Vala's Pumpkin Patch

(Note: Click on the photos to super size. It was taking me too long to sit and enlarge them this time...)

Vala's Pumpkin Patch is the best of all pumpkin patches! It's got everything that you could ever want in the fall time~pumpkin fields, apple orchards, haunted houses, live bands in the evenings, fire pits, hay rack rides, turkey legs, pig races, pumpkin catapults, petting zoo, kettle corn, corn maze......it's a wonderful place to bring the day care kids and we try to go every year! This time we had a large group of Me, Bill and Sawyer, five of my day care kids, my friend Arliss and her husband James, their daughter Nora, my friend Emily and her husband Brian, their three kids and her two day care kids, my friend Laney and her two kids!

We picked the most perfect day to go because the weather was just great and it was the middle of the week so we kind of had the place to ourselves! I borrowed a friend's van to transport some of my kiddos and I felt like a mother for four little girls! They just gibber jabbered the entire way!

Me and my day care kids on the huge rocking chair!

Here is the motley crew on our hay rack ride through the pumpkin fields! It was a bumpy ride and some of the kids looked like they were dozing off :)

Me and my girls!

Of course we spent way too much time at the petting zoo.....after purchasing ridiculously over priced animal feed that kept somehow falling out of chubby little hands and into the dirt, we tried to feed the goats, lamas, camel, donkeys and one random goose that was in there! The kids just LOVED it when the little baby goats would stick their pink tongues out and grab the food-it always erupted in a bunch of giggling!

...and we had to feed more baby goats in the storybook gardens too!

The boys (and I'm including Bill too) got a real kick out of this hand cranked conveyor belt that you put food into that would feed the goats at the top!

One of the things the kids got most fun out of was the GIANT two-story red slide that comes out the side of a barn! They come shooting out of there SO fast that we needed someone down at the bottom to be somewhat of a barrier wall to stop them. They each went down probably ten times and squealed with delighted fright each trip!

Of course we had to get a shot of all the kids together because they looked waaay too cute!

There are piggy races on the hour that go along with this little skit that the farmer and his cousin do-none of the kids got the piggy jokes at all (they were pretty cheesy!) But most of the older kids got picked to go up and cheer for one of the pigs and Sawyer's little guy actually won! So he got a rubber pig nose as a prize and his pig got a crumbled up cookie in his bowl of food :)

We stopped and took a much needed break for lunch and battled the bees for our food.

They made the rounds of the bunny town, but were a little ticked that they weren't allowed to jump the fence and pick them up....

We headed to the education barn to start our apple tour~the kids sat very nicely while the teacher explained the life cycle of the apple. She started off by asking, "Where do apples come from?" and being the city kid that he is, Sawyer yells out, "From the STORE!" Then we headed into the orchard to pick some apples off these kid-sized little trees!

Kendyl Me and Charlotte in the apple orchard.

We had to keep reminding the kids to not just yank the apples off the branches, but to twist them gently until they come off. They all had a grand time running from tree to tree looking for that perfect apple!

It was a L-O-N-G day and fun was had by all! What a great way to kick off the fall season! It was a pretty quiet ride home*

Sawyer has been very excited since then about the apples that he picked and keeps asking to eat them for snack....so he picked three and has eaten about six....and hasn't figured it out quite yet :)

4 Year Check Up

Sawyer is turning four next month! Can you believe it?! The time has gone SO fast and before I know it, it'll be Kindergarten round up and I'll be a basket case! Anyway, Sawyer went in for his four year check up last week at the Boys Town Pediatric Center. They have a beautiful new facility and Sawyer was actually pretty excited when we pulled up! He did VERY well with nurse Angie who took his blood pressure, tested large and fine motor skills, and verbal skills.

He stepped up on the scale and weighed in at 35 pounds! (27th percentile)

He was a little perturbed that she messed his hair up when she checked his height...but he is a healthy 38 inches tall! (10th percentile)

Waiting patiently to see Dr. Nancy Vandersluis.

