Dad's B'Day

So I hit the big 3 - 5, and finally noticing the old man staring back at me in the mirror each morning.  He looks rough, and needs more sleep.  I don't know if owning nose trimmers was an indication of being old, but probably when I felt I needed them next to me in the living room was a dead give away.  My wonderful crew of young'uns took me to Taziki's for my birthday, and Magan made me some delicious cake.  I got the nano block sets I have been wanting for awhile, and I don't even have to put them together...sam and davis take care of that.  OK, mid-life crisis blog soon to follow...May go out and buy an RV, cruise around and check out the ladies in the PT Cruisers...man, I am so old.  But loving these days spent with my "friends" around me.  

Oak Mountain Hike

So for our first Webelo Den hike, I told the parents that the hike around the lake was about 3 miles.  I had run this trail a couple of times, and thought that distance was pretty accurate, but I had forgotten about the distance from the end of the trail back to the parking lot...another mile.  Also told the parents 1 hour...whoops, more like 2 hours.  So I think all the parents had a good time, I know the boys did, but the wall for webelos is about the 3 mile mark.  We worked on our Naturalist requirements and Forrester requirements.  And towards the end of the trail, one of the bikers was passing us and looked very familiar.  It was Mr. Ralph from church.  He gave a fist pump to Sam and Davis, elevating their cool status.  The boys thought it was awesome to see Mr. Ralph in all his mountain biking equipment.  The scouts each took turns leading our den...and I just sang "Follow Me, Boys, Follow Me"... (Good Movie).  Sam got a lot of laughs with his stick man he made with his hat on his walking stick.  

Around the House (September)

Fun times with the Deans and Rawls families from church...

Look at that greaser...Davis all dressed up for 50s day.

Belle needed a nap earlier...and she loved "Bring Your Bear to School" week, where she took her favorite three...Pooh Bear, Princess Bear, and Mercedes Bear.

Fun night of fishing at the lake near our house.  Davis caught three Brim, but none of the rest of us had any luck.  Sam is a fisherman through and through tho, he loves it, and has no problems throwing that redworm on the hook.  Just not very patient, as he changed bait and hook about 3 times while we were there.  Belle just squeeled everytime I got the worm close to her.

Ruby is now in bible class...

Fall Baseball

Fall Ball has begun with a fury of very hot Sunday afternoon games.  Both Sam and Davis are doing really well in practices, and hitting the ball pretty good.  Davis is Number 1 for the Chelsea Camo Red 8U team, and Sam is Number 4 for the Chelsea Camo Blue 10U team.  Both primarily play right field, but have gotten some opportunities in the infield already, and Davis got to play catcher for an inning.  

Sam caught a ball with his eye during practice one night and had a nice black eye for awhile.  He has since caught a long pop up in practice and a line drive, so he is getting the hang of using the glove for those catches.  Both seem to enjoy this year more than others, and like being on the team.  

Belle loves Fall Ball too, because she always finds many friends at the ballpark.  Ruby is OK, as long as she has some ice and food.  

Trip to Huntsville

We have been trying to get to Uncle Marc's house for a long time now, and finally made it up to Huntsville while he was not snowboarding in the mountains or playing on desert islands.  Marc has done an excellent job working on the house he bought...definitely not something I would ever even attempt.  I found a really comfy chair of his...and...zzzz, zzzz, zzzz... OK, I'm back.  After not wanting to take us to some Vietnamese place he likes, he decided to take us to a Mexican restaurant that was really good.  We all told Marcus goodbye and then decided to go to the Rocket Center.  

I love the Rocket Center, and really just any excuse to take the kids to a museum/science center/place where Magan can't make us work.  :)  We only had about 1 hour for this visit, so we decided to skip all that history boring stuff, and jump right to the attractions.  They had a new maze that the kids liked alot, then the Mars Rover was ridden multiple times.  Sam and I ran out to the Space Shot which we rode twice shooting us up way in the air.  I have a video of this that will be great if ever I decide to make an actual video that the kids can watch.  :)  We ended our visit in the Space Shuttle park, which we NEVER have seemed to come over to...not much here, but the kids loved climbing and running around this park area.

On our way out, we ran down the sidewalk all the way to Pluto...which was a scaled down version of the solar system, but still a long ways off from the Sun which is at the welcome center.

And what did we find in Decatur, but 4 big eyes watching out a door looking for their cousins...That was funny, Ben and Luke were just staring out the door as we pulled in.  And our crew was happy to come in and play with them.  Sam and Luke were finally able to bond, even if Luke did want to destroy Sam's castles each time he got them built.  A very long day, but fun to see all the family we don't get to see enough...and the Rocket Center.