October 30, Monday

The weather was perfect yesterday. I love fall. The colors turn warm. The temp cools down. And the day was practically begging me to get outside. So I did! I went to Kickapoo state park and hiked for a few hours. It was such a leisurely hike. The air smelled of moist earth, drying leaves and, maybe my sniffer is a little off, but I'd swear it also smelled like wet dog. Parts of the hike had me ducking down real low, or climbing up high. I had to bust through a few spider webs as well. And, can I say, I'm breathing deeper right now just thinking about it all. This is by no means the best picture from the day, but I do like it. My thought process while taking it was something like this, "I'm mighty hiker woman. [bang chest here] Watch me climb over fallen trees with no problem." Then when I jumped down off the tree, I almost twisted my ankle. Thank goodness for totally rocking hiking boots!

Jack

Obligatory jack-o-lantern shot. L-R, Julia's small one, with only a few eyelashes, Jasper's small one, mine, which is supposed to look like a ghost, but I didn't shave enough of the outer layer off yet, Jasper's big one (I love the eyebrows!), and Julia's big one, with lots and lots of eyelashes.

Need Air. Must breathe.

I haven't been feeling quite like myself lately. I'm still laughing (maybe too much?), and still enjoying so much of the things around me. But things that normally don't stress me are taking a toll. I'm hoping to get outdoors for the better part of the weekend. I'm certain that there are other things that I've been putting off doing that need to get done. I'm also certain that they'll still be there, waiting for me, after I've gotten outside and worn my hiking boots down a little, and breathed in some clean air. Since the weekend is still a day and a half away, and since it will probably be Sunday before I can really get away, I'm holding on to this, a memory from August:

Obi Wan

Seems like I never really snap a lot of good pictures of Jasper. He's always in motion and as soon as I pick up a camera, he's gone. He doesn't avoid the camera, he's just always moving and doing and humming and singing. It's hard to capture his kindness, depth, and humor in a picture. (How do you capture humor, anyway? I know it when I see it.) On Sunday, October 15th Allerton Park in Monticello, Illinois held their first Pumpkinpalooza. We met up with some friends and had a great time. Before the friends arrived, Jasper grabbed a stick and was drawing maps on the ground that tracked where all the people he loves live. For a split second he looked up at me and I got this picture.

Ghosts

We went to the Pumpkin Patch in Arthur on Saturday and picked up a few gourds to paint like ghosts. Sunday we painted them white, Monday morning we added faces, and here's how they ended up:

From R-L, Julia's, with it's cute eyelashes and happy smile, Jasper's, with the speech bubble "BOO", and mine, scared silly.
Jasper's is a cyclops:

And Julia's has an extra eye, plus a tail (?):

Added on 10/26: Julia asked me why I laughed when I talked about the smile on her ghost. I explained that most people don't put smiles on their ghosts and I thought it was really cool that she had done something different. She seemed okay with that explanation, but was disappointed that her ghost wasn't scary. She said that she had tried really hard to make scary eyelashes. How much do I love this girl? And Jasper, making a cyclops ghost?! Wow.

Brownies

At work they have a birthday lunch every month. When it's your birthday, you bring in dessert. So tonight I'm making brownies for tomorrow's birthday buddy lunch. I don't think I've ever made brownies before, so we'll see how they come out. They have mini peppermint patties in them! I liked the way the flour was swirling into the cocoa/sugar mixture. . .

Birthday Flowers

The Birthday Bunny delivered a balloon on my birthday, and Beth and Amit gave me these flowers:

Ah, Aging

When my big brother turned 30, I got him a t-shirt that says "I'm not 30. I'm 29.95" When I turned thirty, guess what was gifted to me? Well, it's been a few years since I turned 30, and I've held on to the t-shirt, waiting for someone turning 30 who was worthy of the family tradition. And here's the someone (who's having just a little bit of crisis about his upcoming birthday in November):