YPG Fall Festival

Friday night, YPG had its Fall Festival. We all had a really nice time, and the kids loved dressing up in their costumes.

The crew, my cowboys and cowgirl

A beautiful sunset on our walk down the street to the festival

Evening in the desert

Cowgirl Madison

Cowboy Alex, who was super tired after taking NO naps (usually has two)

Madison was super excited to see a rock wall. She didn't waste any time.

Cowboy Luke enjoyed watching. He even brought popcorn to keep him entertained.

She did it!

Scaling down the wall

As you can see, she did all of that climbing in her cowgirl boots!

The costume contest...

Cowboy Luke with Fancy Nancy Kate

Cowgirl Madison with some of her kindergarten friends. None of the kids won, but Alex did come in second for his age category. They picked some strange winners. One who didn't win that should have was a set of brothers dressed as snipers. They had on all sorts of rags and such to look like ground cover. Gotta love the Army!

Luke really wanted to do the cake walk contest. We had made a cake and a ton of cupcakes for the festival, and he was determined to win something we made back. We didn't win any of them! Oh well, we didn't need the cake anyways.

Cowboy crew in our modified chuck wagon

I took the boys home, while Edward and Madison walked down the street to the post haunted house. There, they ran into our neighbors. Supergirl and Cowgirl waiting in line...

Joined by Little Red Riding Hood...Madison has a nice group of little girls here to play with all the time.

It's sad that is our last Halloween festival here at YPG. One of the best things about such a small base is knowing everyone. It makes festivals fun. We also love that we can walk everywhere! That will be missed wherever we move next.

Cookies

Happy Halloween Weekend!

It's like I'm Martha Stewart. If you know me, this is the most creative I've been. The kids thought it was awesome I mixed food colorings to make orange. On top of that, my sugar cookies actually look like pumpkins! Have a Happy Halloween!

Trick or Treat Parade

Luke's preschool had its Trick-or-Treat Parade this morning. I have enjoyed this each year, as the kids walk around post and trick-or-treat at the different offices. Alex and I joined Luke at his parade.

My cowboys!

Luke and his friend, Vinny. Luke and Vinny love Batman.

Alex and Luke in our "chuckwagon."

Crazy Hair Day

This week is Spirit Week at Madison's school. Today is Crazy Hair Day, and it's also the day the whole school is visiting the pumpkin patch. I'm not sure that's the best combo. I think the people at the pumpkin patch are going to think those Army kids are a little crazy, haha. Madison was so excited for her first real field trip. I don't know if she was more excited to get a pumpkin or to ride the bus. It's funny to me because I rode the bus from Day 1 of Kindergarten, so it didn't seem like a big deal, but Madison came how all excited, exclaiming, "I get to ride a BUS for the field trip!"

Yes, I would be glad to chaperon the field trip, but Madison's teacher (and I agree) thought it was nice to let the kids have some independence, so I'm letting go and letting her grow up (a little).

Treats from MOPS

Last Friday, our MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) group had its Halloween party. I've been running the MOPS group here for almost two years. MOPS is an international Christian-based outreach group targeting moms as they journey through motherhood. Each group is sponsored by a church, and here, the chapel sponsors us. I used to run it with my friend Heather, but she stepped down to start getting ready for their PCS. I'm now running it with my friend Jessica, and I'll finish my term at Christmas. It's bittersweet to finish up. I've enjoyed running MOPS, but I too, must start getting ready for our next PCS. I guess it would help to know where we are going...ahh, the joys of the Army. Anyways, we had a fun Halloween party, and the food was awesome, as usual. Since we have so many amazing cooks, we have a blog setup just for our recipes. Trying everyone's food is one of my favorite things here. I've gotten some great new recipes I'll treasure forever!

This was my dish. I made a Twinkie Trifle. Thanks goes to my mom for sending me this recipe. It was a BIG hit. Oh, this is the trifle BEFORE I added a tub of Cool Whip to the top.

Madison is always sad to miss my meetings. Now that she is in kindergarten, she doesn't get to come, as we meet on Friday mornings. She always enjoyed coming over after preschool (preschool is next door to the chapel, so all the kids come over) and sampling the food. On Friday, Heather sent this ghost home to Madison. It's two marshmallows with a white chocolate covering. She and Luke both had one and loved them!

Imperial Sand Dunes

We stopped at the Imperial Sand Dunes (just outside of Yuma) on the way to Julian this past Saturday. We took the opportunity to take some Christmas pictures. None of these are the actual Christmas card photos.

Julian, California

Saturday, we took a day trip over to Julian, California, about three hours away. If you have been to visit us (and San Diego), Julian is off of I-8 on the way to San Diego. Once you get to the top of the mountain peak in California, there's an exit for Julian, and it's another 25 mile drive up more mountains into Julian. It's a very cute, quaint town, especially known for its apple and pear orchards, but more importantly for PIE. We've never been to Julian and wanted to go before moving. It was a nice day.

We spent most of the time in the small town, eating lunch and of course, eating pie. Seriously, who wouldn't want to visit a town whose main emphasis is pie? There are pie shops all over town; the hard part is deciding which pie to try! As we walked around, we asked one of the shopkeepers about U-Pick orchards. We had read online that most, if not all, were closed for the year because of a very poor apple crop due to a late frost. The lady told us one orchard two miles out of town had U-Pick, so we went in search of it.

We found it! And, as we pulled up, Alex passed out. He was in desperate need of a nap, so I can't blame him. Alex and I stayed at the car while the rest of the crew picked apples. It was hard work munching on chocoloate covered peanuts I had just purchased while sitting with Alex. I'm bummed I didn't get to pick apples, but I'm glad the kids did. It was their first time doing so. Luke thought eating his way through the orchard was awesome.

Mountains in the background. The fall weather was much appreciated. It was 51 degrees in Julian all day with a fog cover. We were loving it!!!

Still eating apples. Apparently, Luke wanted to try all the varities in the orchard.

They thought this was hilarious.

Just outside the orchard gate...car with myself and Alex is in the background.

We came home with three pies. One was for our neighbors. They had picked up a pie for us a couple of weeks ago. We brought one home for now and one to freeze. The ladies said they kept very well frozen. We got an apple and a mountain berry apple pie.

The apple...Edward had to eat a slice just to show the readers the pie's interior.

We came home with a bag of picked apples, a bag of pears, three pies, a gallon of fresh apple cider, homemade salsa, fresh honey, and some candy treats :)

So glad we found a taste of fall near our bleak desert!!!