Halloween Night

This Halloween was so super duper AWESOME!!! Joey was very specific about what he wanted to be: Obi-won-kenobi with blue spiked hair (not real sure WHERE the blue hair came from : ) He was really good at getting into character and watched Episode 1 about 20 times to learn the moves.

Here is a weary traveler on the road....

No wait, its really a Jedi Knight, Sith run in fear : )

Moves down pat, blue spiked hair and a padawan braid : )

My cute Jedi : )

With his pumpkins doing the Jedi Mind Trick on me

Joey and his trick or treat pal Declan, an Astronaut this year

Joey and the beautiful Allison (a bumblebee) My son is such a flirt!!!! So funny Allison's Dad kept calling her a Cougar, haha!!

Joey and Allison's sister Caroline, what a witchy cutie pie!!

Joey and his other best pal Alexis and Mama's Pal Kathy (Alexis's Mom)

So much CANDY!!!!

School Harvest Celebration

I volunteered at Joey's School Harvest Party on the Friday before Halloween. It was so much fun to be in his class with him!!! Here is the whole group, his teacher Mrs. McCubbin on the left and Mrs. Osborne her assistant on the right.

Joey kept talking about getting married (even asking if he could marry my cousin and his 2nd cousin Molly : ) being in his classroom helped me to see the whole picture....the little girl who he has a crush on Angelina (who BTW has an identical twin that Joey does not like : ) has been dressing Joey up as a cowboy, dressing as a bride and they pretend to get married! So cute!!

Once he was dressed up..I kindof thought Joey looked like a member of the Village People

Me and Joey making Indian Corn : )

Joey and his pals John and Michael (also twins) 30% of Joey's school is twins this year, amazing!!!! They were coming to our house for a playdate after school!!!

Michael being silly at our house after school!!

Up next Halloween!!!! and Disney for Molly!!

Picking a Pumpkin

Since our Saturdays have been filled with soccer and piano there wasn't much time to go get pumpkins, so late one day after a soccer game we stopped (in uniform : ) to get our pumpkins. We told Joey he could have ANY pumpkin he wanted but he chose this cute small pumpkin!!

How cute!!!

As we learned last year, when you live in Florida you do not carve your pumpkin in advance (they rot from the heat VERY FAST!!) So we carved them on Halloween Day : ) Here is Joey and Da carving his pumpkin...such a very cute picture. You can see what a cuddlebug we have : )

Quick flashback to his 2nd Halloween picking Pumpkins, how he has grown!!!

Soccer Practice and game

Joey at his first soccer practice ever, wanting me to hurry up and take the picture : )

His first soccer huddle & his Coach Connie

Stealing the ball in practice

Joey and his pals Ryan and Nic before their first game

Joey is number 10...he is good when he decides to play, haha....at first he would get MAD when he got pushed on the field (Mama had told him it wasn't nice to push) so we had to explain that in sports people push and its okay to push back, he is getting the hang of it : )

these games can be frustrating with all these 4 yr old boys it is kindof like herding cats...i.e. it doesn't work. They play for about 5 minutes and then want to do something else, it doesn't help that is it still around 97 degrees on game day, VERY HOT! But Joey has made some new friends and is having fun and that all that matters : )

Summer Critters

Living in Florida, everyday is mixed with unusual wildlife- whether you like it or not. For starters there are the little gecko-like lizards that run around everywhere, even in your house : ) In fact, they have been doing construction near our subdivision and its chased all kinds of animals out and about...last week we saw a large gopher tortoise and a GIGANTIC Florida Cottonmouth. The Cottonmouth slithered right up to the car while Joey and I watched it for about 5 minutes straight! Of course, I didn't have my camera in either case, darn!!! I have been carrying it since and have seen nothing, nada, zippo. Anyway, enough of my chatting...here are our summer critters : )

Early this summer this dove took up residence in one of our outdoor speakers. Bill was NONE too happy!! He even was going to pressure wash its nest away, when we noticed she had laid eggs. So Bill has dealt with a dirty speaker and she has dealt with our music, haha!

and soon enough here are the little baby birds

Aren't they cute!!!

We also have a resident toad. Who must be super toad surviving our resident snake (more below) But we have seen him or her all summer

Here is Joey trying to catch it

and it jumped up on him....look at that funny face!!

a better pic, big toad must be eating all the bugs and lizards

Well here she is, our snake. My first sighting of her was about 1 1/2 yrs ago and she has been haunting our backyard ever since. I know she is a girl because her babies ran over my foot while I was mowing....I screamed VERY LOUD!!! You can see she is very long and will rear up on you when you approach. For that reason and for my sanity while Joey played out back, I finally was successful in "shoveling" her. Sorry animal lovers, she was driving me mad!!

Not sure if I posted this one before but here is our resident gator, she comes back and forth to our pond and we have seen a couple of her babies....for this reason we do not walk around ANY ponds here anymore.

More coming, Animal Kingdom Lodge, first soccer game, Summer of 09...

More from the Jax Zoo...

After going with our pals Joey and me decided to take Da to the Zoo as well. Here is Joey and Da feeding the giraffes


Joey trying to coax this bird onto his finger

Beautiful silverback Gorilla, very regal

Joey trying to harass another big bird

The Jaguars, always asleep

The lions were out, yay!!!

Jax Zoo with Kyle and Evie

This summer we went to the Jacksonville Zoo with our pals and great neighbors, Evie and Kyle (and their Mom, my pal Beth)

We got to see the new baby giraffe that was just born!!!

Evie liked pushing Joey in the stroller, so funny!!!

Of course, the best part of the Jax Zoo, feeding the Giraffes...just LOOK at the tongue

We also lucked out and got to see the snakes being fed, this one was munching down...YUK!!

The Jaguars are SO awesome!!! The black one wasn't out this day, too HOT!!
Elephants, my favorite!!

It was so hot, the kids all got changed and splashed around

Joey and Evie riding the dolphin