Pumpkins at the Palace

I was glad a friend of mine told me about this cool festival in Ludwigsburg while Myles' parents were in town.

We thought these udders were pretty fun.

This year's theme was Switzerland.

It was amazing how many different kinds of pumpkins and squash they had to see and to taste.  We enjoyed trying pumpkin spaghetti, soup, and quiche.

Behind the palace, they had the cutest Fairytale land where every house told a different story.  This witch from Hansel and Gretel is a little disturbing, don't you think?

Good thing there were lots of cute gnomes, too.

When the kids yelled, "Rapunzel, let down your hair" (in German), then her hair came down.

 

We were blessed with a beautiful fall day until it was time to leave and it began to rain.

Swirl Bread

 

When Myles was a kid, his mom liked to bring this kind of bread to the widows in their neighborhood when they went trick-or-treating.

When she came to visit, she brought the food coloring, etc, so she could make it with the girls.  Robyn had fun taking it to her Halloween party for English class, where they also got a kick out of bobbing for apples.

 

We made these with the extra dough that didn't fit in the loaf pans, and thought they were pretty fun.

It is also fun to make the black coloring on the outside so that people think the bread is burned or moldy...

Halloween Costumes

Macy as The Cat in the Hat

Carly as Spidergirl

And, Robyn as Cowgirl.

 

This year, the girls had fun trick-or-treating (in our neighborhood to people we knew) and trunk-or-treating (with American friends from the military base).  They also went to a few parties.  I guess Halloween just started catching on around here about 5 yrs. ago, lucky for us.

Ah, the Simple Joys in Life

Every Monday night we have what's called Family Home Evening where we have a song, prayer, little lesson, activity, and of course a treat.  We all take turns being in charge of each part, which the girls love.  Tonight, we'd planned on taking a family walk to deliver some invitations for making gingerbread houses, but it was cold...and...dark...and rainy.  I was proud of Carly for not getting upset when we said we needed her to come up with something different.  After talking about how miracles still exist today, like in the time of Jesus, eating German cookies and sipping lemon tea, Carly grabbed Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein and had each of us read our favorite poem.  It was great fun!  After the girls were in bed, Myles and I enjoyed laughing over some of the less read ones.  Which one is your favorite?

Our Pumpkin Patch

 

When we did a special treasure hunt to break the news to the girls, they were SO excited.  Macy screamed, "I always wanted a silly bean!  Or, what is it called?  Oh, yeah, a sib-il-ing."  Soon after I'd found out that it was official, but the girls didn't know yet, I was helping Macy fill out a friend book where she includes her picture and answers some questions about herself.  One of the questions was, "If you had a wish, what would it be?"  She said, "A baby brother or a sister."  The girls worked a long time doing their jobs, etc, to fill a bean jar.  When it was filled, they could each choose a Mommy Daughter or Daddy Daughter Date.  Macy said she wanted her date to be shopping with me for something for the baby.  But, she wants to wait to see if  it's a boy our a girl first, so she knows what we should buy.  She does know that she wants to buy an orange stroller.

Although it was not in our plans to have this big of a gap, it is fun to see how much of an opinion the girls already have on things, and fun that they will be want to help so much and be able to remember when their baby sister or brother was little.

The girls wanted to wait to break our news to others until Myles' parents came for a visit, so that we could tell them face to face.  When I said that we might have to tell some people we see because I'd be showing, Carly said, "That's OK.  They'll just think you've been eating more hamburgers."

People were surprised that we told them before we were starting to tell everyone else.  They thought it was fun to keep the secret.  Then, each of them got to choose one person who they wanted to tell first.

We're excited to see around Christmas time if we'll be continuing our pattern of girls or if we'll have a boy this time.  Of course, we're just grateful this little pumpkin is coming!