'I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers."

I heard this Anne of Green Gables quote recently, and it is so true.  As an October baby, I've always loved this month.  Here's what we've been up to this October...

VA STATE FAIR- Anderson's 3rd annual visit and, of course, Brady's first.  Hot, mid-80's!

The big boys checking out some tractors          

Brady and Grandma- Brady's sweaty hair evidence of the heat!

Anderson loved watching the ducks go up and down the ramp.

Cheese

Anderson's first pony ride!  He surprised us by saying he wanted to ride a pony.  He protested the minute I went to put him in the saddle, but within a second of the ride, he was loving it.  A couple days later, we were talking about animals.  I asked him if he likes dogs. "No," he said (sorry, Sadie.)  I said, "Oh, well do you like... horses?"  He said, "Of course I do!" Ha. :-)

Happy Brady and Grandpa :-)  We have a similar picture of Anderson and Grandpa during his first trip to the fair.  Thank you, Ryan, for being sure to get this one.

 BELVIDERE PLANTATION AND THE CASSONS!

Ca-razy picture- but I think this captures the bouncey horse hopper things pretty well...

And this one, because Anderson loved it!

The big slide...

A lot of Ives in that slide!

Super Brave Liam!

Oh, my sweet boy!!

Second pony ride. :)  Not even nervous this time.

Liam and Chris at the "race track"

Anderson and Grandma

Brady thought Liam was hilarious, and Liam was sweet to entertain my Brady Bear!

Group Shot on the Hayride

Happy boys!

 

Anderson, Colin, and Brady

Cutie brothers!  Anderson really took notice of Liam and Colin- I've definitely seen him pay Brady more attention ever since their visit. :)

This boy loves tractors.

Belvidere Plantation had some GOOD LOOKIN pumpkins!

And then the next weekend...

APPLE PICKING at Carter's Mountain

Drizzly day, but beautiful view

Nannie and Papa

Anderson and Nannie looked at some pumpkins.

Anderson is 11 apples tall.

We picked about a dozen Granny Smith Apples, and we gathered a 1/2 bushel of "pre-picked" apples, as well.

About all of the apple picking fun Brady could handle. ;-)

 A couple of days later, the boys and I put our apples to good use:

Anderson won't eat the apples, but he's loved counting them during his meals...

 APPLESAUCE :)

Brown sugar and cinnamon

DUCK

With no school schedules to stop us, my mom and I planned a late-September family trip to the beach in Duck, NC (part of the Outer Banks.)  With Mom, Dad, and Ryan's work and my tutoring, we ended up with a half-week trip. Mom, the boys, and I  headed out Tuesday mid-day, and Dad and Ryan joined us that night.  The trip had many "pro's"- the boys got lots of extra quality time with Daddy, Grandma, and Grandpa; the weather was PERFECT mid-70's and sunny; I got to sleep in an extra hour or so a couple of mornings; AND we had four straight days of delicious seafood.  It was so good!

There was really only one "con", but it was enough to make the only 5-day trip seem just about right.  In our otherwise nice time-share condo, every single step the people above us took was amplified x 20 into our unit below.  And those people did not know how to relax on vacation.  I swear they were pacing, running, dropping things up until 11 or so at night and then starting again at 6 or so in the morning.  Sit down, people! Any thoughts I had of nicely mentioning this to them were squelched by the bumper sticker on what I can only imagine was their car in our parking lot.  It so cleverly read: "Keep honking, I'm reloading..." Cute, right?...
(Okay, I'm moving on.)

Back to the many highlights, here are some of my favorite photos:

I loved their one-piece swim suits!

Admiring "his" hard work with the sand castle.

This happened- a whole hour just Ryan and me on the beach.  Thank you, Mom and Dad! :)

Beach babe!

My color-coordinated cutie :)

We all took a lot of turns holding Anderson's hand right at the edge of the water.  He very happily got wet up to his waist, and he loved to watch the waves!

Goofy, but he laughed :)

Our view from dinner!

The boys had a lot of fun playing inside, too:

Friday was mighty windy, and Saturday was supposed to be even windier, so we opted for a pool/ aquarium day instead.  The boys loved the pool!  Brady is still a little frog in the water, and Anderson loved "swimming" and let me dunk him a couple of times again.  He came up one time and said, "Eat water!"  Oops.  Haha.

The aquarium was really fun- I think Anderson was more into the fish than he has been the animals at the zoo.  He's definitely getting to a fun age for these types of trips.  

Sour-puss face from Anderson.  Because he is two, and we had some moments of this.

At the zoo, Anderson is usually ready for "anutter animal."  But at the aquarium, he never wanted to leave each tank.  He really liked the "big fish"

Anderson refused this photo op- we are completely in a "No pictures!" phase.  Thankfully Brady is happy to oblige. :)

Otters!

Yay for a smiley family photo!

And this one- Anderson cracks me up every time I see it :)