Parks, Pecks, and Carousels

Fall is here!  It's here!  It's my favorite time of year :).  I don't appreciate the fact that it means I'll be another year older :/...  But otherwise, it's my favorite :). 

Temperatures have dropped well into the 50s the last two nights.  In Alabama, this is a huge thing.  My Washington peeps have been doing this for a while now.  And they haven't seen 80-degree weather (much less anything hotter) for a month now.  So for me, this is big stuff :).

Anyway, since Fall is here, and I've seen it in the changing leaves out back, I decided it might be fun to make a Fall craft with Lynnaea.  So we went out yesterday and collected different colored leaves.  And then we made a Fall Leaf Wreath.

I think it turned out pretty cute -- now we just need to put a hangar on it and hang it up somewhere :).  She loved collecting the leaves -- and may or may not have picked a couple of green ones to throw in there ;).  We also did some bench swinging out back while enjoying the cooler weather.

Then today, we went to Landmark Park.  We hadn't been in a while, and we bought the annual membership.  So worth it.  It's already paid for itself.  So every time we go, it just makes it that much more worthwhile.  We were watching a friend's son while she had some appointments, so we thought it would be a good thing to do for fun today.  The kids loved it.  We looked at the mules, pigs, chickens, and sheep.  Corbin got hen-pecked...  I told him to get used to it ;).  Nah, not really.  He did, in fact, get pecked by the chicken.  I had told him to take his hands out of the little wire holes, because the chicken would think it was food.  He didn't listen.  Even after I moved his hand away when I saw the chicken going for it.  He put his little fingers right back up there.  And the hen pecked.  I did not, however, tell him to get used to it...  I held him and comforted him.  He wasn't impressed.  He recovered, though...  Started running in to see the sheep right afterward.

We cracked open some pecans (last season's, I'm pretty sure -- they were all moldy and shriveled.  We didn't eat them, of course.  Just cracked them open to see what we would find).  We walked through the old farmhouse and saw a squirrel hanging out in an upper corner of one of the rooms. We walked the boardwalk.  Fed the fish and turtles.  Looked at the alive snakes (behind glass, of course). 

Then we headed home and the little boy we were watching got picked up.  My kiddos ate lunch and took naps.  Then, because my trial contacts were in, we headed to the mall to pick them up (we are hoping the issue is that my eyes have developed a sensitivity to silicone and that it just means I need to buy a different brand of contacts...  Well, I say "hope" in the sense that, since something is wrong, I'd rather find out what and find out that there's a solution and I can still wear contacts.  Honestly, I'd prefer the news to be that my eyes just got over their problem and I am no longer dealing with problems and can wear my old contacts all the time again.  Particularly because I still have a whole year's supply of my old contacts.).  But anyway...  so we went to the mall.  And we rode the carousel.  Lynnaea loves the carousel.  Loves it.  And the cheetah.  Which she hugged good-bye after the ride was done.

Corbin strongly dislikes the carousel.  Even with me standing right by him with my arm wrapped around him.  He clings to me for dear life.  And fusses.  The whole time.  I think the saying is "a picture is worth a thousand words..."  Bless his little heart.  Right after this we sat at a table near the carousel to eat a pretzel.  He watched it go around and around and pointed at it and said, "Uh!"  He seems to like it from afar....

So that's what we did the last couple days.  And I started re-watching The Office on Netflix.  Oh. My. Gosh.  I laugh.  And laugh.  And laugh.