Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween! Do you remember these type of Halloween costumes? You know the ones that came in a box with the clear cellophane sheet over the cover so you could see the plastic mask and under the mask was the plastic one piece costume. I thought so. Well I am pretty sure that on this particular Halloween it must have snowed because under that plastic sheet we have on our snow suits. Well anyway I hope you enjoy your Halloween this year and if you are in the land whee it snowed last night, enjoy it!

Jeffrey finally has a website

Jeffrey has finally got a website going to showcase some of his art, it is still a work in progress and looks really cool. Its called "i landed upside down" to get to it click http://jeffreyschulz.weebly.com/.

Jeff's Carving

So Jeff is doing this art exhibit in Tustin this weekend and yesterday and today he competed in an open air carving, this is what he carved. It's a historic building on Main St. in Tustin. the picture isn't so clear because he took it with his cell phone and sent to to me, then I e-mailed it to myself. Tomorrow I will see the real carving and the actual building. I am a proud momma and had to post the talented carving of Jeffrey Schulz.

Expensive tree

Tonight I had to take my wonderful 15 year old out to buy new dress shoes for a robotic thing tomorrow. . .where do you buy size 15 shoes at 6:00pm? We headed out to the mall and prayed we would find a pair, worn out skater shoes could not replace dress shoes and oh yes "I need new gray dress slacks also tonight" Holy Cow kid your killing me with the last minute dress attire for the luncheon tomorrow.
Anyway as we were driving we saw this tree with this "freakin'" sign. Obviously someone was upset about the amount of money spent on this tree. Which was place in one of our 2 expensive round-abouts . . .they do not help the traffic flow to the beach, sorry Encinitas.

Rain, Rain, Rain

It has been raining this week, and we had to turn our heater on last night for the first time in a year. When we do get a break from the down pour I can see it hanging out right outside my back yard. Sometimes we get lucky and the rain just stays on the outside of our cove and heads to San Diego or north to LA.
The only good thing about all this rain is that we do not have the horrible wild fires and I get to make lots and lots of soups. Tonight's soup . . . sage and butternut squash, I think I will even make some parmesan cheese crisp to go along with it.

The big day has arrived!!!

After 2 long years the day finally arrived. . . he got his braces off! His teeth look so great, now he will be in a retainer for a year then just at night. Hopefully he doesn't throw it away while he is eating like I did when I wore a retainer.

Remember what they looked like 28 months ago? They were really jacked.

What do you miss?

It is fall a beautiful time of the year, the leaves turn to beautiful shade if golden yellow, bright orange and red and even a shade of purple. I miss this time of year, growing up on the east coast I have so many memories of fall the crisp cool air the smell of smoke from the fireplace, the sound of the leaves in the street as cars drive over them then the sight of those crushed up leaves flying around like glitter. I remember throwing my poor grandmother in a pile of leaves and the many, many pile we would rake and jump in. There is nothing like the colors of fall, it is magical . . .almost as magical as the first snowfall of the winter.
I hope everyone gets to get out and enjoy this fall, bake a pie, pick some pumpkins and apples and create your own special fall memories.

Pumpkin Time

On Saturday morning we got a call from a girlfriend to go to an amazing pumpkin patch in Fallbrook the Lavender Farms Pumpkin Patch. It was a REAL pumpkin patch . . .acres of pumpkins still on the vine. It was simple and beautiful and so much fun. He had 38 varieties of pumpkins, we were all in amazement, each one cooler than the first. We came home with 4 different types of pumpkins. Wyatt's favorite looks like a giant pickle.

Wyatt holding a traditional orange one.
This is one of the cool ones we brought home it has such character.

The entire driveway was covered with these great smelling lavender plants

Fields and fields with so many different types of pumpkins.

We will definitely return next year, this is by far my favorite pumpkin patch, simple and sweet.

Some Fun Volunteering

Yesterday we went to the Jenna Druck Foundation Family Day and volunteered a few hours of our day helping out during some grief counseling and at their picnic. It was a really good reminder of how lucky we are. I worked with the children some who lost parents, one who's 5 year old brother drowned on Father's Day, one who's mom delivered a baby and it died as the child was looking at her for the first time and a 10 year old boy who's dad just left the family and he has never heard from him. I knew I couldn't have helped in the Mom or the Dad grief counseling, many of them lost children tragically. Cancer, drive by shooting, traffic accidents and even abductions and murder. I would have been a mess.
I was able to meet Dr. Ken Drucker who started this foundation after his 21 year old daughter was killed in a bus accident while away at school. He is an amazing man to turn such a tragedy into such a beautiful thing for these families.
Here is a picture one of the children took of me. They were all so excited to get to use my camera. . . I had to delete 889 pictures. They had such a great time snapping photos around the room.

Wyatt was caught as well by one of the children. He helped set up, take down and rearrange chairs, serve food and play games with the children. . .how cool to get service hours and be able to play football.

I got to take pictures of the kids as they acted completely goofy, silly and just plain excited. I was nice to see them laughing and having fun.