Aquarium fun

 Our friends Alex and Bill generously gave us some Aquarium of the Pacific tickets and we went yesterday! It was so much fun - we watched the seals and sea lions do flips and breakdance, watched rays and sharks in the touch pools, chased Noah while he ran back and forth in front of the sea otters, and stared at countless fish and even an olive ridley sea turtle (one guess as to what Benjamin's favorite part was...)

halloween parade

 Benjamin's school had a little Halloween/orange parade last week. The kids made bat or pumpkin hats and then marched around to "Monster Mash". 

This is the gorgeous view from the school. I am jealous of my child.

 Benjamin and his little friend Amaya. So cute!!

making caramel apples

a couple of weeks ago, our friend invited us over to make caramel apples! it was messy and so much fun!!

first jack o'lantern

 Last week Benjamin and I carved a pumpkin! (Well, I did the carving. And the de-gooping. But he drew the face that he wanted his pumpkin to have!) He had so much fun and so did I. :)

pumpkins

 The boys and I went to the nearby pumpkin patch yesterday (we were going to go this morning with some friends, but those plans changed). It was cool and slightly drizzly, so we were the only ones there. It was great! The boys ran around the pumpkins, I managed to get a few great photos of them, and we left with three tiny pumpkins plus the two I brought with me. :)

benjamin adds

As I've said before, Benjamin just loves numbers. The other night he was sitting next to Tim while he was doing some work and said he wanted to add. So Tim gave him some two digit numbers to add and with a little instruction completely understood how to do the problems. Then Tim gave Benjamin some problems that involved carrying numbers...which he completely understood. So I gave him a "really hard" three digit problem...And he did it with no trouble. Next up: calculus. :)

fall craftiness!

 Yesterday was rainy and cool, which was a welcome change from last weeks ridiculous temperatures. I have all sorts of random craft supplies, thanks to teaching/having a mother in law who was a teacher/having a mom who just collects things and passes them on to me. So we made pipe cleaner pumpkins:

 Paper chains, plus i strung the pipe cleaner pumpkins onto fishing line to make a mini-garland, and then hung them on the fireplace.

 Poms: (i like the small ones better, they're puffier. i guess i needed another piece of tissue or two for the large ones)

 Paper bag pumpkins:

 Pipe cleaner spiders:

 And this one is my mom's quilt, she made it for the boys last year! We also have some cute halloween placemats on the table that she made last year!

We had a lot of fun, and didn't get paint or glue everywhere! Success!