On the go

The boys had their first field trip on Friday to a family farm, mostly lots of very cool horses. I found the discrepancy in their pumpkin sizes rather funny. Joey went a little on the conservative side, it's a cute little pumpkin. Lucas' while the picture doesn't show it, it's a little bigger than Joey's, a nice size. Then there is Tyler who's eyes were WAY bigger than than his muscles but he had to have it! :P

Holly had her last game of the season. She played great and they won...THEY WON!!! Eric captured some great moments and a classic Holly look!

Mia also had her last game, it was the CHAMPIONSHIP game and we WON! It was a fun game and a great season, until....
...it was time to hand out the trophies. There were 5 girls left and the guy handing them out looked in his box and it was empty!! (thank you Wendi, for the priceless photos, she caught them at the moment he looked up and said they were all gone!) But all was not lost, he found them in the wrong box later in the day so they were happy again! But it was a little dicey for a while there. :)

We topped off the weekend by carving pumpkins Saturday night. Good fun!

Fish & Games

We had a great weekend over here. Grandma and Grandpa VH had the "little cousins" over Saturday night for a sleepover (L, T, J, Emma and Lily!) so Eric and I had a night with just the girls. Instead of going to a movie (since there was NOTHING good out for the 4 of us to see) we bought a new game, Pictureka. It is A LOT of fun! It's kind of like the "Where's Waldo" books in a game version. If you need a Christmas gift idea for kids 6 and up this would be perfect. (and it was on sale last week at Target, it still may be, too)Sunday morning Eric, Mia, Holly and Uncle Dave got up at the crack of dawn with frost still on the ground to go fishing. They had a great time and great success as well! I had a couple hours to myself so I made myself get up when they fisherpeople left and enjoyed my coffee in the quiet. Then I went out with my camera (I'm turning into my Father!) because it was a very cool morning, as the sun was rising it was very, very foggy.
Then I headed to G & G to gather up the boys and head to church. It was a good day!

What's the big deal?

Seriously, what's the big deal! Check out this video by clicking HERE. A friend of mine forwarded this to me, thanks Jill! :) And then Eric and I were watching the news last night and it was on AGAIN! Either it was a slow news day yesterday or we slipped through the cracks 5 years ago!! I'm not bitter, trust me, we get ENOUGH attention. :)

Pumpkin Patch!

The kids had a couple days off of school last week so we made use of one of the beautiful days and headed to the pumpkin patch.

I know, way to many pictures but I couldn't resist!

A mystery...solved

One of my kids (I can't remember who) alerted me to the fact that there was a bite out of the block of Tillamook. I dismissed it at the time because it wasn't a big deal. Later, I opened the fridge and saw the bite and then laughed when I saw the bag it was in. So, someone must have taken the time to take the bite them put the cheese back in a new bag, but funny that it says "To Tyler" on it. I may have to investigate a little further and ask Tyler if he realizes someone left him a little gift. :)
And it was Spot Day at pre-school today....my very last Spot Day. One of their teachers LOVES spots so each year they have a whole day designated to spots. Click HERE if you want to see Holly on spot day a few years ago. I suggested to these guys that we paint their faces, too, and they looked at me like I was nuts! At least we got the shirts on them, right!

edited: found my mouse but he wants to remain anonymous! :)

Wahoo, we have a W and other fun stuff!

We've had a busy weekend over here but I think, quite possibly, the most exciting news of all is Holly's little soccer team finally got a win! We finally scored our first goal and held on to win 1-0!!! Mia's team is doing great, we had another good game on Saturday and remain undefeated!
I handed my camera off to a couple professionals and they captured a ton of great shots for me. Thanks Betsy and Shona! Friday Holly had a field trip to the library and the fire station. The most exciting part of the whole trip, I think, is when the fire fighters got an aid call and had to leave with the sirens on!

Friday night we went to the football game. Alec has his "touchdown" moves perfected however, he didn't need to use them. The Lyncs are doing about as good as the Seahawks and the Huskies, or maybe a little better. Not a good year for football in the state of Washington! :PThe other great part of our weekend was we had a couple visitors! Ben and Betsy were up from Southern CA with the Ontario Chr. cross county team. Ben's a coach and Besty came to chaperon. The really fun part is Betsy was in our youth group almost 15 years ago when Eric an I lived in CA and through the magic of Facebook we were reconnected earlier this year. She let us know they were coming and we were so glad that were able to stay with us a couple days. Our kids had so much fun with them and wouldn't leave them alone! They were VERY tolerant of our crazy, wild kids!