Sporting a pretty awesome tweety bird gown with Woody from Toy Story peaking out the back. Dr. Nancy chatted with Sawyer about his colors and numbers and they went through the alphabet. He told her his daily routine at home and all the things he like to do. She also wanted to check out his skin because ever since he was a baby he has had a touch of eczema on the backs of his legs and on his little behind.....

I remember the morning after Sawyer was born, Dr. Nancy came to check on him and I just knew she was going to be excellent. The way that she handled him as an infant and never made us feel like she was in a rush made us like her instantly. She has a really calming voice and being a mother as well she has TERRIFIC 'bed-side' manner. She said that he is happy and healthy and ready for Kindergarten next year if we decide to put him in. At this point, we are thinking we will probably wait and do it the year after that just to make sure he is ready-maturity wise :)

Garage Sale in the Rain

As I had written in an earlier post, we were gearing up for the launch of a three year church project that was both large in vision as well as funding. Bill's parent's had a great idea of having a one day only garage sale in which all of the proceeds would go to the church and the launch. So, we called everyone we knew and asked them to clean out their basements and storage rooms of anything that could be sold. The turn out was amazing! We had so much stuff we were running out of room to put it! So, Friday night we stayed up late into the night slapping neon price tags on other people's junk and collapsing into fits of laughter after each werid/disgusting thing that we pulled out of the many boxes that were donated for the sale!

Saturday morning came all too quickly and it was cold and pouring rain.....but that didn't stop us or the 'garage sale-ing pros' that pulled up into the drive way at 7:05 a.m. with the hope of finding a treasure amongst the crap, with coin purses in hand. The weather cleared up as the day wore on and we were able to pull everything out into the drive way and fire up the grill to sell hot dogs!

It was so great to have lots of friends that came out to show support and break up the day a bit! Sawyer's besties, Theo and Jack showed up to have lunch with us! In the end, we made $800!!! Understandably, it's only a drop in the bucket but every little bit counts!

Sunday evening we met our friends Brandon & Laney and their son Nolan and another friend Brandon out at the lake near our house! It was the most beautiful evening and the scenery was gorgeous. (I know this picture looks like we're eating under a bridge in the ghetto, but oh well!)

Trying to get a good family photo with everyone looking, eyes open and a 150 lb. dog sitting calmly is a task......

We headed down to the water with Brandon's fishing pole to just mess around and with no real hopes for catching a thing.....

But low and behold, all of a sudden, Sawyer yells, "I got some-fin!" And sure enough out he pulls a fish!!!! All by him self!

He was pretty proud of himself but not quite sure what to do with it. We told him about catch and release and off the little fishy went.....

After his lucky catch, Sawyer felt as though he were the Bass Pro expert and thought he needed to assist Daddy on when to pull it up! We heard a lot of, "No, no let me show you..." I guess he had a point, because we did't catch anything after that!

We grilled chicken for Chicken BLTs that turned out to be D-Lish!!!!

As soon as the sun went down and the mosquitoes came out, we packed up and headed for home.

Dispick-a-Boy

Nana Kathy had a couple of days off of work so she called Sawyer up yesterday to see if he wanted t o go out and see a movie! He of course jumped at the chance!

They swung by Papa's office to pick him up for lunch and off to Burger King they went!

I think we need a re-sizing of the crown please....

and I have no idea what's going on here...but it looks like they were enjoying themselves!

Dispick-a-Boy....aka Despicable Me

Every since Sawyer saw a preview for Despicable me, he's been calling it Dispick-a-boy?!?! This was a special treat that Nana got him one of those cool snack boxes that cost way more than they are worth (Mommy and Daddy are mean and don't buy him those....)

They even had the entire theater to themselves! Everything is just hunky dory until....

OPPS! :)

He had such a great afternoon with Nana & Papa and came back with all sorts of stories and tried to tell me what happened in the movie but I still have no idea what it was about :)

Underwear Overload

There are so many wonderful things that come out of having two sets of very loving and generous grandparents. Lots of hugs & kisses, free babysitting and gifts! The result of very shop-savvy Nanas is this: Sawyer's 38 pairs of underwear!

