Goal!

On Saturday, we were finally able to capture Skyler's victory dance on camera.  It may be hard to tell if Skyler was the one to actually kick the goal, but some slow motion shows that he did, and trust us, if he hadn't kicked it, he wouldn't have been celebrating!

A Little Bit of Self Promotion

Being Savvy is a blog all about parenting preschoolers.  They have local pages too, and the Albuquerque one (that I write) is now up.  It's all about things to do with your kids with a local twist to it.  If you're local, please check it out and tell all your friends too!  If you don't live around here, check it out anyway, but also look to see if there's a city near you with a page (the list in the upper right corner).  A Tucson page just launched and a Phoenix area one should launch within the next month.  Many cities are coming soon, so keep checking back.

Pumpkin Patch

Last Friday, we drove to the other side of the mountain to visit a pumpkin patch.  We got to go on a hayride to the pumpkins and choose a few pumpkins to take home.  There was also a petting zoo, haybales to climb on, a big slide, and plenty of other things we didn't get a chance to do.  Skyler decided at the last minute that he did not want to go down the slide.  The girl in front of him screamed the whole way down and I think that made him nervous.  He is eagerly awaiting next year because he says he'll go on the slide then. 

Waiting for the hayride to start

 

Choosing the perfect pumpkin

The rule was that Skyler had to be able to carry the one he chose.  So the one in the last picture didn't make the cut!  Jonah thinks that pumpkins are cool balls and keeps trying to throw his.

 

There were several of these and Skyler made me take his picture with every one of them!

Jonah climbing on the bales of hay and Skyler climbing out of the little hay bale maze.

Primary Program

Today at church we had our primary program, which meant we got to listen to the kids speak instead of adults.  It was Skyler's first one and his line was "Hi, my name is Skyler.  I am a child of God".  He was very first to go and did a great job.  All of the sunbeams (the kids that are Skyler's age) had the same line, which seems a little odd to hear ten kids say nearly the same thing, but it was powerful.  So wonderful to hear the little kids testify of one of our church's most basic beliefs. 

After it was over, I asked Skyler why he couldn't always be that reverent.  He said it was "so hard because I didn't have a snack".  And then he got to sit on the floor in the primary room because they hadn't brought the little chairs out of the chapel yet.  He's told that to both grandmas today, so he must have thought it was pretty cool. 

Ahoy Mateys, There Be A Train Next To Me

Our camera is on its last leg.  One if it's "I'm almost in need of being replaced" features is that it will only stay charged for a short time.  I'm not quite used to this yet and we we went back to Balloon Fiesta for the nighttime stuff, the camera's battery was nearly gone, despite having charged it two nights before.  When it's practically dead, it will obviously automatically turn off, but then I can usually turn it on again and quickly snap a picture before it turns off by itself again.  I can get away with taking a few pictures that way, but it doesn't leave time for adjusting settings or the zoom.  So that's my excuse for not getting many pictures. 

This was the special shapes glowdeo, where the shaped balloons fill up and just glow after it gets dark.  There were some really awesome shapes!  But I only have photographic proof of two of them - this lovely pirate and train.  Jonah really loved this, he just kept pointing and saying "ba" and wouldn't eat anything for dinner because he was just too excited.

 

That last picture will kinda, sorta, not really give you an idea of what the glowing balloons look like.   

Why You Should All Come to Albuquerque

At least during the first week of October, that is.

We got up early to attend the mass ascension this morning at Balloon Fiesta.  Skyler was very nervous about the noise, but he really did like seeing all the balloons and guessing what the special shape balloons would be as they were inflating.

At first Jonah was much more interested in his banana than the balloons, but then when the banana was gone, he started pointing like crazy at everything.

Just in case any of you are delusional and think I actually take good pictures here's some proof otherwise (not that the other pictures are particularly wonderful, but this one is especially not good).  But isn't this just the coolest balloon?  It came all the way from Switzerland.

He Beat Me To It...

Check out Jordan's blog for some pictures from today.

Team Mario

We asked Skyler what the name of his soccer team was.  He told us "Mario" (his coach's name), so Jordan couldn't resist putting together this little video.

Balloon Chasers

The Hot Air Balloon Fiesta kicks off tomorrow, but we got a fun sneak peek this morning. On the day before it starts, balloons launch from local elementary schools, so there were several up this morning. Living on the edge of town and near lots of empty fields means that if the wind is in our favor we get a fun show. Though sometimes the empty fields have nothing to do with it and they just land in the middle of a neighborhood like this morning.

This wasn't our neighborhood, but the one next to us. We walked over as fast we could and although we didn't see the landing, we did see them take it down.

Woof

Jonah is entering a sweet phase where he calls animals not by their names, but by the sounds they make. I'll point to our neighbor's dog and ask him what it is, and he says, "woof, woof". He'll point to the TV when Skyler is watching Clifford or Martha Speaks and say "woof, woof". He thinks every four-legged creature is a dog, but it starting to figure out how to quack when he sees our neighbor's ducks (yup same neighbor - and the fact that the dog is a pit bull and they also share the yard with more than a dozen rabbits makes it even more strange). When Skyler was into animal sounds, my favorite of his his monkey noise, he'd say "ah-ee". I'm looking forward to hearing Jonah's animal sounds!