I am a highlight

Check it out: Fourth row down, second column. I had a butterfly painted on my face Saturday, while wearing a beagle costume.

The world according to Mitchell

One day a few weeks ago, while taking a walk with Mom, I suddenly cracked up laughing. She asked what was so funny, and I asked why this sign shows a seesaw crushing a shed. Then Mom cracked up laughing too.

What a weekend!

Last weekend was an absolute blast.

Saturday morning we kicked things off bright and early, heading out to Georgetown for Vern's No Frills 5k. Mom's been training for about 10 weeks and finally felt ready to do an official race, so we wanted to be there to help by cheering her on. Dad took care of us so Mom could focus on kicking butt. He packed lots of yummy snacks for us, kept us entertained and helped us find a good, strategic place to stand so we could easily find Mom when she passed by. We all had fun, and after the race, Hazel told Mom, "I loved it!"

Once we got home, Mom thought it was time to give Dad a break so we headed out to do a few errands. We all behaved nicely, and afterward, went to Red Barn Garden Center, where they had a harvest festival. There were pumpkins everywhere, two bounce houses and farm animals at a petting zoo.

It was great! The highlight was when Hazel and I held bunnies, and Turner pet them. We looked at mice, a horse, donkeys, ducks, chickens, a snake and a guinea pig. Hazel and I liked jumping in the bounce houses and Turner liked looking at the pumpkins. It was a really good time.

Once we came home, I told Mom I wanted to try riding my bike. It was a total success! I rode all the way to the park and back. Hazel rode her tricycle, and Turner went in his little car. I went so fast, I popped my chain, which I thought was hilarious. We spent this week trying to fix it, and I'm hoping to ride some more this weekend.

Sunday was a really busy day. We went to our friend's house in the morning. His birthday party was mid-day but we had other plans so we couldn't stay long. So we just went a little early to play with them while his parents prepared for the party.

They have really fun toys and a nice backyard, and before we left, the entertainment for the party -- a petting zoo -- showed up. We only had a few minutes, but I had the chance to hold a rabbit and a hedgehog. The lady put a rug on my lap for the animals to sit on, and the hedgehog went underneath, which I really thought was funny.

Next we headed back to Georgetown for the Buddy Walk, a fundraiser for Down Syndrome. Along with a few others from my class, we nominated my teacher for an award. She won and we wanted to be there to see her.

When we first got there, we had the chance to see a real helicopter. Hazel is kind of afraid of things right now, and she did not want to get in, but I did. It was cool. We next moved on to paddleboats, then met up with my friends and teacher for the award presentation. Hazel, Mom and I went up on the stage with my teacher and another family from our class. Dad and Turner waved at us.

After lunch, we walked a whole mile with everyone. It was kind of hot and Hazel said she felt dizzy. While we were on the walk, some horses got loose and ran about 100 miles an hour at the crowd. A guy caught them, and it was pretty exciting.

Before leaving, we had the chance to hit a bounce house and a playscape with a giant slide. We were all exhausted by the time we left, but had plans to meet up with some out of town friends at Waterloo for dinner. That was a great chance to eat, eat, eat (Mom and Dad had to order me two dinners, I was so hungry), and to play in a fun sandbox.

We all slept really well Sunday night, exhausted after a really fun and eventful weekend.

Falling for haircuts

A few weekends ago, Mom had a Groupon in her hand and she and Hazel set out for a girls' afternoon at a swanky salon.

Mom really need a haircut and Hazel needed her bangs trimmed. They got to the salon and the lady -- who made it clear she does not appreciate Mom's laid back approach to hair -- started working on Mom.

When the lady was finally finished with Mom's hair, she took care of Hazel. Hazel was really well behaved the whole time.

When they came home, I ran into the garage and told Mom she looked nice. Then I started laughing and told her she looked like my teacher. Dad thought it was funny and said I was right.

Mom got me back a few days later, when she got a coupon in the mail for a cheap haircut at a less swanky place the day before I had my picture taken at school.

Nonetheless, I ended up with a pretty good haircut and I was brave and well behaved the whole time we were there.  

