And Ashley Too

Almost two weeks ago, Ashley had her turn to go to the archery range with her dad. Actually, it was quite the whirl wind of a day. We started out the morning at the Native American festival at the local 4-H club where the kids made crafts, shot bows, and went canoeing. I forgot my camera, but when April takes pity on me and sends pictures, I am sure I will post them. Afterward, we went to a birthday party and then Ashley went to the range with her dad, one of her very best friends (Leonora) and Leonora's dad and sister. For having little experience so far, Ashley is a decent shot I have to say. This past weekend, this same group headed up to Lancaster to an archery store. Ashley shot on Trent's old re curve at the range there and nearly got a bull's eye. She was pretty excited.

This was just two days after her birthday. Our Ashley is now 9. When did that happen? She seems the same to me until I pull older pictures out. What a tall, leggy, imaginative fun girl she is. We, of course, love her immensely. We are not sure we love the alarm clock she received for her birthday though she absolutely does. She insists on setting it every school day, and it sounds like R2-D2 on a major caffeine kick. It rolls away after the first snooze, and I think it is hilarious that she will deliberately wait for it to go off again and roll off of her nightstand. The bottom picture shows the boots she just had to have. I guess she really is getting older. Sigh.

A Little Archer

I need to post about Halloween, but that will take more time than I have right now.

After some chatting with friends last weekend, Trent got out his compound bow and went and got some arrows etc. for it this past Saturday. It was nice to see him so excited about getting it out. At the same time, he tried to restring his old re curve, but they couldn't restring it anymore. Sooooooo, Trent bought a children's basic re curve for the kids to use.

After coming home, Trent headed out with Jon for the archery range not far from here. It is free (so cool) and very close. Ashley really wanted to go with her dad, but she was still recovering from the 3rd grade plague. Next time. Jon is still a little young for the whole thing, so he needed a lot of help. He is starting to get it though, and, according to Trent, he got at least one arrow off. He had a great time and wants to go again.

I guess we could argue we should have spent last Saturday raking leaves etc. as the weather was so spectacular. I am glad the boys got out to the archery range though. The picture above is the Japanese maple tree in our front yard. It is a late turner. While most trees are dropping their leaves copiously right now, it has just now fully turned and started dropping. I love the colors. When we are done with our time on the East Coast, I will always remember how much I love the fall here. It is a longer season than I remember fall being growing up, and it is just beautiful.

The Great Pumpkin?

Friday the 23rd, we had Sammy's preschool field trip to the pumpkin patch. The trip was originally scheduled for the 16th, which is a teacher work day for Anne Arundel County. As a result, older siblings could come along. That day turned out to be very cold and very wet. In our case, we wouldn't have been able to attend anyhow, because Sammy was sick at the time. So, though it was a bummer for Ashley and Jon, the trip was rescheduled for the following Friday, and off we went to the Pumpkin Patch.

It was a great little place to visit. They aren't open to the public until the afternoon and evening on weekdays, so it was just the 4year old class and the 3 year old class and their parents etc. It wasn't huge, but it was plenty big, and the kids had such a great time picking out pumpkins and going through the corn maze and just playing around. The prices were good actually, and I picked up some decorations for the porch.

Later that day, we brought Ashley and Jon back to pick out their pumpkins and to run through the corn maze a few times before the farm closed. What a fun place. It is only about 5 miles from where we live, and it was a great time for the kids. I think I know where we are getting pumpkins next October.

We arrived a bit early since the farm is only about 5 miles from our house, so Sammy decided to have an early story time on top of the stack of straw bales

Time for a few songs before picking pumpkins

Time to choose a pumpkin. This looks like a sincere pumpkin patch to me. What do you think?

She found the pumpkin she wanted

Sammy and her friend Claire inside one of the corn stalk teepees

Time to go inside the corn maze

Inside the maze. Sammy and her friend Claire must have gone through this maze at least 4 different ways in about 15 minutes. Ironically, when we brought Ashley and Jon back after 4-H that afternoon, we had a harder time navigating though.

May the Force Be With You

Our kids have been on a Star Wars kick recently. They've been re watching all the old movies and playing lego Star Wars on the wii as their game of preference. I am proud that their favorites are episodes 4, 5 and 6.

Last Friday, there was no school. It was a district work day of some kind. Samantha was home from pre-school anyhow as she was still ill. On this particular day, she seemed to be improving, but still being ill coupled with a cold rainy day in the middle of a nor'easter meant staying home and inside. There were, however, no Cat in the Hat scenarios on this cold cold wet day. Imaginations prevailed, and the kids turned our small family room (also called the kids room) into a Star Wars extravaganza. They set up a tent at one point and watched one of the movies inside. I don't have a picture of that, but I enjoy their imaginations and how well they entertain themselves and each other.

