Andrew just finished another successful flag football season last Thursday. One of the best things about this team is that they had no concept of score. One game they were getting smoked 28 to 0 and when they finally made a touchdown, the conversation on the field went like this:

Boy 1: "We are winning now!"
Andrew: "No, we are still losing but the score is like 19-21!"

It was a fun season and Andrew played his best every game. Great job sweetie!

Taking one for the team

Andrew came into the kitchen this morning with a small box of nerds and asked if he could have them. I asked him where he found them and he said he had been playing in my closet and found them. Weird.

I then had to look for something in my closet and noticed one of my huge bags of Halloween candy I had stashed on the very top shelf down on the floor, open, with a couple open wrappers next to it. Weird.

I then asked the boys who did it...even though I had a pretty good idea who had done it. I got multiple "not me's" and finally I said I would withhold treats from their lunches until someone told me the truth. Because really, nothing bothers me more than a big, fat liar. (In this case, it was a skinny boy with a hollow leg).

After a little while of more "not me's", Luke piped up and said: "Mom. I am doing this for Andrew. I didn't get the candy down but I am just saying I did."

I kissed Luke on his cute pudgy lips and told him thank you. And then Andrew finally confessed and we had a good ol' talk about honesty.

What a way to start the morning.

At least there was lots and lots of corn

When Andrew asked what we were doing when he arrived home from school, I told him that we were going to the corn maze down at Thanksgiving Point. He sat there for a minute and then asked, "Is it the one that has the big picture of Martin Luther King or something like that?" I said, "It is actually Larry H. Miller, but yes, that is the one." He looked really nervous and said he didn't want to go. I asked him why and he said that it was too big and what if we got lost? I told him that we would just have to sleep there and we'd be in a corn field so we wouldn't get hungry.

That was probably the wrong thing to tell him.

We did have a TON of fun. There is so much to do there...jumping pillows, slides, you can practice your lasso skills, a mechanical bull, go carts, greased pig races...the list goes on and on.

We hung out and enjoyed the activities for a while and then decided to try our abilities in the maze. On the way to the entrance, my dad told Andrew that he knew a guy that went into a corn maze and didn't come out for two days...but he was okay in the end. Thanks dad.

There were two entrances...one leading to an easier one and one leading to PHASE 2. Justin went straight for that one and I questioned him but he said this was going to be a piece of cake. The girl manning the booth said it would take 35 minutes to go through the maze and Justin gave me the all knowing look of "See, I'm right, it won't be that bad" and we headed in. And further in. And further in.

I was an anxious wreck at the beginning because I don't like being lost and the boys were running all over the place and I didn't want them getting lost while I was lost because how do you find someone while you are lost yourself? Andrew was holding my hand asking me what happens if the maze closes and we are still in there...I told him that they wouldn't let that happen and that they make sure everyone is out before it closes and they won't make us sleep here. That calmed him down but after we were in the maze for a while he kept commenting that he can't believe that we are going to be in here until Tuesday and he doesn't want to miss school.

Luckily we figured out where the exit was before it closed and had plenty of time to enjoy more of the festivities. I am not sure how far we were into the maze, but I think we made it to Larry's eyebrows.

The boys shot pumpkins out of a cannon, we saw a huge pumpkin tower, sat by a fire...it was such a fun, fun night.











This is me telling Justin to smile...he said he was

Sweet nothings

Today, Liam looked into my eyes with his beautiful brown ones and whispered:

"You're beautiful."

It was so sweet and tender and out of the blue that I almost cried.

He said it two more times.

Man, I love that kid.

Apparently...

...I am not very observant when I am in the car.

Ecstasy!

Do you think there is a better feeling for a 10 year old boy than running in on a 40 yard touchdown? A picture is definately worth 1,000 words.

And it begins

The boys are on fall break this week and the first two days of it were beautiful and sunny and warm and I was stuck inside a classroom learning some exciting new skills for my job. The first day that we actually were able to do something, it snowed.

Yes. It snowed.

And we decided to go to Gardner Village, a super cute, quaint outdoor shopping area. Every year they have a witch display and even though we have seen then a few times, it has become a tradition and it is fun to have the boys search for their favorite ones. This year they mixed it up a bit and put the witches in different places so we were able to walk around the entire place and enjoy ourselves.




Don't worry about the boys being too cold and uncomfortable though. We stopped at the bakery for a doughnut in the middle of our excursion and then at the end went and visited the candy store. That is also a huge tradition and I wish I would remember to take pictures in there but keeping four boys under control in a candy store is not a small undertaking.












I have a love-hate relationship with this time of year. I absolutely love all the fun activities there are to do--all of the festivals and pumpkin patches, making soup more often, the beautiful decorations of nature, pulling on a stylish sweater, and of course, Halloween.

I do not love the cold weather at all. I am a sun loving type of girl and I am so sad that the cold is inevitable and the days are getting shorter. I always think to myself that we are going to move to California or Arizona so on a cold day it is 70 degrees whenever it starts getting cold.

But then I think really, would living in perfect, unchanging weather be that amazing? I think I would miss the seasons, looking at the mountains and seeing a patchwork quilt of color, and much to my disdain, I would miss the first big snowfall of winter because it is absolutely fairytale like. And really, would Christmas seem as magical without the snow? Even though I grumble year after year, I don't think I would have it any other way.