Fall Fun, or, the Random Adventures of the Wards in September and October

I haven't done well at all at keeping up with blogging lately (which is why you're going to see several posts in a row to catch up on all of that we've been up to).  A lot of it isn't so much that we've been doing lots of interesting stuff, it's just that we've been busy living life, and in the fall when the weather is nice, we're busier than usual.  So, here's a (sort of) catch-up, catch-all post about what we've been doing in my latest blogging hiatus, you know, the kind of stuff that doesn't merit its own post, but is part of daily lives.

Hanging out in our favorite "pirate shirt" and "pirate shoes" (they have little skull and crossbones on them):

 

Being sweet and looking super cute before church!

Getting excited about wearing his cowboy boots for the first time and getting to go to a "cowboy" birthday party for his friend Grayson, where he got to ride a pony!

Quite the attitude - is that a little Blue Steel I see?

 Alan and I took a last-minute trip to Pensacola.  Seriously, we decided to go on a Friday, booked it on Sunday, and left the following Friday.  We've decided this is the best time of year to go - everything is less crowded and the weather is perfect.

View from our balcony

View from our front door - Peg Leg Pete's, our favorite restaurant, was within walking distance ... awesome.

One of the boats at Joe Patti's seafood market.  We always go there and load up on peel-em-and-eat-em shrimp, fresh from the Gulf, then go back to the condo and cook them up and eat on them the whole time we're there.

Relaxing!

At Peg Leg Pete's ... out of the seven nights we were there, we ate here 3 of them :o)

 Making some cookies with my favorite helper!

 

Helping Dad get the deer stand ready for deer season!

Driving the Ranger.

Playing in the park in the beautiful fall weather!

 

He would climb all the way to the top of this slide and then slide all the way back down, backwards!

We spent quite a lot of time picking up and sorting rocks.

Going "super fast!"!

More rock sorting

Crossing the "creepy" bridge

 We spent a lot of time going down the slide and climbing back up the slide, sliding down backwards, climbing up the slide, sliding, climbing up the slide, sliding back down ... you get the picture!

 

So, as you can tell, just living life!

Happy Halloween 2014, or, Halloween Hayride Madness 2.0!

Last year, we had an impromptu Halloween party and hayride.  It was so much fun, we decided to do it again, a little less impromptu this time (by which I mean, instead of deciding to throw a party 4 days in advance, we decided to throw a party 10 days in advance).  It was another success, as evidenced by these pictures that I managed to take (it's hard to host a party, a hayride, manage a 2-year-old on Halloween, and take pictures)!

We loaded up the hayride, mostly with Moms and kiddos (most of the Dads stayed behind to guard the house ... and the chili :o))

 

Our fearless driver, and his assistant - Jones was way more excited about the Ranger than the hayride, in the beginning, and insisted on driving.  

 

Our first official trick-or-treat!

Jones, to be honest, did not care a thing about trick-or-treating.  He got himself a few pieces of candy from the first few houses, and that was enough for him.  After that, he just wanted to play in the hay, and in the Ranger, and he didn't give a hoot about the trick-or-treating experience.

Something else he did not care a thing about:  his pirate hat for his costume.  These are the only pictures of him wearing it.  He refused, REFUSED, to wear it, and because I figured it was more important that he had fun than if he wore the hat, I let him be a hat-less pirate (this was tough for me because I was so excited about the cute costume, and then the little toot didn't cooperate with me).

 

Seriously, the time lapse on those photos is like 5 seconds.  That's the only amount of time he would allow that hat on his head.

Trick-or-Treating!

Jones wasn't the only one who was content to take his candy and then just hang out on the hayride. 
This is his buddy Jett, looking super cute in his Frankenstein costume (and, you'll note, peaceably
wearing his head gear ... Jones needs to follow Jett's lead).

Daddy, Jones, Uncle Ed, and Anna Kay ... this was pretty much Jones' demeanor when you tried to get him to do anything ... he's all about it having to be his idea in order to do something!

Satisfied with only a couple of houses, he headed back to the Ranger to have a sucker!

I think this is a cute picture, Jones and his buddy Kate with their treats, back in the hayride.

 

When I say Jones wasn't alone in his desire to just hang out in the hay after trick-or-treating, I promise I'm not exaggerating!  These are pics of all of the kiddos hanging out in the hayride while we waited for some of the other, older kids to do their trick-or-treating.  They were all content to climb around on the hay and just eat a little of the candy and hang out together (and be cute, too)!

Jones and Kate - they are so cute, they go to school together, and their teachers told me and Kate's mom that they spent all day at school on Halloween talking about the party that night, and then when Kate left, she waved to Jones and said, "See you at the party!" and he said back, "See you at the party!"  So cute.

 

We tried to take a group picture.  I love the fact that Jones had, at this point, totally taken off every piece of his costume (we moved on from "no hat!" to "no pants! no shirt! no socks! no shoes!" until we were down to just the undershirt and underwear), and was unwilling to sit still for a group shot.  I also love that all of the girls are princesses - so cute!

 

Happy Halloween from the Ward family!