Outings in October

We had several outings for our family in October.


Washington D.C.

Right at the beginning of the month we made a small trip to the D.C. area, and we got to stay with some friends from Iowa.  It was great to catch up and see them, and we did many things while visiting.

Hannah got a little bored when we hit the D.C. traffic.

Hannah woke up really early one morning and she enjoyed playing dress up before the other kids woke up.

We went to one of the Air & Space Museums, and that was SUPER COOL!  There were airplanes EVERYWHERE!  Nathan and I will definitely have to go sometime by ourselves without a 4 year old.  Poor Hannah.  She got bored pretty quickly.  She did enjoy driving a plane with her friends though.

We saw an awesome spy plane called the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird.  This plane was by far Nathan's favorite in the entire museum.  It looks so cool and slick, and it's the first thing you see when entering the floor.

We saw THE Enola Gay.  This is the airplane that dropped the A-bomb.  I'll admit, it was pretty cool to see this airplane knowing the history behind it.  Not to mention, this plane was HUGE!  I couldn't get a full picture of the beast.

We also saw a Concorde plane.  Who wouldn't want to travel from Europe to the US in about 3 hours?!

Hannah saw this airplane and said: "Mommy, that airplane is mad."  Kids.

My favorite plane we saw was the Discover Space Shuttle.  When I saw that my heart skipped a few beats.  

You can see how enormous this shuttle is.  I'm standing right smack in the middle of this picture.

After the museum the kids took a nap in the car while we drove to our next destination.

When they woke up they found out we were at a trampoline park.  Hannah loved it.

We also went to visit the grounds of the Washington D.C. temple.  Hannah really liked the Angel Moroni.

Hannah loved playing at the visitors center.  They have a whole section there dedicated for little kids. She was in heaven because we got to "color" on the i-pads.

After visiting the temple grounds we met up with our friends and went to the National Zoo.  We thought Hannah would enjoy it more than we had imagined, but she was so tired.  She liked seeing the animals, but she was so gassed from walking that after a few hours we decided to go home. Within minutes of getting into the car, she was out.

A few more random pictures of visiting with our Iowa friends.

General Conference

General Conference was wonderful as usual.

I won the conference song pool, but only by one song.  Here was the score:

• Rachel: 14 / 32
• Nathan: 13 / 32

I had 3 favorite talks:

1. Elder Hales' on Meeting the Challenges of Today's World
2. Elder Holland's on Behold Thy Mother
3. President Nelson's A Plea to My Sisters

Pikes

We also went down to visit the Pikes and we played a lot.  It's great because it wears Hannah out.  It's so rare that we get to see Hannah sleeping that we couldn't pass up this photo opportunity.

We played with the cat and dog.  Hannah enjoys feeding them their favorite treat -- string cheese.

We went to a pumpkin patch.

We came home and carved/drew on pumpkins (that we didn't buy at the pumpkin patch because they were WAY over priced).

This is Hannah's pumpkin.  She used every color of marker available.

Nathan made his a mechanical pumpkin.

We then went and had dinner at Homeplace.  The scenery was gorgeous, yet a little chili.  

I guess Hannah's coat doesn't fit Mason.

We also took a ride in the old 1948 dodge car (and I just realized I never got a picture of the full car.  Oops).

Nathan was excited to drive it.  Hannah, well she liked playing with the suicide doors.

In fact, Hannah had so much fun on the trip that she slept in the car for about 2.5 hours on our way home.

Stuff back home

We installed some blinds in the master bedroom, and Hannah helped by wearing her tool belt.

We played at the "wood park" several times.

We got our first frost of the season.

Nathan got sick (poor guy).

Hannah enjoyed her Halloween cards she got in the mail.

And we have enjoyed the fall colors.  This is one of our favorite things about Pennsylvania.  I wish there was a way we could capture the true scenery in a photo.  Pictures just don't do things justice.

Halloween

Hannah has been so excited about Halloween.  She and Nathan carved a pumpkin.

This year, Hannah was a fish.  I got this costume about 2 years ago from a friend at church, but I put it in a box downstairs and forgot about it.  When we were cleaning stuff out this summer, I re-discovered the costume so I asked Hannah if she would like to be a fish for Halloween.  Her reply was an enthusiastic "YES!"  Score for me. 

Here is Hannah demonstrating what a fish does.  I love her face,

This kid loves Halloween.  She doubled the amount of homes she trick-or-treated this year.  Yes folks, we went down the hill and worked the adjacent street.  It surprised us both.  Hannah also enjoys coming home and seeing what goodies she acquired.

And that, my friends, wraps up our outings in October.

General Conference Ensign picture courtesy of lds.org