Random photos of recent days...

 Gazebo on a favorite trail.

 One of my daughter's recent dragons.

 The artist at work.

 Part of an ongoing attempt to spruce up my entryway.

 Ongoing stair project for the entryway. I might finish it some day.

 My boy.

My other boy. The triumphant leaf catcher. :)

Cheese! Wow. I am shorter than I feel.

 Love this of my daughter peeking at the sunset.

My tree. Only one around left in leaves.

We're doing our best to get and stay healthy through one of the most virus filled autumns we've experienced and trying to appreciate the last bits of the season. We had the first snow fall last week, and it is always so beautiful those first flakes. But, they let us know that we better soak in the sun and the earth whenever we get a chance; sore throats or not. Winter, she looms.

Hope the weekend finds everyone surrounded by the people and places you love! 

A girl and her dragons.

My daughter loves dragons. She reads book after book about dragons. Her favorite books are ones with lead female characters that befriend dragons. There are a surprising number of books like that actually and she's gone through quite a stack of them this year. However, I am always on the lookout for more. If you know of any dragon books where the dragons are the good guys. I'm all ears.

She also writes her own stories about dragons and their brave girl trainers. She watches movies about them whenever she can find ones that cast dragons in a favorable light. She doesn't like stories that stage dragons as the beast to be conquered. She feels that dragons are misunderstood creatures with powers that need to be respected, not feared. She's as adamant about this as she is about not eating food that is shaped like animals. Love this kid.

And as if this isn't enough dragon-filled fun for one young girl, she also makes clay dragons. Constantly. She's gifted almost everyone in our family with their own personal dragon, and she has plenty left over to guard her bedroom.

Some of her first clay dragons.

My personal favorite one besides the one she made for me (which I failed to photograph for this post).

Recently I found a cute little shelf at Goodwill that after a good scrubbing and a few coats of white paint, makes a perfect home for some of her dragon creations.

Oh, how I love these sweet dragons. And how I love my little dragon girl.

Halloween Conquered

Yep. Even my dog. We're THAT family.

A sweet Alice and a freaky sith Jedi, Savage Opress. Some Star Wars geekery for you on a cold November eve. We're that family too.

The cousins in their superhero splendor.

She had that bunny bag stuffed with candy by the end of the night.

Captain America would only let Alice hold his hand. Awwww....

Wow.

Won't be long before I'm thinking thoughts like this again. Halloween candy and I have a love/hate thing. All in all, Halloween 2011 was a smashing success all around. A weekend full of beautiful weather, wonderful company and too much sugar. Can't beat that.

Halloween is one of our favorite times of the year. We love the silliness involved, the excuse to dress up in costumes in public, the generosity of strangers. For a glimpse of past years' Halloween fun you can see here and here. We do tend to get into this holiday.

Well, onward and upwards toward the deep dark winter now, huh? Hmmmm.... might need a chocolate or bar or two to wrap my mind around that thought. Good thing we're well stocked! Wishing everyone a happy weekend filled with sweet treats!

2011: The Year of the Pumpkin

Once upon a time, back when the kids were little, I thought it would be fun to show them how to carve pumpkins. So I bought a nice round pumpkin, we looked up cute pumpkin faces online to decide what to carve. Then I sat my sweet babies around me and they watched with gigantic eyes as their mother took a big knife and did this....

 And they screamed and burst into tears.

It was then I realized why therapists are an integral part of society. And that was pretty much the end of me even attempting to carve pumpkins until this year. We've painted pumpkins, stickered pumpkins, pretty much anything that had nothing at all to do with murdering pumpkins.

But this year I saw THESE!

For those that don't want to click over, they are Pumpkin Teeth. SO COOL! And I bought some because, dude. Pumpkin. Teeth. So I petitioned once again for the opportunity to show my family how murdering carving pumpkins can be fun. And I won! Yay! I am happy to report that no children were harmed, emotionally or physically, in this endeavor. I cannot say the same about the pumpkins involved.

We did this a couple weeks ago, hence the shorts and sun, but my camera cord went missing and I just found it today when I was trying to find something else. Go figure. Maybe next time I am searching for something I'll find my missing brain.

I am happy to say that my family is now on board

with the whole pumpkin carving thing:

 Pumpkin fang teeth!

 An originally designed pumpkin wolf. Awesome!

 Had to get a shot of the mess. At least part of it, this was semi cleaned up.

 Our cheerleader.

 Daddy's pumpkin. He used a design from a book and it looks really cool when lit.

 I just crammed as many teeth as I could into mine. Yay, pumpkin teeth!!!

 Setting up the display.

Trick or Treat!!!

The countdown starts now! A whole weekend of Halloween festivities begins in just a few short days. Wishing everyone that participates in such shenanigans a very Happy (and safe) Halloween Weekend!