The young Jedi, Master Jon Warner

Princess Leia and one of her cute cuddly Ewok friends.

The evil slug looking villain, Jabba the Hut.

Here is Master Yoda. His body is drawn on the box, though that is hard to see.

If you look out into the blackness of space that is this chalk board, you will see the Death Star floating ominously. You will also notice that Ashley can't spell Death. She can spell binoculars and suburban and temperature and camouflage but not death. Go figure.

School Girl

Samantha has attended pre-school 3 days a week for the past two months now, and she loves it. She loves it so much that she is even hoping to get her next round of shots sooner, because that means it is time for kindergarten. We will see how it goes when we actually get there. She is making a lot of friends. She was out for a week when she was sick, and when we arrived Wednesday morning for her fire station field trip, there was a shriek of, "Sammy," followed by a dog pile of 4 year old girls surrounding my daughter. It was really cute. I wished I had brought the camera.

I took a few pictures of her early last week to show off our cute little preschool girl.

Home Improvements

Wow. These pictures have waited a little while.

We decided to buy the home we are living in currently. We knew that we would be involved in some improvement projects over the next few years. Most will be minor and involve things like paint. Perhaps a few will be on a larger scale.

Our first weekend in the house after our things were delivered, we embarked on our first project. In our master bedroom, the closet was originally a dressing room with a double closet. At some point the closet doors were removed, and a wire shelf ran along the length of the double closet. This shelf was placed in a manner making it a waste of some of the space up toward the ceiling. The wire shelf was also the hanging bar as there was no bar running under it. The shelf was no longer level from holding the weight of everything that was stored on it as well as hung from it. Trent and I decided to make the closet more efficient and bought a kit at Lowes. We thought it would one of those Saturday afternoon projects that would take us most of a Saturday afternoon into the evening, and we would be able to put everything away.

What started as a Saturday afternoon project, involved at least one more trip to Lowes, two to IKEA, a couple of phone calls for estimates from a professional, and 3 days. However, all is well that ends much better than I imagined.

When we started, we took everything out of the closet (some boxes were still not unpacked yet). It turned our room into a disaster in which we could barely get around. We had to hang Trent's suits in the hallway closet so that he could get ready for work that Monday before we finished.

We started pulling the old shelf etc. out and patching and repainting the drywall. When all of that was done and dry, we realized we could not put the new closet system up like we had planned. The result of all the weight on that wire shelf was not only a tipping shelf; it had pulled the dry wall away from the studs slightly. Trent determined there was no way we could put up a new system with dry wall anchors and have any reason to think it would hold up. That meant a trip to Lowes to take back the system we could not use and to look through all their options. This was followed by the first trip to IKEA. We looked at their closet options and even took a pamphlet for the Stolmen system. Everything on display was either too complicated or not what we thought we wanted. We went home discouraged, and this lead to research and phone calls to closet contractor types. I looked at the Stolmen pamphlet again and did a new set of measurements. Afterward, we felt that we really needed to go back to IKEA and give the Stolmen system another look. I designed a typical (and useful I might add) 25/25/50 configuration and figured out what parts we would need to accomplish this and whether the measurements fit. Everything we needed was in stock, and the kids loved the extra trip to IKEA. They have a play center the kids can play at for up to an hour while mom and dad shop. If the center is too full, the kids get coupons for a free ice cream cone. Either way is a win as far as the Warner kids are concerned. We went home and began the process of putting it together. We finished the next evening, and now, two months and some later, I still really love my closet. It has a real walk in closet look and feel. It is so much more useful. No more wasted space. In fact, if Trent would take his Coast Guard legoes into work, I would still have empty shelf space. We went into it thinking that this would at least make it workable. I came out of it really liking it.

Trent took what I conceptualized and made it happen.

I even helped

A Rite of Passage?

This past weekend, we bought our first full size outdoor grill. That is right. We had a small charcoal grill that we could do a little on (not reliably or always well), but we never had the ability to just go cook up something on the grill. Trent has wanted one for some time, and, because this is the complete wrong season for grilling, they are available for a good price.

Trent was so excited. We spent Saturday afternoon putting it together, and Sunday, Trent cooked us some hamburgers and hot dogs. Nothing big yet. I guess we need to have some friends over and really break it in. Trent says he has reached passed another rite of manhood. I don't know that I would go that far, but it is fun to be able to cook steaks etc. outside and to cook them without worrying about setting off our very sensitive smoke alarm. :)

Now when we have visitors, we can grill out for you. Now I just have to get Trent some tools so that he stops using my kitchen stuff. ;)