Leaves

Our leaves started to fall at the end of October but we still have quite a few leaves on the trees but have snow on the ground.  Guess those aren't going to be bagged up this year.  We raked leaves twice this year.  N2 love to help rake and they love to jump in the leaves.  We have to remind them not to take the leaves from the neighbor's yard since we don't want to pay to get rid of those leaves!  I tried to get good pictures of the kids in the leaves in October and I tried again in November.  They weren't the most cooperative.

Snow?

We had a very minimal amount of snow last weekend.  N2 wanted to go out and play in the snow so we got them all decked out in their snowpants, coats, gloves and hats to go out and play in the immeasurable snow.  By the time they got out there the snow on the driveway had started to melt.  They scraped all the snow from the driveway, sidewalk and yards into a pile to try to make snowballs.  It was pretty pitiful.

The snow did not stick around long and we haven't had anything stick since then thank goodness.  I'm not ready for snow.  We have had snow flurries quite regularly though.

Apple Picking

Back in September we had one weekend available after the start of apple season so we decided we better go get some apples before it was too late!  We really liked Empire apples in the past but knew those weren't ripe so we figured we would try a new orchard.  We visited More Than Delicious Orchard and discovered it wasn't that far from our house!  Normally we drive about 35-40 minutes to get to orchards-this one was on the other side of McHenry.  This orchard was small but had quite a few varieties.  They only were letting people pick one bag of apples and the apples were on the smaller side but they were quite delicious!  I think our favorite apple and the one that we picked the most of were the Lustre Elstar.  They were very sweet and crisp.  It's always nice to discover new types of apples!  I can't even remember the other types of apples we picked.

It didn't take us long to pick apples so I didn't get many pictures.  The kids were tired and not in the best of moods.  There were also tons of bees in the orchard which freaked Natalie out as she always seemed to have a half eaten apple in her hand.  Here are the few pictures I got of that day.

Cubs'. Game

Back in September for Brian's birthday we went to Wrigley Field for the Cubs' game.  It was not the nicest of days-there was a high chance of rain.  Our seats were the first row in the balcony along the third base line but way down the line!  It was not the best placement for 5 year olds because they couldn't see over the railing.  I couldn't see well over the railing either for that matter!  It started spitting on us part way through the 2nd inning when Brian had gone to get food so Noah and I made the decision to move because we were getting rained on.  There were so many empty seats/rows in the sections around us that it wasn't hard to find other seats.  We could see much better in these seats!

Our little Cubs fans were not too interested in the game.  They were so uninterested that we decided we probably won't go to a game next year with them.  They constantly wanted to eat and they didn't watch any baseball.  It was a somewhat interesting game.  The other team (I can't remember who it was at this point) got quite a few runs and then the Cubs almost caught up but then the other team got more runs.  Here are some pictures from the game.

N2 even tried to get the Cubs to get more runs by wearing their rally caps.  It didn't work.  (Sorry, the pictures aren't the greatest-I didn't take my nice camera with me).

Busy Bees Adventure Farm

We met up with Marcie's family at the beginning of October at the Busy Bees Adventure Farm in Ft. Atkinson.  This is our 3rd time meeting them there and all of the kids still love it!  It was much more crowded than we had experienced in the past.  The kids really enjoyed the big slid in the loft of the barn.  We put Nathaniel down the small slide and he seemed to like it for the most part except for the fact that Aunt Becky was catching him.

All the kids tried out the can stilts this year.  They get better at them each time we visit the farm.

We spent a lot of time in the corn crib.  The kids were much more willing this year to have corn poured on them.  From my pictures, it appears that Natalie had more corn poured on her than other people.  Nathaniel got to play in the corn too.  Marcie only had to fish out corn from his mouth twice (I think).  We did have to stop him from putting corn in his mouth several other times.  The kids also took turns being buried in the corn.

 They loved the obstacle course this year.  Sometimes my kids would bypass some of the obstacles so that they could keep up with Amelia.  They loved swinging on the rope at the end of the course.  They didn't try to climb up it.

 The corn maze was popular this year (there were lots of other people in it).  We had to answer trivia questions to figure out which way to go.  Most answers were true and they quickly realized that so they would run down the false path until it was a dead end and then run back.  We had to slow them down several times because there were slower people ahead of us-littler kids, strollers, walkers, etc, so I had them hop back or skip or walk.  Megan did a great job following the instructions each time.  The older kids just wanted to beat each other!

The hamster wheel tracks were very popular.  The kids tried to push Ben but Brian had to help!

Noah was really interested in trying to lasso/loop the cows.  After a while Aunt Marcie came over and we played loop Noah.  He thought that was a lot of fun!

Here are some random other pictures from the farm.  We had a great time!  I did miss the hog hustle (or whatever it was called) instead of chasing chickens.  I wonder if their pigs weren't old enough?

Leaves

We had such a beautiful weekend before Halloween so we played outside a lot!  We had some leaves on the ground and N2 wanted to rake leaves.  They raked a big pile and then jumped in and threw the leaves in the area.  They had a great time!  We have a lot more leaves on the ground so they should rake again soon.

They had a great time throwing leaves at each other.  

 I know the first picture below is out of focus but she had such a great time jumping (she would run around the whole house to jump in).