Orange Pumpkins!

Nolan has been playing his first season of soccer with HAYSL this fall. He seems to enjoy it although their field is so small that they spend most of their games kicking it out of bounds and doing throw-ins. Here is his little team, the Orange Pumpkins!!

 

That name will certainly strike fear into all of their opponents!!

Between soccer for Nolan and baseball for Landon, our Fall has stayed pretty busy with sporting events!!

FHE at Misty Meadows

While Jason was out of town, we headed over to Misty Meadows for our Family Home Evening activity. They had all of their fall decor up and Maylie loved crawling around the pumpkin patch!

The sunflowers were also in full bloom which made for a beautiful sight!

Landon wanted a picture with that huge Turkey in the background. It looks like it will make someone a nice feast come Thanksgiving!

Abby is like the animal whisperer to all living creatures. She especially loved this little calf in the petting zoo and that calf had a little fit when Abby walked away. I guess that calf was pretty fond of Abby too!

Nolan driving the tractor...

We ended the evening with some yummy ice cream straight from their dairy cows. Pure yumminess!!

Cross Country Race

The weekend after we got back from Disney World, Abby participated in the Elementary Cross Country Race. She was a bit nervous before the race began, but seeing all her 4th grade friends from Paramount Elementary helped to calm her nerves...

Here she is at the starting line...

And she's off!!

Looking good Abby!

She finished the mile course in 8:17 and we were so proud of her!!

There were over 130 4th grade girls who participated and Abby ended up coming in 25th place.

She received her ribbon...

And was excited to be right next to her good friends Sydney and Avery.

The top 30!

Way to go Abby!!

Disney World Day 5 - Back at Magic Kingdom

Our last day at Disney World did not start out very promising. Landon woke up not feeling well and then starting throwing up. We weren't quite sure what to do since our plane wasn't leaving until 5 p.m. Landon still wanted to head over to Magic Kingdom so we boarded the bus and wished for the best. Landon ended up throwing up on the bus and had several bouts of diarrhea too (fun, fun!!) but he was a trooper and still went on every ride that morning. We think it was food poisoning from some whipped cream he had eaten the night before that had sat out in the afternoon sun for too long. Thank goodness he was all back to normal by the time we got to the Orlando airport later in the afternoon.

We enjoyed visiting the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse...

And going on the "Jungle Cruise." Gotta love Nolan's expression here!!

We had brunch reservations at the Crystal Palace where we got to meet all the Winnie the Pooh characters. Maylie was quite enthralled with Tigger, as long as he didn't get too close!

Nolan was obviously a big fan too!!

When Nolan spied Pooh across the restaurant, he declared "I sure hope that honey guy comes over here!!"

Abby getting some Piglet love!!

And who could forget Eeyore!!

We were able to go on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad again as well as Splash Mountain which were both a lot of fun!

We went back to Fantasyland to go on "It's a Small World" and "Winnie the Pooh" again before it was time to take the bus back to the hotel and head to the airport. It was really hard to leave such a magical place. We all had an amazing time and can't wait to start planning our next trip.

Bye, bye Disney World...until next time!!!

Disney World Day 4 - Downtown Disney & Hollywood Studios

I made a major snafu on Friday morning in our Disney World planning. For some reason I thought we had Water Park tickets along with Park Hopper so we all got dressed in our swim gear and headed to Typhoon Lagoon. When we got to the entrance we were told our Disney tickets didn't include the water park option. I felt like an idiot, the kids were disappointed, and we weren't quite sure what to do next. Then we saw a bus headed for Downtown Disney and decided to jump on board. It ended up being a pretty fantastic morning after all!!

A few sights from our tour of Downtown Disney...

The highlight of that little trip was the LEGO store. Seeing all these creations outside made entirely of LEGO blocks was amazing!!

Nolan making his best "Hulk" pose!

And then Landon gave it a shot!

Can you believe all of these figures are made from LEGOs?!?!?

We picked out a few kits for the kids and then they got to fill up a bucket with all kinds of unique LEGOs to add to our collection. The LEGO store was definitely a highlight of our trip and wouldn't have happened except for the "water park snafu!"

After Downtown Disney, we headed back to out hotel to change and grab a snack before heading over to Hollywood Studios. The weather had been pretty mild all week, but this day we started to feel the heat a bit more.

We started out by watching the "Lights, Motors, Action Extreme Stunt Show." The action parts were pretty fun to watch, but there was a lot of talking in between and since it was in the middle of the afternoon, we were all ready for it to be done!

The kid play center from "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids" was quite fun for the older kids though!

Looks like we're on a movie set here!!

"Toy Story Mania" was a fun ride. Thank goodness for Fast Passes though because the line was over an hour long. With our Fast Passes, we were in and out in less than 15 minutes!

We had a late lunch/early dinner at the 50's Prime Time Cafe which was quite a treat and had really good food. My favorite part was the Peanut Butter and Jelly Milkshake. Yummy!!

After dinner we watched the "Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular". We all loved it!!

We had to drag Landon to go and see "Voyage of the Little Mermaid" since we had already done so many "boy" type shows. Needless to say, even Landon loved this little show and was enthralled the entire time!

We ended the evening by going on the Tower of Terror. I went with Landon, Nolan and Abby and none of us knew what we were getting ourselves into!!

I thought it would be just one big drop, but nope, they kept bringing us back up and dropping us again and again and again. Neither Landon nor I enjoyed this one, but Nolan liked it and Abby even went on it a second time with Jason. Once was more than enough for me though!!

We were going to stay for the night show called "Fantasmic" but it was standing room only and it was already pretty late. We'll save that one for next time!!