The Play Date Cafe Challenge

My sister has just shared a really neat crafting blog which has challenges each week for anyone who's interested and each week there is a different color scheme. This weeks color picks are black and white with a touch of burgundy. Burgundy made me think of all the beautiful trees outside. I needed to make a card this week anyway and now I had inspiration!

Here's my card:

After looking at some of the entries, I see I'm way out of my league. But it's worth a shot, right?

Pumpkin Patch (Part Two)

You can read Part One here.

After the slides came the animals!

They had all kinds of facts about different animals written on the sides of the barns and the chicken coop. Little Miss Chatterbox particularly enjoyed reading them.

After that, it was time for lunch.

There was an all female band of middle aged woman rockin' out by the picnic tables. But we couldn't stay long because they weren't playing songs that were family friendly. We actually thought it was strange to have this kind of band playing at a place that's obviously geared towards children. But idunno... maybe other families don't mind if they're kids listen about sexy wet lips. And yes, my children pay attention because after they sang those words LMC looked at me with a questioning look on her face. But other than that, they were really good. I was impressed, at least.

Then we went to see the Pumpkin Princess in her pretty orange and green dress. There was a medieval theme that weekend so the kids got to make a wand craft and color shields.

They have a really nice pond where you can go fishing if you bring your own pole. The ducks in the pond came over to us as fast as they could, looking for hand outs. Sorry, ducks! We didn't know to bring bread for you. It was a nice place to take some pictures. Too bad the kids were pretty sick of pictures by that time. Or should I say, the boys were sick of pictures by that time.

And the sun was getting in every one's eyes.

Okay kids, time to move on! We need to catch a hay ride out to the pumpkin patch.

Here we go!

A real pumpkin patch! Cool!

Oops, hair in the face. Let's try again.

After paying to get in and buying lunch, only one pumpkin was in our budget. So, we decided to pick out a family pumpkin rather than individual pumpkins.

Mr. Tickle was so cute. As soon as we got off the hay ride, he went to the first pumpkin he saw and tried to pick it up. But it was too heavy. He continued on in this manner the whole time, going from one pumpkin to the other. But they were all too heavy for him to pick up.

Finally, as we were loading back onto the hay ride he found one small enough to pick out and shouted, "I did it! I found my pumpkin!" I was too busy cheering for him to get a picture of his big smile. He was very proud of himself. I was afraid he'd want to take it but instead he put it back down and said, "Bye, pumpkin! See you next year!"

And then guess what? I forgot to get a picture of the pumpkin we picked out. But it was the one Mike carved a Sacred Heart in to.

And that, my friends, was our adventure at Great Country Farms.

As you can see, the kids had a Great time at Great Country.

Saint-O-Lantern Link Up

Pictures of our pumpkins for the Saint-O-Lantern Link over at Catholic Cuisine.

Monstrance By Me

Sacred Heart by Mike

St. Elizabeth of Hungary and a rose by Little Miss Chatterbox

Flaming Sword of St. Michael By Mr. Funny (inspired by Charlotte's t-shirt)

Feed the Hungry by Mr. Tickle who said, "I don't want to do a saint. I want to do feed the poor." (Mike just taught the kinds the corporal works of mercy).

A longer post to come!

Pumpkin Patch 2010 (Part One)

We wanted to try a new pumpkin patch this year and decided on Great Country Farms because it had been recommended by a family member. We're really glad we went because the scenery was beautiful and the kids had a lot of fun.

They had what they called an "air pillow" which was this huge pillow looking thing full of air. Pretty logical name then, eh?

Anyway, the kids thought it was awesome and had a great time jumping on it. Little Miss Chatterbox had fun pretending to be a kangaroo, Mr. Funny had fun jumping off of it and Mr. Tickle enjoyed himself by being more cautious and taking little jumps.

Then we moved on to the "forest" where they had little playgrounds set up and a really need rope spider web to play in.

And they had a huge chess set.

Then it was off to find the slides. The first one we saw was really neat because it was a bit hidden under vines and growing plants.

The kids would walk up the logs steps and then slide out of the bottom.

Mr. Tickle LOVED this SO much. I stayed with him awhile longer after Mike and the other kids went to use the rope swings because he wasn't ready to move on. The smile on his face every time he slid out was priceless.

Little Miss Sunshine only got to watch but I could tell she wished she was big enough to go because she would kick her legs and wave her arms like wild every time a sibling popped out of the slide.

(photo by Little Miss Chatterbox)

Little Miss Chatterbox really enjoyed the rope swing but Mr.Funny was scared. I thought they were really cool.

Then there was a mountain made of tractor tires, a mechanical T-Rex that eats pumpkins and a double barrel slide. We didn't get to see P-Rex in action but the kids got their picture with him.

(We don't know the man in the picture. I think he wanted to be king of the mountain)

(the 60' double barrel slide)

And this post is taking entirely too long so I will have to come back some time next week to finish it!