Enjoying the fall!

This is my favorite time of year!! I love the crispness in the air, wearing sweatshirts again, and smelling wood fires being burned! We've been busy enjoying the season and looking forward to Halloween, especially Ella and David. We went camping this past weekend (except Emily who spent the weekend with her good friend Emma). Ella and I worked on a craft project from Family Fun magazine, and had a great time doing it! Last night I went over to the Mast's and took 6 week photos of Finn, I'll include a few here for your enjoyment. I'm sure we'll have another new post soon with Halloween pictures so check back later on this week!

At the land! (Trying a video on the blog for the first time, hope it works). This is Jason, Ella, and David riding a quad through what is left of the pond!

Ella and her haunted house!

Finn being the cute baby boy he is so good at being!!!!

Fall farming!

This weekend we felt a little like farmers ourselves. Jason and I spent 8 hours tilling a large patch of ground in our backyard. It's a spot that the previous owners had used as a garden and had turned into our weedpatch! We ended up renting a tiller and even with that powerful thing it took forever because the ground was so hard from the drought. Sunday we got the grass seed down and the two bales of hay that I had purchased, unfortunately we need about five more bales to finish the job! Thank goodness we had enough seed but we need to get it covered soon before the birds eat it! Now comes the fun part of watering it well, which will require a few hours of the sprinkler a day.

As well as doing "farming" ourselves, we visited Iron's Fruit Farm today and went to get pumpkins. The crowd was large but we thought that the half hour wait in line for the free hayride to the pumpkin patch was worth it. Jason and Emily had a good time hunting for the perfect pumpkin while Ella, David and I had more fun hunting the craziest looking gourd! It took a while but we were all happy with our finds and went home to finish our seeding and haying.

Jason on the hunt for the perfect pumpkin

Ella in the pumpkin patch with her choice gourds

Ella and David on the hay ride

Emily with the perfect pumpkin!

Is it fall yet?

The calander it's October, but here in Cincinnati it still feels like July. Fall is my favorite time of year and I feel like I'm getting shorted this year. Knowing the weather around here it'll be in the 80's this week and then in the 40's the next and we'll have no wonderful weather inbetween! Enough of my ranting, and onto why you've come to read this post.


The past couple of weeks I have felt like a hamster on a wheel that is running and going nowhere. Emily's cross country season did come to a close this last Saturday. She did excellent and we are all very proud of her. The coach is trying to convince her to run track in the spring time but Emily is not so sure about that. Our goal is to keep her in good running shape so that next year she's even better!

Emily's Sideline Cheerleaders at her League Final Meet

Emily with her teammates just before the race.

Emily coming down the finish line!

We spent a weekend at The Land with Mamaw, Papaw and Nataliya. We relaxed, played, and thanks to Jason's ipod hooked up in the minivan we did the Hokey Pokey and Chicken Dance around the firepit! It's so much fun to go for a time without the tv and just enjoy one another's company in God's creation.

Doing the Hokey Pokey!

Doing the Chicken Dance!

David and Ella are gearing up for Halloween and can't wait to dress up. Ella was so excited to decorate the house you would have thought it was Christmas! The only part that they, and I, don't like about Halloween are all of the scary figures in the stores. You've seen them, the mummies, witches, and bald serving guys that make noises and move at just the right time to make you jump! We're hoping to get to a pumpkin farm this weekend and if we do I'll post those pictures as soon as I can. That's it for now, thanks for visiting!

Our weekend

This weekend was quiet yet busy enough that we weren't board. On Saturday we picked up five 3 year old red maple trees that we had ordered in June from the Hamilton County Park District. It took us two and a half hours but we got them all planted, mulched and with treegators (tree watering system) in place! Here's hoping they'll grow big and strong!

On Sunday Jason was at the annual Cincinnati VW show. The rest of us joined him after church, picnicked and played on the playground equipment. Jason had to cut his time with us short because he was asked to help judge the rest of the contest!


After the show all of us, except Jason, went to go see and for most, meet Finn at his home. Emily and Ella were in awe of their new little cousin. David was interested for a short while but then just wanted to know if he could go play with toys. We were able to help Jennifer out with Finn's first bath and then just enjoy the newness that is a newborn.

Ella showing off one of our new trees!

Emily and Finn

Emily, Ella and Finn

David and Finn

Finn getting his hair washed

Our new family member!

On Monday September 17th at 6:54am, Stephen Phillip Mast was born! Proud parents Joe and Jennifer couldn't have been happier with their 8#3oz little boy. He has blond/red hair and is "as cute as a button"! Mom and baby should be coming home from the hospital today, as Jennifer had a C-section. Now I'll just let the pictures do the talking!

Sparky the Squirrel

This past weekend we had an unexpected visitor in our home. It all started at Jennifer and Joe's house. We were over there for dinner with them and Mimi and Boppie and as we sat around talking Joe heard something on their front porch. He quickly let us know that there was a baby squirrel on the porch. We all took a look and when someone opened the front door, the squirrel decided he'd like to come in!

We didn't allow him to come in the house but I, against my better judgement, picked him up in my arms. He seemed quite content there and enjoyed being stroked by all. We decided to make him a little house out of a shoe box because he was obviously too young to take care of himself. We offered cat food, water and old washcloths for him in the box. He seemed content at first but then kept coming out of the box toward us as if to say, "I'd rather be with you!"

We were getting ready to leave and Jason and I decided to take him with us to see what we might be able to do for him, Jennifer and Joe couldn't do anymore for him with Finn scheduled to be born soon and 2 cats in the house.

We took the newly named "Sparky" home and set him up in our bathroom in the cat carrier. I looked up on the Internet what was needed to take care of him and found out he was probably about 8-10 weeks old and a lot of other info on how to care for him. We tried all that was suggested from a heating pad on low to keep him warm to Gatorade to help rehydrated him.

It was apparent the next morning that, well, Sparky wasn't going to last. He had been very tired from the time we got him but him status had only gone downhill from getting him. Sparky ended up passing away on Sunday about 3:30pm while I held him in my hands. It just goes to prove that God has created each creature special and what a large amount of specialized care each one takes.

Back in the swing of things

I think that since we've been back in school for almost 3 weeks now that we've almost gotten into the swing of how our weeks will go this school year. I hesitate to say we have figured it out because there always seems to be something that will throw us a curve ball and we have to adjust, life is like that isn't it?

Our family life seems to be revolving around Emily's cross country season (which isn't too long so I'm not complaining). We had 2 meets this past week, Lebanon and Mason (close so that was very nice). Ella and David are not that thrilled at having being made to attend these events but thankfully we're not there very long and we can leave with Emily in tow.

Emily's Lebanon Meet

Emily's Mason Meet

Ella's first grade teacher, Mrs.Creech, called us this week and let us know that Ella is transitioning well to first grade from kindergarten. Ella doesn't care for her homework (one whole sheet a night) but we do it and go on.

Ella showing her contempt at having to be at Emily's meet.

David enjoys his time at home with Mommy and I seem to be getting a lot more done with just him to deal with. I will start attending MOPS (mothers of preschoolers) this week at our church. This is my first time to do this and I'm diving right in and agreed to do the financing! I'm assured that it is not that involved and I stressed that I have never done anything of this type before but if they were willing to give me a chance I was willing to try.

Jason is busy with the demands of work and is now looking at a big side job for himself (and maybe a helper) to do later on this fall. He is going to be installing the HVAC system for one of our pastors in a house they're building. Jason was just over this afternoon discussing strategy before ground has even been broken. That's all for now, check back for further updates from our neck of the woods!