Perfect fall day

After church this morning we decided to pack a lunch and take off for the mountains. We made it up to Chain Lakes, had our lunch and then took off on an awesome hike! Picture Lake and Mount Shuksan
No trip up to Baker is complete without a stop in Glacier for ice cream!

Hi girls!

We've been doing a lot of this on Saturdays. Both Holly and Mia are playing. Since the family photographer is a little tied up coaching and their dad is busy parenting the rest of our kids on the sideline there hasn't been many photos yet. So, either Grandpa has to fly out for a visit :) or we'll need to get the camera in someone elses hands one of these weekends. (Wendi? Shannon? Shona? Anyone!?!) And some of these crazy girls asked if these pictures were going to go on the blog...yup!

:)

I feel better now that I've completed Lauri's trip down memory lane. I'm sure Michelle appreciates it too! :)

Kinda like this...

Lauri? Is this the haircut you were talking about?
I found these in a box in the basement yesterday and they were to good to pass up!

Lucas

So after that terribly disappointing loss by the Seahawks yesterday we had to get Eric out of the house for some fresh air. We decided to go for a walk and feed the ducks. As we were getting ready to leave Lucas tells me he has a toy and a magazine along in his backpack "just in case, Mom." I tried to ask "just in case of what?" but he didn't really give me an answer and I still didn't know what was in the backpack. We hadn't gotten very far down the path and Lucas is trailing far behind and already looking through the catalog. He really didn't think it was a big deal. Then I hear what toy he brought since his backpack keeps saying "to infinity and beyond". Yup, Buzz Lighyear came along and he talked the whole way! Lucas, with his nose in the catalog, and Buzz pulled up the rear the whole time!

Maybe now I know why when he was saying the Lords Prayer the other night he prayed "lead us not into transportation" :)

A little side note here...The "magazine" that he had packed along was the #1 catalog at our house right now is Costume Express and the #1 page is Star Wars costumes. (I know mom..we're on our own this year!) :)

Delicious AND Nutritious

Last year, one of our favorite fall treats were making pretzel hugs. This year in an effort to be a little more health conscience I decided to switch up the recipe just a little bit.
Instead of pretzels, Hershey Hugs and Milk Chocolate M&M's this year we are using pretzels, Candy Corn Hershey Kisses (if you haven't tried them you MUST!!) and Dark Chocolate M&M's (this is the nutritious part, isn't dark chocolate supposed to be good for your heart!) :) Here's the complete recipe if you interested.

1 bag pretzels (waffle pretzels work the best)
1 pkg. M&Ms
1 pkg. Hershey Hugs or Kisses (if using Kisses they look better with a lighter colored chocolate)

Place pretzels on baking stone or sheet. Place a Hug on each pretzel and bake at 200 degrees for about 6-8 minutes. Remove from oven and promptly place a couple of M&Ms on each pretzel, pressing into the melted chocolate. Allow to cool before serving, either at room temperature (this takes SEVERAL hours) or in the refrigerator if you want to speed up the process.

Oh yeah, the Hawks are on today! If any of you are checking this blog :) please make every effort to win so the rest of our week is a little more enjoyable!

Hmmmm....

So, what do you think today was at school?

And Joey's really good question for the day.
"Does God live in a castle because He's a King?"

Exploring

These two pictures crack me up. The top one is Lucas, drowning out the mole that took over our front yard. (Do you think he saw someone else doing this?!?) And the next one is Joey at Grandma and Grandpas house looking for grasshoppers. He kept telling us to be very quiet and we could hear them hop. Needless to say the adults (mostly Michelle and I) kept getting shushed for not being quiet! :)

We hung out and G & G's on Sunday. The kids got to pick apples, a favorite yearly tradition. Now my dehydrator is going non-stop! We attempted a gigantic pile'o kids but throwing the boys on next with a Lily on top looked like it could spell disaster so decided to go with 2.