Carving Pumpkins

Field Trip

Amelia had her first field trip on Tuesday. I went along as a chaperone and Ben took the morning off to watch Elsa and get some far too expensive maintenance done on the car.

Her class went to the pumpkin playground at Burke Nursery. It was really fun to get to know the kids in her class and see her having so much fun. But it was exhausting. I was only in charge of Amelia and two others, but it was crazy trying to keep them together. Although at this point in my pregnancy, pretty much everything is exhausting.




Some of Amelia's friends: Safa, Rhiana, Lameese, Julissa, and Kamalani

The kids LOVED the hayride through the spooky forest. They screamed the ENTIRE time:











Their favorite activity was the tumbling tubes:








(This dad from another group was spinning this thing super fast. Kids were flying off of it and hitting heads like crazy. And they all looked sick when it finally stopped. No wonder they don't have these on playgrounds anymore.)

Monkeying Around

Sunday Evening Stroll

Last Sunday afternoon we wanted to get out and enjoy the changing leaves and go somewhere with no crowds. We found the perfect spot at Turkey Run on the George Washington Parkway. Scenic and very few people. We did a little hike down to the river and walked around on the rocks. It was so beautiful (still mostly green by the river but some amazing trees along the Parkway). The girls had so much fun that they walked the entire trail by themselves and didn't even notice that it was uphill the entire way back. I was the slowest one in the group. But I'll give myself the pregnancy excuse. We have been having the most wonderful fall weather so it felt so great to be outside enjoying it.

Halloween at the Air and Space Museum

On Saturday we decided to try out the "Air and Scare" event at the National Air and Space Museum (the Udvar-Hazy Center near Dulles Airport). It was incredibly crowded and we were so glad we arrived right when it opened because we didn't have to wait in line to enter. However, when we left a few hours later, we could hardly exit the building because there were so many people trying to enter and there was a line of cars stretching down the highway (probably a mile long) just waiting to enter the parking lot. Definitely not worth that wait.

But the kids had fun and really enjoyed looking at all of the airplanes almost more than the crowded activities and lines for getting a piece of candy.


(The gnome still might make a return, but Elsa wanted to be a witch that day. A Bavarian candy corn witch?)


(There were Star Wars characters everywhere. Our kids know nothing about Star Wars, but there happened to be nobody around these storm troopers so I made Amelia pose for a picture.)




(Coloring a paper witch for the "witch rockets" activity.)


They strapped the paper witches to these balloon rockets and the kids chased them.






(Shooting puffs of air at ghosts.)

The girls were really into the face painting:











(Completely worn out and happy to be away from the crowds.)

We made a very wise choice to stop at Nielsen's Frozen Custard in Vienna on the way home. In addition to consuming lots of fries with fry sauce, we tried all four flavors of custard available that day. The lemon and vanilla were so refreshing. We also did a mix of pumpkin and chocolate...pure October deliciousness.

Shower

Last week some wonderful friends threw a combined baby shower for me and my friend Michelle, who is also expecting a boy in November. Since we both have girls, it was so great to build up our stock of blue and brown and all things boy. It was a fun night and I'm blessed to be surrounded by such great friends.