Fall Fun

When we were in Birmingham for the Columbus Day weekend Mike and Carol (also known as Pops and CG) officially kicked off fall with a pumpkin carving activity. However, their plan backfired when Lauren decided the inside of the pumpkin was "yucky" and therefore didn't want to touch it.

So it was up to me, Pops and Aunt Carol to pick up the slack and carve the pumpkins while Patrick took pictures and CG entertained Lauren. Armed with my mini saws and pattern book I suggested we make it a contest.

This was the extent of Lauren "helping." She wanted her hand traced on the back of our pumpkin.

I was pretty confident I would win the contest due to my skillz, but since Aunt Carol is an artist I knew I would be challenged. However, Lauren was the judge...so at least I had that going for me. Here are our creations. Pops' pumpkin is the one on the left, Aunt Carol in the middle and mine is on the end.

The judging has begun....and the winner is...

Aunt Carol. Yep, my traitor daughter didn't pick her Mamma's pumpkin. Even though I asked her several times which one she liked she stuck with Carol's. So I lost. The following weekend brought cooler weather to Columbus, which was nice because it actually felt like fall. So Patrick got some pine straw to make our flower beds look pretty and some hay and Mums for the front porch.

Lauren decided Dadda needed help spreading the pine straw.

She soon got bored so she stopped to smell the Mums.

The next day headed out to the pumpkin patch. We were supposed to go while we were in Birmingham the weekend before, but the weather didn't cooperate and it rained. So I asked around at work and decided we would go to the Marengo Creek Farm just outside of Phenix City, Ala. It was an okay farm, not as good as Old Baker Farm in Harpersville, but still nice. They had giant swimming pools filled with dried corn for the kids to play in and at first Lauren declined. She said "I don't want to get dirty." So I convinced her to at least touch the corn while Patrick went back to the car to retrieve her jacket.

However, once Dadda got back he jumped in the corn.

Then suddenly it was okay to get dirty and Lauren begged me to put her in too.

So she played and wallowed in the corn for awhile before deciding to explore the rest of the farm. Next up was sheep herding. It was way cool. The dog brought the sheep right over to us.

Lauren LOVED the sheep. She waved and talked to them.

Then she decided it was time to move on again. So we went over to the hay maze, which consisted of a bunch of hay bails set up for kids to run through.

She had a blast, but soon discovered you could cheat and climb over the hay rather than run around it.

After the hay maze it was time to go see more farm animals so we went over and saw goats, chickens, turkeys, a cow, a mini horse, some bunnies and more sheep.

Lauren was good when one or two sheep were near her, but when the whole flock came over and started saying "Baa!, Baa!, Baa!" she looked at me and Patrick and said "I scared." So we moved on to find the hay ride.

Waiting on her hay ride to arrive...

The hay ride was "okay," but it could have been better. The last stop on it was the pumpkin patch, which is why we went to the farm in the first place. It turned out to be a disappointment because the pumpkins weren't grown there and they were grossly over-priced.

So we took some cute pictures and decided to get our pumpkins at Walmart later.

Although Lauren was pretty thrilled to find one she could hold we weren't willing to spend $8 on tiny pumpkins, especially when I got two for $9 the next day at Walmart.

Overall, Bebe had a fun day on the farm. Even now, three days later and she's still talking about it. She likes to lead you into the conversation with "What did Warren see on the farm?" You are then to reply (in an exited tone) "What did Lauren see on the farm?" To which she will say, "Umm...she saw goats and shickens, bunnies and a doggie chasing the seep." You can then continue the conversation and talk about the pumpkins and chickens and such. More fall fun is scheduled for this coming weekend as Nonie and Granddaddy come visit and we carve the Walmart pumpkins.

Our morning commute

Thought I'd share a little bit about our weekday morning commute. We live about 20 minutes from Fort Benning and then once we get through the gate it's another 10-15 minutes to Lauren's daycare and my office, which are about five minutes apart. So we're in the car together for about 30 minutes or so each morning.

Back in 2008 when she first started going to daycare on post Lauren used to say nothing, then she started babbling, then it was the occasional few words such as mamma, dadda, bus, and now she starts conversations, most of which are quite funny. Take today for instance...we got in the car and drove past the bus stop which was crowded because the school bus hadn't come yet. Lauren said "What those kids doin'?" My response was, "They're waiting on the bus." And she said "They going to school like Warren?" (She doesn't pronounce her name very well). I laughed and told her "Yep, they're going to school like Lauren."

As we left the neighborhood and reached the first major intersection I got in the turn lane and it's funny, but Lauren can tell you if we're going straight to school or stopping at Starbucks first by which lane I get in. Typically I make coffee at home about three times a week and indulge in a latte the other two days -- today was an indulge day. Usually she asks when we're in the turn lane "You need coffee mamma?" but she didn't today. However, when we got to Starbucks there where already two people in the drive-thru ahead of me and Lauren hates that so she said "Those cars need to move."

The rest of the trip she was pretty quiet for awhile then she said "What 'chu doin' mamma?" I said "Driving, what 'chu doin' Lauren?" Usually her response is "I'm sitting in my carseat" but instead today she rattled off a list of stuff she needed to do, "I need to get my oil shanged, I need to go soppin', I need to get zroercies, I need to buy brudder bottles..." For those that don't speak Lauren that translates to I need to get my oil changed, I need to go shopping, I need to get groceries, I need to buy brother bottles. I laughed out loud. I told her she had a lot to do and she said "I busy."

Then mom called and we talked or little bit. After we hung up Lauren decided it was time for her to call people. So she got out her cell phone and said "I callin' dadda. Hey dadda. You runnin'? I miss you, miss you. Good night!" She then called her usually line-up of people...Aunt Hoddy and Biscotti, Michael, Jonathan and Nonie. Sometimes she'll throw someone else into the mix, but those are her regulars.

Shortly after she finished her correspondence we reach the Fort Benning Main Gate and if you've never been to a military installation you have to pull up and give the gate guard your military I.D. card so they can check to make sure you aren't Osama Bin Ladin. As we pulled up Lauren said, "We goin' through the gate? I need my card" She reached into her My First Purse and pulled out her play credit card, which she considers her I.D card. She held it out for the guard and said "Here, thank you!" (she does that just about every morning and it's precious).

After we rolled through the gate we had random conversations about buses and car colors, and her favorite, we counted the houses. When we finally got close enough to daycare she started craning her neck to see if her favorite teacher's car is parked out front. She'll look and say "That Emmie's car!" Ms. Emily is Lauren's favorite teacher and my daughter the stalker knows her car. God forbid Ms. Emmie go on vacation or get sick -- Lauren doesn't handle it well. We went inside the routine is pretty standard each day. They scanned my card to check Lauren in, we went in her classroom, washed hands and headed over to the reading corner. Lauren kissed me bye and I headed to work. She never protests going to school or me going to work because she has such a good time in daycare, in fact sometimes she requests to go to school or "go see friends" on Saturday. So that's pretty much our morning commute and some variation of it happens between 6:45 and 7:15 a.m. every weekday.