Wack-o-ween

This past weekend we got away to Shaver Lake with our friends, the Wiens' family for our made-up holiday known as Wack-o-ween. Our families have been close friends for years, but we have found that it can be hard to spend quality time with each other once the holiday season begins. So we made up a holiday to "carve out" some time with each other before the season gets away from us! Here's Randy and Aaron on the back porch, grillin' up dinner. As is true with most holiday gatherings, food is essential! And when it's Christa and I cooking, it's LOTS of GOOD food (if I do say so myself). This year our menu included biscuits and sausage gravy, grilled pork tenderloin with chunky spiced applesauce and swiss baked potatoes, Jack-o-lantern pancakes, mashed potatoes with BBQ meatballs (a la Pioneer Woman), and, of course, our pumpkin chocolate cake cooked in our pumpkin pan...double the glaze!
Wack-o-ween isn't complete with pumpkin carving either! Isaac decided not to carve his pumpkin this year, but decorate it. We gave him a hammer, some nails, screws, and odd hardware pieces lying around, and this is what he made! Isaac's on the left, Levi's on the right. Here are the carved pumpkins. The rest of the weekend was filled with games, crafts, story-telling, and some fun outdoors when the rain would stop! See the Wiens' blog for more pictures and stories from the weekend!

Fall Flashback Foto

Just because...October 2005

Fall favorites

Fall is finally here in the Valley! And I'm not just talking about school starting and soccer season, fall weather is actually here. Over the past few weeks we have enjoyed picking apples at the Bowsers' house and my aunt's house, eating butternut squash and kale from Farmers' Market, walking in the rain, and going to the Fresno Fair! Here are some photos of our adventures over the last month! Jam-making! End-of-season peach jam. Isaac's hard at work peeling apples for... applesauce. Violet helping place apple slices on our favorite fall baked good, Apple-Pecan Breakfast Buns! Rolled up, cut, and placing them in the gooey yumminess for the baking! With the onset of fall begins my adventures in the kitchen once again. I have been experimenting with new recipes and recording my endeavors on my camera (including this recipe...I know, reading too many food blogs lately) just incase one of them turns out fabulous and I want to share the how-to on my blog. Apparently Violet now thinks that part of the cooking process includes taking pictures of every step. Had to get a photo of her taking a photo of her own! All done! Then flipped onto a different pan. A yummy success! Who doesn't love breakfast for dinner? Violet was all smiles the day that we attended the Fair with the Mom's Group from our church. Our group got free tickets to attend one of their Education Days and had a great time! Violet and her friend Mya getting to ride the little tractors in Ag Ventureland. Makin' music with metal. Playing in the treehouse. Although you can't see it, there's a cinnamon roll in my lap that Violet and I shared. That's why I'm all smiles too! And even a fun train to ride back to your car? To a four-year-old, could it get any more fantastic?

Violet's summer accomplishment

Our goofy little girl had a big accom-plishment this summer... she learned how to swim! No more vest, no more floaties, just those strong little legs and a good pair of goggles is all she needs now! Well last month I realized that I didn't have any photos or videos of Vi in the pool since I was usually in there working with her. So last week when we had a few days of triple digits and got in the pool one last time, I made sure to bring my camera. Here's our little girl swimmin' to her heart's content (which was all of 15 minutes before she started shivering and her lips turned blue...with the cool evenings the pool is down to about 80 degrees now).

Gymnastics

As promised, I took my camera to gymnastics last week and took a couple videos of Violet! She loves going to gymnastics with her buddy Jackson each week and she is so good at it! I love watching her do all her tricks! Enjoy!