Here are photos of our hair adventures.

Pumpkin time!

The weekend of Columbus Day, I had a three-day weekend because of the holiday. Plus, Dad was out of town. So Mom decided to round up some friends and we all hit the road together.

Our first surprise when we got up Saturday morning was the weather. While it had been more than 90 degrees Thursday and Friday, Saturday was cold. Mom hustled up some warm weather clothes, and we grumbled about having to put them on, but it's a good thing we did because it was really chilly all weekend.

This is how many kids we can fit in our car

As soon as we finished breakfast, we got in the car, filled our gas tank, and headed over to Vishnu's house. We popped his booster seat in the back of our car, he and his mom got in, and we set off for Sweet Berry Farm in Marble Falls.

Our trip was fun. Vishnu's mom brought loads of yummy snacks and while Mom drove, she passed food back to us. We listened to fun music, I liked having Vishnu's company in the back, and Mom and Vishnu's mom had a good time talking with each other.

A little over an hour later, we were all happy to stretch our legs at the farm. Fortunately, there's lots of room to run there!

We first hit a big bouncy structure. I thought it was kind of tough to climb to the top, but Hazel and Vishnu ran right up and I eventually made it. It was a good chance to burn some of our energy we collected in the car.

After that, we played on a little tractor and with some corn maze signs while waiting to meet up with another friend -- Zhenya! We were happy to see her smiling face before we set off to take a hay ride.

The hay ride was a blast. Not only was it fun riding behind a big tractor with all our friends, there were funny scenes set up with scarecrows the whole way through the course. There were scarecrows in bed, scarecrows in jail, scarecrows in school, scarecrows on the playground and many more.

The end was Turner's favorite part. He's really into animals right now; every time the deer walk past our house, he runs to the back door to yell and wave at them. Anyway, on the hay ride, we came around the last corner to find about a million goats, some donkeys and some horses. He yelled, pointed and stared at them. It was pretty funny.

After that, Hazel and I rode a train together, and we all helped Zhenya pick some flowers. Hazel and Vishnu especially liked that part. Then we had a nice picnic lunch, Hazel and Vishnu made a sand art project and Turner and I ran around.

Because we went on the weekend, it was pretty crowded at the farm, but we felt we made the most of it and had a lot of fun.

We certainly tired ourselves out. As soon as we got in the car, Hazel, Turner and I fell asleep. Vishnu was awake the whole way back and liked listening to kids' book recordings we have on our iPod.

Since we've been home, Hazel and I have been asking Mom to take us back again. She said we'll have to wait until next year, or at least next summer, when they have berry picking on the farm.

To see more pictures of our fun day, click here.

Fall fun

Now that it's cooling down a little outside (the high temperature is in the mid-90s most days instead of the 100s), we've been spending more time with Mother Nature.

One day Hazel, Turner and I got to go to work with Mom while Dad was in California. Going to work may sound like a drag, but our mom has no ordinary job. She writes news articles about amusement parks and takes photos of us on the rides for her story!

We headed out to a small amusement park about 15 minutes away. They have lots of rides, including a train, ferris wheel and airplanes. They also have ponies, but Hazel and I were scared of them.

Anyway, we got to ride all the rides. We even rode some of them twice. We hung out with the owners of the park, who were very nice. It was a great day, and now Hazel and I get to appear in a newspaper.

Another fun thing we all did together was we set some ladybugs free in our backyard. We read that it's good to have ladybugs in your yard, so one day a few weeks ago, we headed to a garden center and bought a little bag of ladybugs. The bag was small, but there were 1,500 ladybugs inside.

We kept the bag in our house for a few hours until it was almost sundown. After dinner, just before bedtime, we took it outside and set them free on our plants. They got all over us. Mom found one in her hair a couple hours later, and Hazel found one in her bed.

I liked the ladybugs at first, and Hazel was really into it. It was a great time while it lasted. They were all gone the next day, and we haven't seen any ladybugs in our yard since.

For pictures of our day at the park, click here. To see more ladybug fun, click here.