Two weeks ago, our friends the Gublers caught Ryan at church and suggested that we go with them the following Saturday to a place called Oak Glen, which is a collection of pick-your-own apple farms about an hour and a half away from here. We didn't realize that the apples were long gone from the trees, but it turned out to be an awesome day anyway. This place is out near San Bernardino, but up in the mountains, so it actually seemed like AUTUMN! A real season! I was in heaven. The kids played with sticks, learned about making cornmeal (until a grouchy lady chased us away -- I guess it was a paid tour thing,) and went on the ubiquitous inflated slide and bounce-house (no pictures of those, since we have enough from previous outings.) 
We also did some archery. Connor and Elise were nowhere near strong enough or safe enough to do it on their own, so they "helped" me pull the string back and aim. We did not impress, but it was cool.
The best activity we did that day was this thing where they let you press your own apple cider. The kids got to pick out the apples, wash them in painfully frigid water, and throw them into a giant daddy-powered grinder. Then they helped turn the handle on the press to actually make the cider. 
It was a pretty messy process, but the cider turned out like some kind of delicious apple-based drug. I think the whole gallon was gone by the next day, and that was us trying to ration it out.
After the cider-making, we went to a different farm to eat cider doughnuts and pet the animals. There was a miniature horse, a llama, and a pygmy goat. They were friendly animals, but every time I tried to take a picture of the miniature horse, she acted as if she was trying to eat my kids. I guess she thought it was funny.
Later that week, we got our new IKEA kitchen pantry put together (almost entirely done by Ryan - so big thanks to him!) The kids had fun helping and stepping on everything. 
It turned out great, though, so now our kitchen looks vastly more tidy than when we just had dirty open shelves. We're totally moving up in the world, eh?
So, for some reason, Halloween seemed to be a massive event this year. It started with a costume birthday party the Saturday before, followed by our ward Halloween party Tuesday night. I think it wouldn't have stressed me out as much if I'd just been smart and purchased both kids' costumes, but I couldn't find a skeleton costume I liked -- they were either too creepy or too poorly made. So, several hours before the ward party I was still glue-gunning felt to a sweatsuit. It took forever, but I think it turned out great!
The ward members all hosted different classrooms in the building for a trick-or-treat, and the kids had their first candy binge of the week!
Thursday night we carved the pumpkins we had picked out for Family Home Evening. We wussed out again, by the way, and had gone to the grocery store rather than a pumpkin patch. Hopefully next year we'll be more inventive, but at least we had fun carving them. Connor actually designed and drew the face on his, then Ryan cut it out for him. For Elise's, we asked her to choose between happy, scared, angry, and surprised faces, and she appropriately chose scared. 
We learned from Halloweens past down here, and waited to carve the pumpkins until a day or two before the event. It took exactly three days for mold to appear in the 85 degree weather, and one week before they were liquifying all over the porch.
Friday morning we had our Joy School party, which was fairly elaborate this year. We had pumpkin-shaped cake, mummy pizzas, eyeball doughnut holes, and witches brew, among other things. Oh, and of course, they trick-or-treated inside the house and ate candy. 
Saturday night we trick-or-treated around our neighborhood, which was surprisingly deserted. As a result, everyone we visited was just shoveling candy into their bags to try to get rid of it. Connor and Elise thought this was awesome, of course. 
That night was the major sugar-gorging. Elise ate a full-size Three Musketeer bar, at least 4-5 smaller candies, then an entire doughnut (Sister Callister hands these out every year), and still climbed out of the car at the end of the night saying "I'm uungweee!" I think they ran around in circles in the living room until 11pm, and I was truly surprised not to find any vomit the next morning. Good old Halloween, the celebration of lousy parenting!
On an unrelated note, here is one of the cool roses growing in our front yard. Plus, the kids decided to share a story in the dog cage. How else to pass the time while Mom and Dad are out partying? 
