Last Baseball Fling

Our local minor league team did well this year and made it to the playoffs. At the last minute, we bought tickets to one of their playoff games. It was a beautiful night. We got there early which turned out to be great. The concession lines are sure short when you get in when the gate opens!

The line for playing on the big playground tower is also short! Aaron and Deborah had a great time on the structure and really liked being able to go all over it without having to stand in line.

It was a great night for a ballgame and we almost won. The team rallied in the 6th to come within one run of tying but couldn't muster enough runs after that to win. There is always next year!

Footprints

Our friends who lived on the lake invited us to come over and take plaster casts of animal prints. Their lake is being drained so the dam can be fixed. They now have about 6 feet of "extra beach". All the critters from far and near were coming and feasting on the crawfish and frogs that got stranded above the water line. They have found mink prints, coon prints, dog and cat prints, and gull and heron prints.

So first we had to find some good clear prints.

Next we mixed up the plaster of paris.

Then we carefully poured the plaster into our plastic ring.

While we were waiting for the plaster to set, our friend had made up several animal track quizzes and lake facts for the children to guess at. And what could be more fun than water based refreshments. We had cupcakes with blue frosting and gummy fish, seaweed (green tinted ramen noodles), and blueberry grunt (with lilypad bisquits).

From left to right: Gull, Raccoon (front and back), Cat, and Dog.

Skeet Shooting!

This August, we went as a family to Skeet Shooting 101, a class given at a local gun club. Everyone got a chance to shoot.

They showed us a video that explained how to shoot clay birds (really clay frisbee like discs) and what the safety rules were. Then we went out to the course and we had an instructor help us.

His name was "Duck" and he was very patient with all of us novices. Aaron is exhibiting the proper stance for skeet shooting by the way.

Deb was too little to shoot so she brought a book and then later amused herself by taking pictures.

My dh did very well as was expected.

And yes, even I shot. I liked it very much and was able to shoot one clay bird from each station (most of the time!).

Deborah captured this picture of me looking quite happy that I got one.

Art Day

When my parents visited in the early summer, we took advantage of my mother's artistic ability and had her give the children a painting lesson. Since the weather was good, we did some splatter painting. Nathan didn't want to do anything abstract so he made a mountain scene and then splattered in the flowers in the foreground.

Aaron and Deborah were game and splattered away.

The finished product.

If you put some painter's blue tape on the page and then splatter and remove the tape later, here is what you get. Pretty cool, isn't it?

Critters from the Woods

Nathan found this great white butterfly last week. It must have liked the taste of his skin because it stayed on his hand a long time.

Nathan also found a porcupine on our property. All of us were able to see it since it apparently only had 3 legs. It was moving pretty slowly but was alert enough to raise its hackles when my dh got a little too close. It certainly looked pretty intimidating even with it limping through the woods.