Pictures tell 1,000 Words

There is so much to tell. I finally found a way to download my pictures easily. It was SO simple. Geez. Technology. I'm looking forward to Zachary getting old enough to manage my website and program all our various TiVos and all.

So, to catch up, the short version. Zachary's doing GREAT in school. His fall festival was a couple of weeks ago.

They had a Fire Truck and tons of bouncy houses. But the best part was the Coconut Climbing tree.

Kurt met us there and was explaining to Zachary the proper climbing technique. Zachary had tried this once before with not so good results. I was nervous.

He started climbing. It was really high up. There was a bell at the top to ring. He really wanted to ring that bell. He got almost to the top and reached for the bell, it was about 6 inches out of his reach.

His left foot was on a solid hand hold, but his right foot had nothing substantial under it. He struggled and struggled. I had a small panic attack. A small crowd had gathered to watch Zachary. Kurt was giving him instructions and lots of shouts of encouragement. I said a prayer. Then somewhere inside him he found the strength to dig in and reach for that bell. I had tears in my eyes. It was like Rocky, theme music and all and everyone cheered and screamed for joy. I took photos, but was so excited I cut Zachary's head off in the pictures so you cannot tell anything. It was, however, one of my proudest moments as a mother.

Later, Kurt showed Zachary the heel hook technique on the monkey bars.

It was a great time. Our first school fall festival. I'm sure there will be many more to come.

Halloween is becoming huge around our house. Saturday night Ryan and I went to a Halloween party, so Zachary decided to put on his costume too. Ryan was King Kong and I was Faye Rae. Evan wasn't too sure about all this.

I kind of liked being a blonde. We had fun at the party. People were out of control. The night ended with some freak in mask wielding a machete. I was glad to get away from that dude.

Yesterday afternoon Zachary's friend Ian came over with his mom and invited Zachary over to play. They all happily rode their bikes down the street. I love this neighborhood. Ryan took Evan for a golf cart ride and I prepared for my class. In a few minutes Ryan came back and told me I just had to come see this.

Here are a few neighborhood kids holding a 3 foot baby ALLIGATOR!!! The daddy of the two kids in the middle has a friend who works for the fish and game services (or whatever it's called) and he caught it, taped it's mouth shut, and brought the kids a toy. I retrieved Zachary and Ian, plus his brother Kyle. All the neighborhood kids were there. You just couldn't miss this.

This was beyond bizarre. I could not believe this gator was crawling all over the kids. What a day. I love this neighborhood.

Today we are prepping for Halloween. It's going to be huge around here. We're having a haunted trail around the house. We have a whole host of characters dressing up to scare kids Saturday night. Ryan's brother will blend into the trees like he did last year as the Moss Monster, coming alive to scare kids. We have Uncle Mike, Aunt Linda, cousin Wendy, cousin Michael and his girlfriend Elise coming. All are playing characters on our haunted trail. I've been working hard getting the house spooky. It's going to be such fun. I promise to take pictures and to update again soon.