Art Night- Autumn Wreaths

Monday night is Art Night at our house. And tonight was a beautiful, warm October evening so the kids and I went the local park by the library. We walked around the ponds and watched the ducks, saw some squirrels chasing each other around, and even saw at least one blue heron (not sure if it was more than one or just the same one flying around). While we walked and enjoyed nature, we also kept our eye out for pretty leaves, acorns and other things to use in our art project.
After the kids got tired of walking, we headed home to make our Autumn wreaths. We just cut holes out of the middle of paper plates and then glued our findings on any way we liked. We were going to hang them up once they're dry, but I think we are going to put some candles in jars in the centers and arrange them on the table for some festive fall decorations.

Hannah had so much fun that she made two wreaths AND then filled this shallow box with more treasures.

James stuck with simplicity on his and I glued as many leaves as I could to mine. We all had a great time exploring outside together and creating our wreaths.

Pumpkin Patch!

*Sorry there are no pictures of our fun day yesterday. Our camera has been acting up and didn't work for us yesterday. Hope you enjoy this pic of Hannah enjoying her cocoa before our adventures. :)

Yesterday was a GORGEOUS Fall day here in the Northwest, James didn't have school, Matt didn't have work, and so we decided it would be a great day to go to the pumpkin patch! We packed a lunch and headed out for the day. We decided to be a little adventurous and check out a pumpkin patch near Hood River, about 2 hours away. On the way we stopped and had a picnic at Multnomah Falls, and took in the scenery. Then on to the pumpkins! The kids had so much fun going through the corn maze and the Pumpkin Funland, and then the hunt was on for the perfect pumpkin! Hannah took the first one she found that she could carry, while James took a good long look around the patch to find the biggest one he could carry. Ellie just enjoyed walking around feeling all the pumpkins and tasting the dirt. We couldn't have asked for better weather!
After the pumpkins were all loaded safely in the back of the truck, we headed for home via the scenic route around Mt. Hood. What a beautiful drive! The leaves were starting to change, the sun was radiant and the white clouds floated lazily through the sky. We took a short side road jaunt up to the Timberline Lodge as we had never been up there before. It was awesome! Mt. Hood is so amazingly huge! We are definitely planning to go back there and hike around some of the trails.
After getting back into the city we headed over to The Old Spaghetti Factory for a nice big dinner to finish off the day. Yum!