October

We start out October with Phil's birthday!  This year on his big day, we attended a gala for North Memorial Hospital.  We headed home as soon as we could, though, to get some sleep for the 10-mile run we were both participating in the next morning!

Nope, Henry did not have a birthday this month, but still took a picture with a giant 5.  Yep, still 5 years old :)

Here we are, after completing the Twin Cities 10 mile with almost 10,000 others out there.  It was such a beautiful morning, about 45 degrees and sunny for the start of the race at 7am.  We treated ourselves to a fantastic Bloody Mary after the race as our reward! 

That night, we went out for Phil's birthday as a family.  We took the kids to Osaka for their first hibachi experience.  Johnny was our chef for the evening, and Lydia still talks about him - "Johnny fire!"  So maybe he freaked out both of the kids right in the beginning with a large poof of fire off of his hot grill - a little warning would have been nice, Johnny :)

In the middle of October, we headed up to Grand Forks for our annual weekend with Old Papa.  Henry said his favorite part of the whole weekend was going outside with Old Papa to feed the squirrels each day - oh, the simple joys in life :)

We happened to stop by the Hyslop pool on UND's campus on Saturday afternoon at the perfect time.  They were just finishing up with a meet, so I got to run into my old diving coach, Brian.  Henry was wearing a MN Gopher t-shirt when we walked in.  Brian quickly covered that up with a North Dakota Diving shirt - looks good on the kid!

We stopped by Scheels to look for any other UND gear, and took a few pics along the way.....the mighty UND hockey goalie.....

.....and the fishermen!

I know that Henry is an early riser in the mornings.  If we're at home, he'll get up and play/color quietly in his room.  So, for this trip, I made sure to put his arts & crafts bag in the room he was sleeping in when he went to bed the first night we got there.  This was the first picture he made in the morning - he didn't know how to spell Old Papa, so he abbreviated with OP - oh my, how cute is that - and he dressed them in exactly what they were wearing the night before!

October also sent us back to Children's Hospital for a hernia repair surgery for Henry.  We were only there for about 5 hours in total.  Everybody that we worked with was amazing, as usual!

After we got home that afternoon, he slept off the medication for the remainder of the day.  The next day, he was feeling much better - good for him - but hard for me to have to keep him contained for the next 1-2 weeks!  He got a new Lego set and a Lego sticker book, which definitely kept his interest for a while.  Thank goodness his restrictions are all through, and he's back to riding his bike and jumping off of park equipment! 

The staff at Children's sent Henry home with a good supply of doctor gear for he and Lydia to play with.  Lydia got a new doctor kit for her birthday, as well, so these two have been very busy giving check-ups and lots of shots!

The last few weeks have really been beautiful around here.  We've been outside a lot!  Henry got a new rake (his prize in a local coloring contest :) and has been busy raking those leaves out there.  He asked for a quarter if he raked the whole yard one day - sweet!

My Auntie Jackie came to visit us last week when Phil was out of town.  We visited the Eveland Family Farm in Andover one afternoon - hay ride, farm animals, corn maze, pumpkin patch, and then we went home with a few squash to cook up.  

 

Oh yes, the cows on the farm were getting up close and personal for pics too :)