Fire

Just wanted to let anyone who might be wondering how we are doing that we are fine and the fires are staying a safe distance away from us. It's smoky out and the kids have not been able to get out to play at recess and there is ash all over the backyard, but I can't see flames from where we are at. You can see a thick cloud of smoke over towards Foothill Ranch, and Sam's school is closed. Some of the houses in Foothill Ranch were evacuated but those are higher up in the hills.

The boys are in the paper!

Well, the online version of our community paper, that is. This Sat. was the annual Fall Festival at Heritage Hill here in Lake Forest. It's a fun community event that we go to every year. We always see lots of people that we know and the kids have a great time doing crafts, playing games, and collecting candy in thier costumes. Here is the link to the story in the paper. http://www.ocregister.com/news/vampire-historical-live-1901031-robinson-half If you click on "view more pictures" you can see the pictures of Will, Ben, and Sam. I believe Will and Ben are number 8 and Sam is number 10.

Super Mario Bros.!

Here are a couple of pictures of the boys in thier Mario and Luigi costumes made by Grandma Zukie. They got so many compliments on them last night at the party we went to! We are going to our town's Harvest Festival today so they will get another chance to wear them before Halloween.

Cupcakes for Ben's class

This afternoon, Ben and I spend some time making 36 cupcakes for his class for tomorrow's party. He cracked the eggs, mixed the batter, put the cupcake tins in the pan, did the sprinkles, and put the ghost rings on all of the cupcakes himself. I thought they turned out pretty cute!

Pet turtles

We are now the proud owners of two red eared slider turtles. We were walking around China town with the boys and Will, who has been asking for turtles for awhile now, saw all of these little boxes with 2 turtles each in them. They were 5 bucks and I knew I'd have to end up buying it a bigger tank, but I thought "what the heck" and let him buy the things. Not a very well thought out plan, as it turns out. I went home and researched these little guys and learned that they grow to between 8 and 15 inches and need a 20 gallon tank at the smallest. They also need a strong filter, and a basking area with a heat lamp. So, $300 later, the turtles are happy in thier new habitat. Will is in turtle heaven.

Vegas Vacation!

This past weekend the boys and I tagged along with Brian to set up for a convention in Vegas. We stayed at the Hilton and the kids and I visited grandma Kathi on Saturday and went swimming in the hotel pool and played in the arcade on Sunday while Brian was working. We were there for three days and had a great time!

We met up with daddy at night and took the kids to Bennihanna for dinner on Friday night, Planet Hollywood on Saturday night, and Rainforest Cafe on Sunday night. On Saturday afternoon we went with Grandma Kathi, Bob, and Uncle Kevin to Freemont Street in downtown Las Vegas where we had lunch, saw some performers, and saw a really huge fish/shark tank surrounding a swimming pool with a water slide going right through the middle. The waterslide was made of some sort of plexiglass so that when you went through, it looked like you were in the fishtank. The boys wanted to go back to our hotel and get our bathing suits!

Family hike

On Saturday we went on a family hike at Casper's Park with our playgroup and Jodi from Earthroots Field School. She takes children and thier families on nature hikes, teaching them about wild, edible, and medicinal plants along the way, showing animal tracks along the trail, teaching about the animals that live there, and just having a great time outdoors. The kids loved it. We didn't call it a "hike" because for some reason that turns them off. We termed it an "explore" and they were very excited, asking Jodi questions, collecting rocks and sticks, and helping some new friends to build a fort out of fallen tree bark and branches in the clearing where we stopped to eat lunch. Normally a picky eater, Will even sampled some of the prickly pear that we picked on the trail. We hope to make this a monthly family activity.