Last Friday I had started sorting through all of Sawyer's summer clothing to give it away and take inventory of what he needed for the next couple of months. I'm pretty sure I can scratch underwear off the list!

I had a coupon for the Baby Gap that had been burning a hole in my pocket for a while, so I headed out to Village Point Mall on Friday Night to do some Fall shopping! When buying Sawyer's clothes, I really like to take my time and really look and re-look at everything, put outfits together, change my mind and try something else and all without stretching the limits of my husband's patience...I like to shop for Sawyer's clothes alone! I really get a kick out of it and don't like to feel in the least bit rushed! So, being as how we had Bill's little brother Alex for the weekend and they were off doing who knows what, it was a perfect time to hit the shops! Lucky for me that once I had picked out everything that I wanted at Baby Gap, I walked up to the counter only to see my old Starbucks co-worker Amber at the check out! After we chit chatted for a while, she offered to give me her employee discount too! AMAZING!!! That meant that I could go back and get twice as much stuff because it was like half off! So needless to say, we got some really great clothes for Sawyer and of course he looks fabulous in all of them :)

Saturday morning I met my friend Emily and her kids for coffee and we had a great time just batting the breeze and solving all of life's problems together! Then Sawyer and I headed over to the farmers market to get some fruit and salsa-it just so fun to walk around the booths in the perfectly warm weather where everyone seems to be in a good mood!

That evening it was Girl's Night Out!! We all met at the Cheesecake factory to celebrate Laney's birthday and just enjoy a kid-free evening!

We gorged ourselves on avocado egg rolls, Bikini Martinis and most importantly all sorts of cheesecake! The company of best friends and cheesecake make for the PERFECT atmosphere!

Us girls and our server, Ben.

Next we headed out to Dave and Busters (Check E Cheese for adults) to round the evening off with car racing, skee ball, horse racing, trivia (Alriss spanked the pants off of everyone else that sat down!) and just loud fun! We had an amazing time out together-can't wati for the next time girls!!*

Our Church has embarked on this three year adventure called, "Double Your Impact". It it is a huge challenge for a church of 3000 in Omaha NE. Essentially, it will create improvements in our regular building at Old Mill, including fixing the facility, upgrading technology, improving space and building a multi-purpose facility that connects our buildings. Our dream is to grow to 4000 in Old Mill and see over 1500 come to faith in Christ and get baptized. It also includes launching four new sites of Christ Community Church in the next five years across the Omaha Metro. These six total sites should have somewhere around 2000 people attending at all of our non-Old Mill campuses in 2015. Finally, a vision has been formed to launch leadership development for Christian leaders in China that will empower 1000 people to experience Christian leadership development and an endowment for pastors in Mali that will help 100 pastors every year to experience Bible School. This is in addition to the work that we are already doing in Mali and China with Orphans, Infants, Kids and the Hospital.

Christ Community offered a handful of different events that you could attend that would allow you to meet other people in your same stage of life to figure out what your family could do to Double your impact. The one that Bill and I chose, was the "Amazing Animals" evening held for parents of small children. The kids were swept up into a Sunday Night bash that included a huge picnic dinner, games, playground time, time to get up close with exotic animals, bouncy castles and snow cones!! While they were off doing their thing, the parents were invited to come to a steak dinner and a Q & A with Pastor Mark about the upcoming plans. We were actually sitting at Pastor Mark and Kelly's table and it was fun getting to know them a little more and of course hear in greater detail all that they were planning to create an even greater Children's Ministry wing for the kids!

They had five or six huge bouncy castle things out in the parking lot for the kids and of course Sawyer thought he had died and gone to heaven!

Sawyer doing some weird dance moves while waiting in line for his snow cone!

Mommy and Sawyer still waiting in line......

Hurray for snow cones! Now we have sticky neon blue syrup all over the back seat of our car...