Adventures of a different sort

We took a break this weekend from our usual outdoor adventures.  I felt behind in lots of things (laundry), and we both agreed that the kids might like a weekend at home.

Saturday, we didn't really stay at home though...  Nick played soccer and the kids and I headed out to go to Trader Joe's.  It's a bit of trip, as it is about 45 minutes away in Hadley.  But, we gotta get the green juice... and the prepackaged Indian food, frozen garlic, edamame, molasses chews, etc.  Oh, and of course, laundry detergent.

Well, we intended to go, but didn't make it.  I was hungry and had a lack-of-caffeine headache, so I thought we could stop in at Wendy's quickly on the way out of town.   After 90 minutes of spilling water (three glasses, we each spilled one) and Willa's epic struggle to decide if a Frosty is worth eating one chicken nugget (it is), we left.  That gave us a half an hour before we were to pick up Nick.   So we defaulted to the craft store. 

Here are some Halloween crafts we have made or are in the process of making:

Our "egg sac".  This is my baby.  (I took picture this through our porch window.  I kind of like the ghostly quality.)

Paper cup bats

Spooky pictures

The last photo is of a project in progress.  We have 4 more pictures to "frame" in spooky ways.  Willa glued the beans on the frame on the left.  I bought different beans (pinto and lima -ewww) and some "creepy" pasta (cavatappi and rigatoni).   I wanted to hang these pictures on the wall around this:

 This is from Martha Stewart's October issue of Living.  I know.  She's evil. But she still has some good ideas, especially for Halloween.  I already have a grape-vine wreath languishing in my basement, but I can't find large size rubber snakes anywhere!  I can find lot of little snakes, but I think the assortment of sizes is key to the creepiness here.  I guess I'll have to order them online...

After the craft store, we found Nick who wanted to stop at the Game Stop.  Some of you may know that I tried to bribe Nick into finishing his dissertation with a gaming system (it didn't work), so we never bought one.  This fall, three years after achieving his Ph.D., he bought an XBOX 360 and with it several games including Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures.  Lego Jones (as Cal call it) is the new favorite pastime of Willa, Cal and Nick (Cal just watches and gives tips).  Occasionally, I have to look up how to solve a level on the internet, or jump in when Willa gets too scared or excited to play, but generally I just stay out of it.  Willa is awesome at finding solutions to these puzzles. She's not so good at killing spiders.

At the Game Stop we bought the Lego Star Wars game, which they started up last night.  Perhaps now we'll add a new song to our repetoire of movie theme songs we sing in the car other than the Indiana Jones theme "Da da da daa, da da daaaa".

Post Game Stop,  Nick took us the back way (which was very lovely and pastoral) into Connecticut for pumpkins.  I'm kind of a pumpkin snob.  I like a variety of colors, types, sizes, textures.  Usually I spend more than I want or I get less than I want due to cost, but this year, Nick found the best pumpkin place yet.  A farm selling their own pumpkins, squash, gourds and super cheap.  Really big Jack-O'-Lanterns for $2!  Willa and I picked out 13 specimens and I have to say, I think we did a great job.  Well, perhaps we overdid it, but it was fun. 

Please never mind the dying flowers.  A couple of the smaller gourds and one of the smallest pumpkins came from our own garden and one of the sugar pumpkins Cal got during his preschool trip to a farm.  The rest are from our new favorite pumpkin people in CT.

Sunday was spent at home doing the aforementioned catching up.  I won't bore you with the details of my day.  Willa and Cal got to play with Emily, our neighbor and Nick did an errand he had been putting off.  Did you know you could return a used fire grate?  Amazing.  

We had a nice weekend, but we missed you, though. 

An original Willa, subject: bats and pumpkins.