A few days after we moved, we had a great visit from some of our friends from NoCal: Justin and Tiffany, and their 4 kids! They have a timeshare in Arizona, and since we're at about the halfway point, we've been able to host them a few times. They were very gracious about sleeping surrounded by cardboard boxes -- we obviously scheduled all this before we knew we were moving! I'm also very impressed by their commitment to vacationing - they have 3 month old twins, a 2 year old, and a 13 year old, and they managed to pull together a two-week-long trip anyway. They actually scheduled an extra day to spend down here, so Ryan took a day off, and we all went down to the Aquarium of the Pacific. I'm not sure why I have no pictures of the fish. I'm equally confused that I took no pictures of the Palmers. Hmmm. Anyway, we do have a bunch of pictures of the lorikeet exhibit, where you buy a little cup of nectar to feed the birds, then wander around desperately trying to convince one that they should indulge you by drinking it. Despite the birds playing hard-to-get, Connor loved it. He did finally get several to drink the nectar, then begged me for my cup so he could do it all again. 
The lady in this picture is about to get after us (again) for letting the kids climb on the fence. 
After the aquarium, we went on a 45 minute harbor tour, which was a lot of fun (though windy). 
Elise was heartbroken that we had to say goodbye to these sea lions. They were advertised as being "in their natural environment". I guess they evolved on buoys and abandoned barges. Luckily, we saw some more on the way back.
It was silly, but being on a boat for even 45 minutes was really fun and exciting for everybody. We need to find a kid-friendly cruise or something. Maybe someday we'll be brave like the Palmers, and actually go on a family vacation!
Here are some pictures from two activities we did just before we moved. Ryan heard about a "lobster festival" down at Long Beach, and since he loves nothing more than dismembering crustaceans, we went to take a look. It was more like a fleamarket/farmers market with cheap lobster plates for sale on one end, but it was fun. We watched a dog costume contest (pretty weird), and the kids went down yet another giant inflatable slide. Actually, I think this was Elise's first time doing that. The slide worker lady quickly saw that Elise had no idea what to do, so she helped her to the top. After that, you can see that her brother lent a helping hand, it was cute.
The next weekend or so, Ryan took Connor downtown to watch the Red Bull Soapbox Races. Elise and I were invited, but I was stressed trying to pack stuff up, and the fact that it was about a million degrees outside didn't make me want to go stand around downtown with two crabby kids and smell other people's sweat. I stayed home and packed. I guess the boys had a lot of fun, though. The races went right past Ryan's building, so they were able to go inside and enjoy the view and air conditioning for awhile. 
Well, it finally happened. We're in our new place, and love it! So, if anyone needs our new address, just send me an email and I'll oblige you. Our phone numbers should stay the same, but the landline still isn't up, so be patient with us on that one.Basically, our friend from the ward mentioned to us a couple months ago that the lady across the street was planning on renting out her place. It had all the things we needed (3-ish bedrooms, fenced yard, A/C, and pet friendly), and was rumored to be extremely inexpensive, so I made a mental note to look into it. Then I forgot. A couple weeks later I was giving a ride to our friend after a fire-inspired beach trip when I remembered, and he took me past the place and gave me the landlord's phone number. Three days later, we were all signed up to move in on October 1st! Big thanks to the Elder's Quorum for the awesome and speedy 3-hour move!I'll try to get some pictures up once it's picture-worthy, but we're still living in Boxopolis. It's only a few minutes away from the old place, and we're still in the same ward, so that's nice.
We also did some archery. Connor and Elise were nowhere near strong enough or safe enough to do it on their own, so they "helped" me pull the string back and aim. We did not impress, but it was cool.
The best activity we did that day was this thing where they let you press your own apple cider. The kids got to pick out the apples, wash them in painfully frigid water, and throw them into a giant daddy-powered grinder. Then they helped turn the handle on the press to actually make the cider. 
It was a pretty messy process, but the cider turned out like some kind of delicious apple-based drug. I think the whole gallon was gone by the next day, and that was us trying to ration it out.
Later that week, we got our new IKEA kitchen pantry put together (almost entirely done by Ryan - so big thanks to him!) The kids had fun helping and stepping on everything. 
It turned out great, though, so now our kitchen looks vastly more tidy than when we just had dirty open shelves. We're totally moving up in the world, eh?
