Fall Art Projects

Fall is finally starting to creep in, so last week, we started making Fall art projects!


This one I did with just Lily. Since she isn't good with scissors yet (OK, I don't let her use scissors...) I cut out squares of orange, yellow, and red and had her glue them onto a piece of paper with a leaf printed on it.

I tried to have her say the names of the colors while she was gluing, but she thinks everything is blue, so we didn't get very far with that. =)


I also had Riley and Lily do fingerprint leaves on paper with trees printed on them.
Riley did a really good job using his fingers.....Lily decided to make handprint leaves......at least she had fun! =)

Can you tell which one is Ri's & which one is Lily's?

The last project we did is making a scarecrow face. I cut out all of the shapes and the kids glued them onto a small paper plate.

Aren't they cute? (oh, the kids are cute too.)

Those are our Fall projects for now..... now I can't wait for Fall weather!!!!

Zach's First Goal!

Zach made his first goal at his soccer game today!!!! He was a little hesitant his first two games to just get in there and kick the ball, but this time he was very confidant and it showed! When he kicked the ball in the goal, he put one finger up (for #1) and kept saying, "It's my first goal!" He was SO proud of himself. =)

Fun At The Fair!

We went to the Kansas State Fair yesterday. We invited along my sister Amy to go with us, which the kids were super excited about.

The first thing the kids saw that they wanted to do was go down this BIG slide!

FUN!!!

Then the boys saw all of these prizes......and games that you could play to win those prizes....

The first one they played was a bowling one that looked easy, but was really kind of hard.....which I guess is the purpose of all of these games. The boys did not win at this one and they were really disappointed.

Then they saw this dart throwing one:

The guy running the booth promised that everyone would be a winner....which I interpreted as, he was going to try to get us to spend a ton of money letting Zach & Riley have chance after chance. Riley popped a balloon on the first try!!!!

But poor Zach had a hard time and got really discouraged when his darts were gone and he hadn't hit a balloon. That's when the VERY NICE man let Zach use more and more darts (for free!!) and showed him how to hold the dart until Zach popped one!!!!


So, each of the boys was a winner! They each chose swords (of course...such boys!) and they were very happy (as was I).

Then we found the slushies that my sister Mary had told us about. They had 12 different flavors and you could make your own flavor combo!!

I can just see Zach thinking of the possibilities! =)

Don't these look colorful and yummy?!?!

Then we headed off to the rides! Amy took the boys on the Tilt-A-Whirl.

They LOVED it! I also took Lily.....but she did NOT love it. =) Poor Lily.

Here are the kids dragging Amy off.....I don't think they like her..... =)

Amy took the boys on this water ride.

The boys loved it.....I think Amy did too, but this picture makes me think she didn't think she would get as wet as she did....

.....or maybe it was that she knew she was going to go up again....only on a bigger hill this time. =)

Then the boys went on the little roller coaster!

We took a break from the rides to see the Pig Races.

Our section was cheering for the pig in the red.....

but he lost each time........

until the last race where they had this fat piggy running in the race. He actually trotted more than ran, and he was really cute.

Then we took a food break. I had heard of a fried candy bar, but had never tasted one, so we bought one to try.

It was good! Zach wouldn't try it and Riley only wanted one bite, so they got ice cream. Lily & I loved it though.

We decided to see the animals next. First we saw the chickens, roosters, and ducks.

Then we moved on to the bunnies!!!

Aren't they cute?!?!


Then the boys got to ride a camel!!!

We asked Lily if she wanted to ride too, but she did not want to.

The boys had a lot of fun!

The petting zoo was next.

After looking at cows and sheep, the boys had had enough of that part of the fair, so we headed back to the rides. Lily loved the Ferris Wheel and both boys liked the rides that they had to walk through and go down a slide to get out of.

After being at the fair for 4 hours (Seriously?!?!) we headed to Yoder to eat dinner at Carriage Crossing. It was YUMMY!!

We didn't get home until after 9:30. It had been a long day at the fair, but definitely a fun day!

My Funny Guy

Riley is the funniest 4 year old I know. He cracks me up on a daily basis. Don't get me wrong, all three of my kids are funny to me, and I laugh at the funny things they do and say all of the time, but Riley just has the funniest sense of humor. He tells terrible jokes (really....they don't make any sense at all!!!) but he laughs so hard at them that you just have to laugh right along with him. =) So here are some funny things that Riley has said that have made me laugh.

I was sitting on the couch and Riley came up beside me and fell on me. He looked up at me and said, "It was gravity mom, you know I can't control it!"

Riley and Zach were having a "discussion" when Zach made Riley mad. So Riley said, "That's it Zach, you are out of my imagination!"

Riley was running through the grocery store and when I told him to walk, he said he had pushed his "super-fast button". When I told him to push his "listen and walk button", he looked up at me and said (very seriously) "I don't have that button."

Lily has been talking in complete sentences for several months now, but the other day, Lily was answering a question that Mickey Mouse had asked (on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse) and Riley looked at me and said, "Lily can talk?!?!"

This one happened at Christmas time, but it still cracks me up:

We had been talking about Santa & how the boys needed to be good for him to bring them presents, when one day Riley said to me, “I want to get less presents this year.” I explained to him that he wanted more presents, that less meant he wouldn't get as many. He looked at me and said, “I know, I want to get less.” I asked why he would want to get less presents & he said, “So I can be a little bit bad.” =)

I have a file for each of the kids on my computer filled with these funny little sayings. Lily's only has one or two things in it since she just started showing her funny little personality, but Zach's is several pages long, and Riley's is quickly catching up. Hopefully they will enjoy them when they are older.......or Jeff & I will enjoy teasing them when they are older. =)

I hope you enjoyed my funny little moments with Riley. =)

Family Room Renovation

We finally painted the Family Room!! We have lived in this house for over 2 1/2 years and I have been talking about painting this room forever, but have just never done it. First of all, I HATE to paint walls...seriously. I also could never decide on curtains for this room. I have very neutral/solid colors in the rest of the house, but I wanted something a little different in here. Not crazy different mind you, just different from white. =)

I found curtains that I liked that went with what I had in mind for this room on Saturday.

I'm the type of person, that once I make up my mind (finally...) I like to just jump in there and do it. So, I took these before pictures.....

In case you are wondering, my family room does not usually look like this. This is after I took out the five million toys, books, random shoes.....

it's not reality, but it looks better this way. =)

On Sunday, I picked out two colors. A tannish color for the top half and a burgundy color for the bottom. (which Riley kept calling burglary.) =) Then we wanted to put up a chair rail to separate the two colors. We actually found the same trim that they used on our windows, so that worked out great!!

We got the painting done in two days.

But with all of the things we have going on recently, it took a little longer to stain the wood for the chair rail and for Jeff to find time to put it all up. That part was the hardest!!! I am so glad my husband is so handy!!

I really like the final result. It really changed the room! The kids like it too. Riley says we have a "fancy house" now. Ha ha! He cracks me up!

I decided not to put up the picture and flowers that had been over the fireplace mantle, and I still think I need to put something above where the TV is...even though Jeff thinks it's fine just as it is..... =) Hopefully I can find something I like soon. If you have any suggestions, I am open to all of them!

So, there is our little home renovation!