Fall Faves

I just love Fall! Every September, I am ready to say Goodbye to summer and Helloooo to Fall! I like summer too, but come on, I can only take so much 110 degree weather! Its still pretty warm and toasty here in Houston, but I know the cool down is coming....soon...I hope. I can't wait for it to be in the 70's! That will be perfect! Here are just a few of my Fall Favorites!!

Halloween is a fun holiday for the kids. I love trying to decide what kind of animal, creature, food item, or character my kids will be. I'm in the process of coming up with ideas now, but I don't have many yet. If anyone does have any ideas, please leave a comment and let me know :) This year, I'm not sure if we will do much trick-or-treating, mainly because we only know a couple of people in our neighborhood. But, I think our town has a Halloween festival or something at the park and I think the church has something as well so I know we will find something fun to do.

Next on my list is Thanksgiving. I mean, who doesn't love Thanksgiving? Unfortunately, it does get over-shadowed in between Halloween and Christmas. All the stores seem to put out Halloween decor in August, and Christmas decor in September and they all seem to forget about Thanksgiving. I love it though.

Fall is the start of football season, which I happen to enjoy. I am and have always been a big Chicago Bears fan. Even though it's rare for them to have a winning season, I stick with them because isn't that what true fans do? So far this year, they are off to a pretty good start :)

Another team we are starting to get into are the Houston Texans. We would love to go to one of their home games sometime.

Warm apple cider is soooo good!! Yum!

Pumpkin pie is one of my favorites desserts at Thanksgiving, but you have to put whipped cream on it!

I love decorating with lots of pumpkins! Sometimes we carve them out into jack-o-laterns and other times we paint faces on them. I need to find a pumpkin patch around here, if thats possible, so we can take the kids to pick out some pumpkins.

Fall weather is probably one of the best things about fall. Along with that are the changing leaves, which are so pretty! I'm not sure how much of that we will see down here but we will find out soon.


What are some of your favorite things about Fall?

Hillarious!!

Pictures!

Ok, so I know its been forever since I have posted any pictures. We've had some internet issues and switched providers and now we are back up and running. And, I have about a million pictures that I've taken since then but here are a select few to show you. (The descriptions are below picture, not above)

Here is Kenzie in the water fountains at Discovery Green.

I told him to make a silly face?

Hmm, you don't see this every day. This beach is Quintana Beach. Its about 30 minutes south of Galveston and we really like it. The water and the beach are much, much cleaner than Galveston and its not nearly as crowded. You can drive your car right down onto the sand so thats nice.

Wading in the water.

Holding his broken truck.

Playing on the playground at Discovery Green. What a bunch of monkeys!

My beautiful baby girl.

Ok, I told him to smile. Notice his new haircut! I love it!

This must be his fake sad face. Ah, the many faces of Aydan! You never know what your gonna get.

He looks much older here.

Have I mentioned we love palm trees?

This is the in the lighthouse district in Kemah, about 10 minutes from us. Kemah is also where the boardwalk is that I've talked about before with the amusement rides and games.

This is our town.

Space Center Houston and NASA, which are 2 blocks from us. Its the closest attraction to us and yet we haven't actually been inside the gate. Its next on our to-do list for sure.

We love to go look at the big boats at the docks.

Kenzie posing on the boat dock.

I Almost Blew It

Kenzie lost yet another tooth last night and was so excited to get some money from the Tooth Fairy. She put the tooth in a plastic baggie and left it under her pillow.

Last night was kind of one of those crazy nights where there's so much to do and so little time. I had to go to Kenzie's parent/teacher orientation night, which of course is right in the middle of the evening, from 6:30 to 7:30. So by the time I get home from work at 5:45 pm, I barely have time to make supper, let alone eat and clean up everything before I head out the door. Needless to say, once I get home I am trying to finish up some stuff that I started before I left.

Anyway, the whole point of the story is that the Tooth Fairy forgot to come visit and I felt HORRIBLE the next day!!

I got up as usual and took a shower before the kids were up. As I am getting dressed, Kenzie walks in and scares the doo-doo out of me. She came in, holding her precious tooth, with the saddest, puppy-dog looking face.

"Mom, is the tooth fairy real?"

**crickets**

All of a sudden a rush of guilt comes over me and I realize that darn old Tooth Fairy failed to make an appearance in the Bracken household last night.

Oh no!! What do I do? Think! Think!

Do I break down and tell her theres no such thing as the Tooth Fairy and break her precious heart?

So I simply say,"Why what's wrong honey?" Yeah, like I don't already know!

She holds up the tooth.

"The Tooth Fairy never came last night!" she claims.

"What?" I said. "Are you sure?"

"Yes Mom. My tooth is still here and he didn't leave me any money."

Fiddlesticks!! I'm such a bad mom!

Somehow, I change the subject and convince her to go get dressed and continue to get ready for school. Since Danny is off on most Fridays, he was home and heard what was going on.

Unwilling to let her know the truth about the Tooth Fairy, he devises a plan.

He asks me for $1 (hey, we're in a recession people! $1 is plenty for a stinkin' tooth, OK. Beats the 50 cents I used to get.)

He folds the dollar up in his hand and heads into her room, where she is still pondering what is up with the Tooth Fairy. He casually asks her if the Tooth Fairy came and she sadly informs him that he did not.

He starts looking around her pillow and blankets and stuff and low and behold...there it is! There is the $1.00 from the Tooth Fairy!

He informs her that the Tooth Fairy must have just forgotten to take the tooth with her after she left the money.

I know.

Questionable story.

But, you know what.

She bought it!

Whew!! I can relax now. I did not ruin my child's dream that the Tooth Fairy really exists. We are good to go, at least until she looses her next tooth.