Fall Break

Monday was M's class fieldtrip to the Pumpkin Patch, which her dad and I were both happy to get to join her for. We took a hayride out to the field, where she picked her own pumpkin. Usually you pick them off the vine, but they didn't actually plant any pumpkins this year for some reason. They bought some and put them out in the field, though. Weird. But still fun. Our M had a fun time hanging out with her buddy, Busy. They also had a few hay bale mazes, and the kids spent a little time on their playground before heading back to school.

Today is the first day of Fall break, and we're starting it off with another first. Our Little Coyote got her first stitches yesterday. Apparently she was getting a bit animated in explaining something at school and fell out of her chair... onto her face. I'm not sure what she hit, but she cut her face about an inch from her eye. Everyone was very calm when I got there, including M, and it sounds like the teachers and students handled it all very well, despite a fair amount of blood. Robbie (her insistent suitor) was given the job of keeping the other kids away (crowd control), and by all accounts he did a great job and took it very seriously.

On the way to the doctor I asked M what the worst part was, the hurting or the scary blood. She said the scary part. Then we saw the doctor and she said the cut was too close to the eye to use glue, and that they'd give her a shot to numb it and then stitch it. It took twice on the shot to get it numbed, and I had to hold her down while she screamed, "NO MORE SHOTS NO MORE SHOTS PLEASE NO MORE SHOTS!" After that the stitches were easy, but I have to wonder if it wouldn't have been quicker and less traumatic to just give her the three little stitches and be done.

So now our brave little coyote is sporting three stitches and a shiner. Poor little girl. She was very brave, though. So were her mom and dad, who managed to not cry where she could see. She'll get the stitches out Monday after school, so her classmates will get to see them. I'm sure they'll all be very impressed.

Meanwhile, I have the next three days with M all to myself, and I'm pretty excited. I do wish it wasn't rainy today so we could go to the zoo, but it looks like we might get a chance tomorrow or the next day.

Autumn Rocks!

Autumn rocks! [Brandi, you put it beautifully when you wrote your tribute to Fall] I've always loved this time of year, with it's brisk mornings and turning leaves. Now that I live in a part of the country with ridiculously hot summers, I have an extra appreciation for Fall, in that it's actually cool enough to do stuff outside. It's more like what summers used to be when I was kid, living further north. Last weekend Madison and I truck-camped at Copan Lake (poor hubby had to go back and take care of the dogs because we were dog sitting for friends). A lovely thunderstorm rolled in around 4am, which I thoroughly enjoyed, but M slept through. I hope we manage to fit in another camping night or two before it gets too cold, but with the whole family!

Some of this weekend's by-and-large spontaneous highlights included an outdoor art festival, a cookout at the park, kite flying, and bike riding. We forgot to bring cooking utensils for the cookout, so we improvised with a stick.

A highly successful weekend, despite a communication error which resulted in The Hubster not getting to watch the big game at his buddy's house. Oops. Totally unintentional, I assure you. Really!

Not Bhaven

Our sweet little coyote is starting to write. Yes, write! Not just her name, but other words, and even sentences. I love it! She hasn't shown a lot of enthusiasm for reading on her own, though she can do it if she tries, but she does like writing. This morning she got into some trouble for being willfully disobedient to her father multiple times. She knew her dad was a bit upset with her, and I asked her to think of something she could do to make him feel better. She decided to draw him a picture, and I suggested she could also write that she was sorry. This is what she came up with. She said she messed up and started over, so the first line is there twice. I could hear her at the table sounding the words out and coming up with some great logical spelling.

She loves to add cute little swirls at the ends of her letters, especially the letter S. Beautiful! Aside from the rainbow, the picture is just what she calls "decoration", which means she wasn't drawing any specific objects, just making it pretty.

Flitter Glitter, the Fabulous Flamingo

Today my most imaginative Coyote was pretending to be "Flitter Glitter, the Fabulous Flamingo". This happens to be an entirely original character from her own wonderfully creative mind. The main gist of Flitter's story is that she went hiking with her mom and dad, and they got ahead of her and she became lost. Then I find her (I'm some human, not her mom), and adopt her. In some of our renditions she stays with me forever, and in others I help her find her parents. I just love this game. She insisted that I feed her shrimp , since that's what makes flamingos pink, so I made her a peanut butter and shrimp jelly sandwhich for lunch. We've played similar versions with M as a goat, a unicorn, and various other little animals. Too fun!