Combine Central & Complaint Control

Over fall break, the kids had the opportunity to ride on a relative's combine during harvest time.  They got to bring home (LOTS OF) soybean pods and shared them with their classmates. 

Yesterday, the farmers harvested the corn next to our house.  We took lots of pictures for Scott since he was at school.  The bare fields now surrounding us has really changed the appearance.  We miss the corn.  You know what they say...good cornstalks make good neighbors...or something like that.  :):)

Scott completed his pumpkin project and is mighty proud of his bunny pumpkin.  I mentioned putting it out for trash day since it will rot, but Scott wasn't quite there yet...guess we'll hang onto it until it starts to smell.  :( 

The first and second graders celebrated the 50th day of school recently.  Natalie dressed in 50's clothes and went to a theater, and Scott tried his hand at bowling.  He was delighted to come home and tell me that they had velcro bowling shoes!!  (Prior to his trip, we had talked about him inventing them someday, but someone must have beat him to it!)

More school fun!

I told the kids we were going to drive the van around the block the other day.  During our mini-excursion, Kate was frustrated and kept saying, "Where's the block?!  I can't see the block!"  The older kids got a kick out of this!

This past week we started a complaining contest in our house.  If you grumble, you get a strike.  The person with the most "strikes" at the end of the week loses.  We have prizes and penalties, as well.  After the end of Day 1 in our game, Natalie said, "This not complaining thing is the hardest thing I've had to do in my entire life."  On Day 2 (and every day since), Natalie has tried to convince me why she needs to drop out of the contest and expressed why she doesn't want to participate in this game anymore.  STRIKE!  

 We (a.k.a. Jon) carved and lit the pumpkin.  Now Kate's ready to move on...