Out in the yard

We've managed to enjoy a couple evenings outside this fall on our patio. Kansas sure can be a windy place in the fall, so finding evenings that aren't too windy and we're actually all home can be a bit tricky! But the moments we have been out there have been lovely and we look forward to having many more in the years ahead. 

In other "out in the yard" news I officially wrapped up gardening when we dug up our sweet potatoes. We had some super-crazy-scary sweet potatoes this year, but a bunch that look normal, too. We're looking forward to eating them!

The zinnias were finally looking more depressing than cheerful so I decided to pull them out.

Some flowers were hanging on, but for the most part the leaves were all turning. I love those flowers so much it was kind of sad to pull them out this year.

We have a handful of small trees in our yard - a couple of them are maples and the few leaves they had turned bright red this fall. I told Ben, "In 30 years these trees will truly be amazing to watch in the fall."

We re-mulched all the plants around our house one day. It was quite the full body workout, but we agreed it needed to happen and we had a nice time working on it together.

Spreading mulch is certainly a job that doesn't sound fun, but once it's complete it's very satisfying.

Halloween 2015

Oh Halloween....not my favorite holiday, but as the mother of two boys it's one I cannot simply pass-by.

I was tasked by the school to help with Levi's class party. Again, not my favorite thing to do on not my favorite holiday, but I tried to make the most of it. I took charge of the food and made little pudding cup treats for the kiddos. 

 I made Ben come help me at the party - first game was the make-your-classmate-into-a-mummy-with-toilet-paper one. I'd never led that game before, but quickly learned that buying the cheapest 1-ply toilet paper wasn't the best idea. It kept breaking for the kids and turned out to make a big mess.

 Oh well, they still had fun!

 The mummified 2nd graders!

 Halloween supper outside - it was a beautiful evening!

 They're absolutely thrilled to have their picture taken, can't you tell?!

 They convinced Ben to go as a football ref. Since he's been officiating high school football this year that was no problem! He quickly got dressed and suddenly I had 3 trick-or-treaters. ;-)

 First stop - Grandma and Grandpa's house!

 Then we met up with friends in town to walk around with. They're big Patriots fans, and where Noah got his Tom Brady jersey from. So, we had coach Bill Belichick, Tom Brady, a ref, a crazy Patriots fan, an astronaut and a knight - quite the crew!

 We had a lot of fun walking around town, following the boys as they collected candy.

 The next morning when Noah dumped out his "pumpkin" this is what he had!

 That's a lot of candy Levi!

On Halloween, I went with a friend up to Hays to watch the Goessel volleyball team win the State Championship. They were so fun to watch and it was a tough last match for them. Driving to Hays is no small feat but I'm glad we made the 2+ hour drive to be there in person!

Apple Trees!

 Apple trees! This is so exciting to me. I have been telling Ben for years now, that I want apple trees and now we have them!

 One's a Honeycrisp and the other is a Prairie Sky (or something like that....)

 Levi was eager to help and proved to truly be helpful!

 Check out that effort!

 He finally got the tree loose from the container.

 And then he helped fill in the hole with loose dirt!

We also planted one pear tree and will have to plant a second pear tree in spring for pollinating purposes. :-)

Out on the Town

On another Friday off from school in October, my mom and I took the boys to Wichita. 

The impetus for the trip, was to get one of Noah's hearing aids checked out by his audiologist. That took a whopping fifteen minutes and then we were off to find lunch!

Old Mill Tasty Shop in downtown was the winner.

 We sat down and I told the owner that the boys love root beer so she brought them each a root beer and then brought her favorite, a marshmallow root beer! It was delicious!
The container of sugar on the table was too tempting for Levi, he had to add just a little to his root beer. :-)

 I love the Old Mill Tasty Shop, old fashioned charm and friendliness, good food and always busy.

 Next stop - The Nifty Nut House!

 We bought lots of delicious things at the Nifty Nut House!

Then our little adventure was over and we drove home. Trips to Wichita are always quick when the boys are along - they have no appreciation for stopping at lots of stores to look around and shop! ;-)

Mmmmm....pumpkin!

I grew pumpkins in my garden this summer. But the squash bugs beat me to them, so instead of harvesting beautiful little pie pumpkins, we piled all the vines in a heap, doused them with diesel and lit them on fire! The squash bugs were so thick, that when I moved the vines the bugs covered the ground and made it look like that entire patch of earth was shimmering and moving. It. was. bad. So we burned them and hopefully eliminated most of the bugs in the process. If nothing else, it was deeply satisfying to believe that all those menacing bugs were destroyed. 

 Lucky for me, the grocery store sells pie pumpkins! I know, they sell pumpkin puree in a can, Ben told me that. But I told him I had wanted to puree my own and I was determined to make it happen.

 Thankfully, Noah was around to lend a hand with the pureeing part. :-)

 And now I have a bunch of pumpkin puree in my freezer just waiting to be eaten!

Mmmmmm....pumpkin!

Hiking at Kanopolis

In the middle of October, when the boys had a Friday off of school, the five of us (Wilbur included) took off for Kanopolis State Park.

It was a beautiful day! Kansas was showing off it's early-fall loveliness and we enjoyed an interesting hike through part of Horse Thief Canyon.

The boys climbed the rocks they could manage.

and we stopped at each place we could see water to look for creatures.

The boys squeezed into a "cave" for this photo.

Thankfully, Ben is good with maps so he could continue to steer us onto trails that would lead back to the truck before hunger made the boys cranky.

There sure are some big sandstone rocks out there!

It is a LOVELY place to hike!

And just when we started to think, "Wait, did we make a wrong turn?!" We came across this lovely orange ribbon telling us we were on the right path. That was a relief because the boys were complaining about being thirsty and hungry and the orange trail was our ticket to a shortcut back to the truck.

After the orange trail was the blue trail - bingo!

It seemed like you could see for miles and miles around from this high, flat spot of prairie.

And finally, with next to no drama from kids, we made it back to our lunch and cold water. Wilbur was thankful for some lunch, too.

Then we headed over to the lake just to see what we might find.

No shortage of Zebra Mussels, that's for sure.

And as we left, and just after Wilbur passed by, Levi noticed this little guy hiding in the sand.

On our way home, we drove through Maxwell Game Preserve to see what the buffalo were up to.

I insist on going up the watch tower each time we go there. I love to be able to look out over the land and feel the breeze on my face.

I wonder how far you can actually see from there on a clear day?

It was a great way to spend a free day together!