LEAVES

We sure love 'em. Thank goodness for Eastside Park, the glorious oasis of giant maples in the center of our desert town. We spent a few hours there yesterday after my run. My camera and I couldn’t resist the combination of cute kids and luscious leaves. Scroll down for proof.

Oh large 'n lovely orangey-yellow tree, you are perfect. Yes, all of those cars belong to the same house...the houses on that street are packed with people! You can sort of see our little old yellow house between the blue one and the green one, behind the red car. It was so nice living with all those trees. Now we have to travel a mile and a half to get to them. But we do have our very own spacious house in a quiet neighborhood. It’s a tradeoff.

   

Those old trucks, old houses and the old-school slide made for some nice, rustic pictures.

  

[Excuse my neon running attire, rosy cheeks, and windblown hair. I wasn’t planning on being in any pictures but then I changed my mind. Kind of similar to how I wasn’t planning to write any captions, anecdotes, or quips along with these pictures, but then…]

And we’ll leaf it at that.

For my Mom

My birthday was yesterday. I’m 26 years old! After frosting one cupcake too many on Jay’s first birthday, I remember ruefully thinking the kid should do something for the Mom on her kid’s birthday, because the Mom is the one who worked so hard to give her kids a birthday. Did that make sense? So for my dear Mom, here are some rich sunrise pictures that I took a few days ago off our back porch.

I had a pleasant, quiet Sunday birthday. Steph brought me yummy treats. Grama Leslie made us dinner. Jeff gave me some awesome binoculars (I left the amazon page up on the computer one night, hee). Binoculars make admiring and enjoying nature even easier. I looked at the moon last night with them—WOW! Bring on the vistas, birds, and stars!

10 minutes later…

Thank you, Mom, and hello 26!

Tick or Treat!

No, that’s not a typo. On Halloween evening, Jeff manned the fort at home while Grama Leslie and I took Jay and Rose trick or treating in our neighborhood. We went to a dozen houses or less. Jay had a blast chorusing “TICK OR TREAT!” Sometimes it came out as trick, but I liked it better as tick. Way creepier! Rose quietly held her bucket on her arm like a purse and said “day doo” (thank you) at about every other house, with her trademark grin.

Meanwhile, back at our home, Jeff did some serious age-profiling on trick or treaters. If they looked older than 12, he asked them how old they were, only gave one tiny candy to middle schoolers, and refused candy outright to the high schoolers and audacious adults. Miraculously, we did not get TP-ed or egged later. They probably saw the junky ghost milk jugs on our porch and thought the place was trashed enough.

I managed to put the costumes over their fleece jackets so they stayed toasty warm.

Getting all ready.

Luke and Leia: back in action

 

Examining the loot. I examined it too and extracted the 3 Almond Joys and a Reese’s. Tasty. We let Jay and Rose eat 2 pieces of candy each. Then we let them stay up a little later than usual to work off the sugar rush.

We had a GIANT bowl of candy to hand out, and it was all gone by 7:20pm. So we hung up an OUT OF CANDY, BOO HOO sign and went to the basement to watch It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown! like we do every Halloween.

Ok, I didn’t dress up this year but this could count as my costume—all I need is red lipstick and high heels. Can you guess who I am? LUCY! One of my favorite episodes is the one where Lucy and Ethel make bread (I think it’s called Pioneer Women). It is absolutely hilarious! Highly recommended if you need a good hearty laugh.

And we all know what Jeff was this year—the 9 fingered man! Actually he wore a paper moustache and goatee to school on Halloween for fun. I’m so glad he didn’t try to grow any facial hair this year.

And because I still get a kick out of these goofy self-taken group pictures, (and because we took these on Halloween)…

We’re ready for some November!