Big brother to the rescue!

Today Ashlyn had her 2 month shots, poor girl. And Duncan came with us to the doctor's office. He was right next to her while she got weighed (12 lbs. 12oz.), and measured (25 in.), and didn't want to leave her side, it was very cute. Then the nurse came in to give her her 4 shots. I caught him out of the corner of my eye jumping off his chair with a fist in the air going towards the nurse! I stopped him and said "No, we don't do that", he replied "She hurting my baby! I don't like her! Stop hurting my baby!" When she was done I picked up Ashlyn to give her loves, and told Duncan to do the same, which he did while the nurse left the room. He then went to the shut door and yelled out "Don't come back! Don't hurt my baby!" I tried to explain that she needed the shots, and that he had them when he was a baby too, but he just wanted to make sure that she didn't come hurt his baby again! I thought it was very sweet of him to be looking out for his little sister, but I think I will get a sitter for him when we go back at 4 months for another round of shots!

Raking leaves

Ready..set..JUMP IN! The kids have been waiting for enough leaves to fall so that we could rake up a proper pile to jump into! Finally we've had enough...not a monstrous pile, but enough to produce some good times!





Funny story to go along with the leave raking.... So, me and my 5 kids are outside raking away in the front yard (Ashlyn is doing more watching than raking), and all of a sudden this truck pulls up to our neighbors yard, and out hops this man and his ride on to suck of all the leaves. He starts working in their yard, and I think, "Me and my 4 kids can take him." So he doesn't know it, but we start racing him! And we won! We raked our yard up before he finished with theirs! Who needs machines when you've got 5 sets of hard working hands!

And then we got to enjoy the fruits of our labors by jumping in the piles! Ashlyn of course got to just sit and look cute in the pile. I love Autumn in Maryland! So colorful and mild! This of course is our first raking of the season, and with as many leaves as we still have on the trees, there will be many more piles to jump in before fall is over!

Fort Frederick

Wow! What another great day we had! We drove out to Western Maryland to Fort Frederick (about a 2 hour drive), and had a great time. There wasn't much to see in the Fort, but tons of beautiful rolling hills to play on! We also walked down to see where the canal used to be, and went over some train tracks (which that in itself is exciting enough). It was just a beautiful fall day.












There was an old home there that they had converted to a store I think, (but it was closed up for the season) but they had 5 rocking chairs out on the big front porch. Since we had the place to ourselves, we all sat on the rockers (a few doubled up), and the kids decided that our next house needs to have a front porch big enough for us all to sit on rockers outside together! I think that is a fine idea! Now if I could only get the land and view that we had there to go with it!


On our way home we stopped at Larriland Farm one last time for some more apples (yes, we did eat the last 60lbs. we picked) and cider before they closed for the season. Then I got a treat that night, and had a 'girls night' with my sister, Missy. We got Chinese take-out, and watched a movie at her place. Ashlyn joined us as well, and it was a good time. I got to see her new appliances, and home improvements she's been doing! I think I'm motivated now to so the tile in my master bathroom!

An Evening at Lost Lake

Today the kids didn't have school, and Brian got home at 2:30pm, so we took off to our new favorite spot for the evening. It is called Lost Lake and is in the Patapsco Valley State Park. It is very quiet and peaceful there (yes, even with our 5 monkeys). The kids all seem to wonder off and explore their own thing or go off in two's, and it's a small enough area that I feel comfortable with them doing so. Sometimes Brian and I just sit at the bench by the lake, and watch the kids walk around it looking for turtles or fish, it's always a good time.
Ronan and Morgan had brought some dinosaurs with them, and were playing in the dirt and water with them. Dinosaurs are so much more fun when played with outside!
I asked the boys if I could get some photos of them, and they both hammed up pretty quick!
I love this one of Duncan, he's such a silly guy!
Some proof that I was actually there on these trips to the lake! I'm on the other side of the lens! It's kind of scary, isn't it?!

Morgan was disappointed that there were not ducks tonight (as we actually remembered to bring bread to feed them), but she seemed to enjoy herself with the dinosaurs anyway!

Happy Halloween!

What a week of Halloween fun! First we had our ward Trunk-or-Treat, which was combined with three other wards-crazy candy! The kids got so much candy that night, that I used some of it to give out on Halloween night, as we DON'T need THAT much sugar in this house!
The kids at the trunk-or-treat
Brian is from the Night before Christmas "With Ma in her kerchief and I in my cap" He was ' I '.

The night before Halloween we carved out our pumpkins. Morgan had gone on a field trip that day to the farm, and got to pick out this little pumpkin, which she said was for Ashlyn. Brian went with her, and they had a blast. Hay ride, hay maze, pumpkin patch and all. When they got back to the school he decided to just join in on the remaining 2 hours left of the school day, and just hung out with her in her class. She LOVED that! Of course I then looked like the not so fun parent when I went to volunteer the following week for only 2 hours in the morning. When I went to leave, she said "Aren't you going to stay the whole day like daddy?" I tried to explain that I had to get home to Ashlyn who can only be without me for 2-3 hours at a time, but that excuse didn't go over very well. Oh well! I guess dad wins the gold star for that one!

On Halloween day they had a parade at the kids school, followed by Halloween parties in each of their classes.
Duncan, Ashlyn & I stood outside and watched the parade. Duncan got dressed up for it too. It was a good time. We then jumped around between the 3 parties. Although our time was cut a bit short when Ashlyn was crying do to a diaper that had leaked out, and near starvation (so she thought). So, I just signed the kids out of school early, and we all came home to get ready for the big night! Brian came home early from work too, so we ended up just going out to eat, and coming home to get dressed for the trick or treating!

Ronan & Duncan were Jedi Knights, and Ashlyn was their Princess Leia. Morgan was 'a Princess', and Hayden was a skeleton with something on his head. I didn't quite understand the white t-shirt on the head thing, but he insisted that it was part of the costume!

It was 70 degrees that day, and the night was perfect for trick-or-treating! I love Maryland in the fall! No coats, or extra sweaters under the costumes. Actually Morgan came home from trick-or-treating and wanted to go back out without her costume, so she 'wouldn't be hot'. But I told her she couldn't go with out a costume, or that's just begging for candy, not trick-or-treating! It was a great Halloween!