Illinois Trip - Part III

We rounded up our Illinois trip with a visit to my sister in Chicago. It was my nephew's 4th birthday and he was thrilled to have his cousins visit.

It was such a wonderful day that we walked to a nearby park and enjoyed playing police/jedi/superhero on the playground.

Deborah made sure that her cousin was safe crossing the streets.

Our final vacation event was to visit the Jelly Belly Warehouse in Wisconsin.

We took a tour of the warehouse and learned how they made Jelly Bellys. And the best part - they had a sample counter where you could get a sample of any candy that the company made. It was great!!

Illinois Trip - Part II

We took some time to go to the St. Louis Zoo while we were in Illinois. It was a beautiful fall day - not too hot, beautiful sunshine, and not a cloud in the sky.

Most of the animals were moving around. We watched these dwarf mongooses (mongeese?) wrestle for a long time.

We had to see the elephants fairly early in the day because they are Aaron's favorite. And right next to the elephants were the elusive...

... wild backhoe in its natural habitat.

The lions of course were sleeping. One lioness was sleeping in a tree. I've never seen that before.

We saw the new baby giraffe walk around and even nurse.

The St. Louis Zoo has an aviary that dates back to the 1904 World's Fair. Now it is a swampland exhibit that you walk through.

I think the penguins were everyone's favorite exhibit. This guy was standing right in front of the cold air vent and his feathers were ruffling in the breeze.

I liked the orangutan that was trying to get the other orangutan to play with him. He kept trying to drag the sheet off the "sleeping" one, but in the end had to give up and go play by himself.

Trip to Illinois - part 1

We went to Illinois in late September to visit friends and family. On the way, we stopped in Indiana to visit friends. It was a beautiful fall day and it was a joy to drive through the fields of golden beans and corn.

It was just barely warm enough to swim. Personally I thought it too cold but hey, it was just above 70 so it was warm enough for the children.

One of the girls is in college, so we met up with her for lunch.

Then onto Illinois! We went to one of our cousin's cross country races.

We also met my dh's godparents at a wonderful restaurant on the Hill in St. Louis (fantastic Italian food!). Doesn't this picture remind you of the Norman Rockwell picture of Thanksgiving dinner? Especially Nathan's face partially out of the picture, but looking back.

Fall Garden pics

Welcome Fall! This is our best jack o lantern pumpkin. We really didn't do anything to make it so big. It just sorta rose out from under the vines and surprised us.

Deb's Indian corn turned out nice. It is pale green, pink, and blue.

The tomatoes this year have been great. I made my first bread salad this summer and really enjoyed it.

I cooked up some white pumpkins on Saturday and made a pie. It looked like pale applesauce before all the spices went in. So overall, the pie looked rather brown due to the spices. I did find that I should have put less spices in. I don't think the white pumpkin was as strong tasting as the regular pumpkin.

Lego Exhibit

This summer we had a Lego exhibit at our local museum. We took the grandparents to it and were really impressed. They had a very detailed huge Lego layout with even some buildings copied from real building in our town.

The Lego Art sculptures were just amazing.

"Louisville Slugger"

I liked the crayon that was partially unwrapped.

Deb is looking at some models of skyscrapers from Detroit.

These are smaller models of some of the most famous skyscrapers from around the world.

There was also a place where you could make Lego projects of your own. Bins and bins of all kinds of Lego pieces.

Viola! Some of the finished pieces.

Boba Fett of course.

And my dh's masterpiece, "Spironimus"

New Chickens

We switched flocks recently and put the newer chickens over to the old coop and took the old birds to the butcher. I was very glad to get rid of this flock. The rooster and about half of the hens were always trying to get out of their yard. And into my garden! This new flock doesn't show any signs of flying over the fence so perhaps they will stay where we want them.

We have a new rooster. No name yet. I think he is a Old English Game Bantam. He was a bonus chick added to our order. It is always a mystery as to what it might be.

We went back to about half Dominiques which are our favorite breed.

This white and black hen is a Columbian Wyandotte.

This is a Partridge Rock. They are pretty good birds also.

Summer fun

This year we tried to make solar some-mores. We saw the design in the Family Fun magazine.

It took a long time and finally we gave up. The chocolate was soft but the marshmellows weren't that melted. So I guess it was a nice idea but not a practical one. We'll stick to bonfires from now on.

On an unrelated note, here is my new cutting board (well, new from July). I got it at the Lumberjack Festival at one of the Arts and Crafts booths. Amazingly, it only cost $25!

The Force is with Us

"To be at our house for breakfast, you wish?"

Archery Range

We have a new archery range near our house. It is a 3D range which means that the targets are realistic foam animals.

So we went to their open house and checked out the range.

Here's Stephen with his two "kills" on a wild boar.

Deborah is a left handed archer due to her dominant left eye (even though she is really right handed).

My dh got 5 kills out of 5.

Garden pictures

Well, the garden is just about finished. We still have some potatoes and carrots in the ground and a couple of peppers hanging in there. Most everything else is finished. We had such a beautiful day that we spent most of it cleaning up all the posts, hoses, spray aways, and fences. It looks very bare out there now.

About a couple of weeks ago, Aaron came inside from feeding the chickens and told me that there were lots of blogerrific pictures out there. So enjoy!

Dew on the cherry tree

Dew on the asparagus ferns

Morning Glory in the corn

Nathan's purple cauliflower

Two cool spider webs