but hate to spend the money right now. Thankfully, Mac has something with similar editing capabilities, just not as advanced. But, it will do for now! ;O)

What a Month!!

Hey people!! Sorry it's been so long since I last posted. It's been kind of ugly around here lately. Our month started out with me having a whopping head cold that knocked me on my butt. I did manage to drag myself out with Dave and Owen Labor Day weekend however, for our annual trip to Hatcher Pass. It was an amazing day and we were thrilled to make it there before they closed the mine down for the season!!! More about that later...our month continued with Owen getting the stomach flu the following Saturday and I followed suit the next Friday after Dave took off hunting for the weekend, of course. Thankfully, Shawn took care of Owen and I Friday night or else we may not have survived!! ;O) To top it all off, my laptop crashed and took with it the last 3 months of photos that I failed to back-up. I was devastated!!! Dave took it in to a computer fix-it place and they were able to recover my hard drive, although, it wasn't worth the cost to try and repair my computer. Therefore, my posts may be farther and fewer between. I have to use Dave's Mac and I am a slow learner. In the meantime, I have no Photoshop to edit the pics either, so what you see is what you get until I master this machine and get the Mac version of Photoshop purchased and installed...I'm already having withdrawals!!! I had no idea how much I used Photoshop!! Of course, in the midst of all the chaos, we made the decision to pull Owen from his current daycare. We may have been a bit rash however as all of the good preschools have waiting lists anywhere from 3 months to 1 year. We were lucky enough to end this week with a phone call letting us know that he will be placed in my first choice school as of November 2nd. Thankfully, Dave's mom is willing to come up and cover us for the next month so Owen doesn't have to transition into a second daycare to tide us over. I am so relieved that it has all fallen into place. Now, just keep your fingers crossed with me that this school is all we are hoping for!!!! If it works out, he can attend kindergarten there and hopefully, the school district will allow him to transition into first grade a year earlier than he would have been allowed otherwise due to his birthday missing the September 1st deadline for enrollment. We'll see though, I have no idea how it will all work out in the long run.

On to the pictures from Hatcher Pass...we could not have asked for a better day!!! Owen was such a pill to begin with, we thought we'd have turn around and go straight home. But, he warmed up to being outside and hiking. We even had to promise ice cream to get him to quit climbing up the hills!! ;O)

See the grassy hill behind Dave and Owen? Owen climbed that entire thing with little to no help, starting with the boulders at the bottom!!! It's hard to see how steep it is, but to give you an idea, Dave had to keep his hand on Owen's back to keep him from falling backwards as Owen literally crawled on all fours to get up that incline. Dave and I didn't really intend to go that far, but Owen was loving it!

We have had the absolute best fall weather I can ever remember this year. It has been amazing blue sunny skies as the leaves slowly change. Usually, fall kind of happens overnight here and within a week, the leaves are completely gone. But, not this year!!! The termination dust did hit our mountain peaks on the first day of fall and it has been creeping down towards us ever since. But, I don't think any of us can complain this year!!! For now, we are enjoying it despite our highs in the mid-40s!! Hope you all are having awesome weather as well. I'll try to post some more of my recovered photos in the near future, don't give up on me!!

It's Fall Y'all!

We are definitely in the full fall swing here and its been amazing!! We've had our typical days of rain, but with lots of sunshine between, so we can't complain. Owen has become far more cooperative in taking photos lately, now that he kind of gets what I am doing. So, he and I did a little photo shoot in the backyard Thursday night. We are so loving having the yard fenced in...Owen and the dogs have gotten better about staying closer to the house, so that makes it easier to throw them out there more often! Here's his "cheese" face again!!
Picking cranberries....

Max is totally digging the running space and gets real depressed on rainy days when we won't let him out to play. The dog literally roles in the mud though!!!

This shot was taken right before Owen bent his leg up and smashed this super beautiful mushroom!!! Can we say all boy!!!

Cheese!!

Dave and I had our backs to the kitchen watching t.v., when I turned around this is what I found...Owen was silently eating the Mickeys off of the leftover cake. Shawnie brought us these Mickey sprinkles for ice cream sundaes a while back and I added them to the cake for a little color. Owen has just recently discovered Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and the other Disney characters and loves them. As a fan, he apparently felt it was his job to sneak up on the cake and eat every Mickey sprinkle. He was quite pleased with himself when we discovered him. This is his new "cheese" face, you pull out the camera and he says cheese with this horrible look. I hate it!! I'm hoping he outgrows this face soon!!!

State Fair

We head out to the fair Monday evening and checked things out. I don't know about Dave, but after spending $25 for nothing more than to park and get in through the main gate, this is likely our last time. Do your fairs cost this much?

Anyway, the weather was awesome and we did have a good time. We didn't do any regular rides, Owen is too short for the fun ones and the baby rides are too slow for him. He loved the animals though!!! He kept telling us how they were all "so tute".

He asked to "sit on the horses" when we saw the pony rides. I truly didn't believe he'd do it. But, he was thrilled and even told me that he didn't want me to stand by him. I kind of felt obligated since he was the smallest one on them, but gave him some space! He's so shockingly independent some times! Other than that, he took the ride very seriously and didn't say a word. It was hilarious. Guess he needs a pony for his birthday! ;O)

If Owen gets a pony, I want this cow named Molly!! She was sooooooooo sweet!!! Owen was a little intimidated and wouldn't get too close, but Molly gave Dave lots of kisses. After that, Owen thought he needed to kiss the pigs!!