Our Garden Family

This year for Halloween our family was a garden. Peter was the gardener, I was the representative plant life (a flower if you can't tell), Eben was the caterpillar, Kivi was a bumble bee, Jasper was the garden gnome, and Opal was a butterfly.

Our Halloween festivities included a party at the Wright's house the week before, trick-or-treating at one house on the 31st; our neighbors, Mr. John and Miss Marie, who are married, that's just what we call them (They gave each kid a huge bag of candy and winter gloves!), and lastly, Nite Lite, our church's event!! Our collective young family HFGs (Biblestudies) got together the night before Halloween to set up the maze, our annual contribution for the event. The guys did an awesome job putting PVC and black visqueen together to make the winding labyrinth. It ended up being the highlight for most everyone. The kids also enjoyed the jumpy toy, scooter race, the cookie walk, and the pick a duck game.

How the Johnsons Carve a Pumpkin

On October 27th we decided it was time to carve all those pumpkins. 

This is how we did it:

#1. Wash the pumpkin.

#2 Draw the face.

#3 Have Dada cut off the top.

#4 Scoop out the seeds.

#5 Make sure all the seeds are out.

#6 Have Dada cut out the face.

#7 Put a candle inside and light it.

Before...

After!

Free Pumpkins!

10-25-08   We go to a lot of pumpkpin patches, but we didn't even have to buy a pumpkin this year! The Lakewood Fire Dept. had a free Pumpkin Fest. The kids got to put out a fire target with the fire hose, jump on the bouncy toy, dress up as fire fighters, and pick out a free pumpkin. We got there at the very end when they were packing up, and they still had 300 pumpkins left over! So we brought home 5! We will definitely remember this for next year! No wonder all little kids want to grow up to be fire fighters!

Eben the fire fighter - he looks like a muchkin from The Wizard of Oz.

Kivi, too afraid to actually hold onto the hose, fighting the fire.

JUMP!

Everyone picking out the perfect pumpkin.

Opie, waiting for everyone to make their decision. Happy girl!

Dada had to make 3 trips with the wheelbarrow to get all those pumpkins and kids to the car.

Eben Turns 5!

Eben 1 day old.

Eben 5 years old.

Our first baby turned 5 on October 20th! (Where did the time go?) So we celebrated his big day on October 18th at Rainier View Christian Church. He planned a "Space" party and invited 4 friends because "then I will make it 5 and I'm turning 5". Plus, he wanted a boy party. So he invited his good friends Hunter and Hayden and Jonathan and Isaac.

He was so specific on what he wanted. He told me just how to make the cake, the type of decorations, etc. And we did pretty good, except for the real rocket.

We ate freeze dried fruit, rocket fuel (soda),

and astroid pizza by the light of glow bracelets and space (book) lights.

The kids all took their space lights and went into space (the next room over which was pitch black and Peter set up a fog machine so you couldn't see even with their lights) where they had to find all the glow in the dark planets.

Then we sang "Happy Birthday" ate cake and ice cream and Eben opened his presents! A favorite came from our friend, Mr. Wiley, a dancing robot with a remote.

Happy Birthday Eben!

We can't believe you are already 5! You are an amazing boy. You are a smart, fun, sensitive, kind, helpful, loving, wonderful child of God. And we are so blessed that He put you in our family so we get to love you, help you, raise you, tickle you and hear you laugh!

We love you, Mama and Dada.

Hunter Farms 2008

On October 17th we went to another pumpkin patch. I really love them and I warned Peter that I was going to want to go to both Spooner and Hunter's 2 months before. This time we went with Nonnie who was visiting from California and Grandma and Grandpa. Last year we got to go on a merry-go-round, ride ATV's, and all the other fun fall stuff but we didn't realize they only have those things on weekends. The good thing is they still have the Giant Slide, Hay Maze, Kiddie Corn Maze, Goats, and of course Pumpkins on weekdays. So we still had a lot to do. We started off our journey with a trip to Elmers because I love their German pancakes and the kids devour their chocolate chip pancakes (with ice cream) and Peter loves a good big breakfast.

Spooner Farms 2008

We went with our HFG (Bible study) to Spooner Farms - my favorite corn maze! They always have a different theme (this year it was Narnia) and it's so much fun to find the characters and hidden mailboxes throughout the corn. We had a race against our other HFG family friends. They casually walked through the maze as a group while we frantically pushed through the maze under Eben's fearless leadership. We lost. By a lot. But we had a ton of fun! We were so proud of Eben - guiding us through to every box and scene, Opal did super on Dada's back and Jasper and Kivi didn't whine once! Afterward we all went out to pizza.

Finding the beaver's den!

Trying to find all of the hidden mailboxes.

Corn mazes are new for me since moving to Washington and I love them. I try to do one every year. I love having this as a family tradition! It encourages family loyalty, adventure, determination, and when going through the dark tunnels - trust.

Things I Want To Remember

These are things we do a lot and at some point I know I will forget them unless, they are somewhere for me to see and spark memories deep in my brain. I have a VERY bad memory. So since these things also happened the second week of October and fit in my chronological family blog, I thought I would mention them. And if the internet is still around, and this blog is too when I'm 60, I'll be happy I put these in here.

This is how we retrieve our trash can. It's a long haul down our lengthy driveway, so we hook the can to the back of Eben's 4-wheeler and off he goes.

We build lots of forts! Almost every other day ALL the cushions get taken off the flowered couches and piled in a new way on the living room floor. Confession: I let my kids jump on the flowered couches. Although I've tried to teach them that we don't jump on other people's couches. But I have a feeling at some point they'll be told to treat things they way they do at home and start jumping all over stuff. Oh well. I've always wanted to jump on couches.

Opal in her jumpy seat. Kivi got her all beautiful and she was so happy to jump around.

Kivi and her Boo Boo Puppy. Nonnie got all the kids a Build-A-Bear for their first birthday, although, she waited until they were about 2 before she went with them to build it. Kivi is definitely the most attached to hers. Although Eben sleeps with his Space Froggy and Bubba likes Bubba Bear, Kivi takes (or begs to take) Boo Boo Puppy everywhere we go.

This video is a new thing that the kids started doing this fall. They drag their cars up to the garage and race down the hill. This day the Schock kids were over and they did it over and over. Poor Jasper dumped his car, but he survived and got back on.