Fall Break Week 3

We kicked off the last week of Fall Break with a hike in Sabino Canyon. Megan had dance class that morning, so she went before we headed off.

McKenzie and Peyton had stayed overnight at Grandma's house since they had Fall Break that week, too (they just get one week), so we all headed up there together.

 The kids were great hikers, and with the more than usual rain this fall, there was plenty of water at Sabino Dam.

 With the cooler weather we had not encouraged the kids to wear their swimsuits, but that didn't stop most of them. I think Megan and Rachel stayed dry, but the others waded in deep enough to get wet. Or slid on the water slide rocks. McKenzie especially was excited about the slide rocks and went repeatedly. Megan has formed a super love of Peyton and they are super buddies every time they get together. They spent a lot of the time on the hike and at the water doing stuff together.

 The last week of Fall Break I finally got to one thing on my to do list: sorting through the kids clothes (and cleaning out their rooms and toys) and getting out winter clothes (long sleeves and pants). Megan was super excited for some "new" clothes and wanted to show them off with her goofy face.

 It was Ryan's turn to conduct Family Home Evening, so he put together this "stand" to conduct from using our lap board for the laptop and a stool, and the remote for the microphone.

Everyone wanted to use it, so Ryan promised he would set it up for them every week.

When I was picking Annie up from gymnastics she saw this hawk catch this bird. We pulled over right next to it to get a closer look. It's a Coopers' Hawk, I think. Shortly after I got this picture he tried to fly to a tree, but the bird got away, and he was left to chase after his dinner again.

Since we weren't able to go on any big trip over break, we decided to do a mini vacation and headed up to Phoenix for Friday and Saturday. We went to the Arizona Science Center, which had some cool stuff, but some parts required too much learning and not enough doing for the younger kids to enjoy and they got impatient in a few areas. Megan did like this play lab that had a few dress up items to become a scientist.

 There was a cool water play area, but with Megan's aversion to getting wet she wanted to watch from the other side of the glass for the first bit. There was a water cyclone and tracks that you could send balls along, some of which ended in the water cyclone, as well as other cool things.

 She did go into the water area eventually and played a little with the water controlled percussion instruments, but mostly stood against the wall out of the splash zone enjoying watching all the craziness.

This lifesized shadow box was pretty cool. The kids had fun getting behind it and doing different poses and playing around.

 We had lunch at the restaurant they have on site. It had several GF selections, including Brownie Bites, so Jacob was able to have a good lunch right along with the rest of us. The girls got cake pops for dessert and Ryan got an emoji cookie.

 The kids were ready to leave the science center earlier than we had anticipated, but it worked out just fine. We got to check in to the house we were staying at through AirBNB and had time to swim in the (freezing) pool, and sit in the nice hot tub there before dinner. Then we had dinner and movie night. Megan enjoyed the few toys they had in the house.

 Rain started during the night and when we checked the weather forecast we saw that it was the remains of a hurricane moving in, so we decided to try and beat the storm and skipped out on our plans for Saturday in Phoenix to start driving early. The rain was pretty heavy for one section of the freeway home, but for the most part it was ok. Since we had missed our Saturday activity in Phoenix, we decided to stop at Jump and let the kids play for a while there before we officially were home from our mini vacation. It was Jacob's first time there, and he had a good time, too.

 This little boy thought Rachel was super cool and everywhere she went, he followed. It was kind of funny to see. He was probably Ryan or Annie's age.

 Jacob the photobomber:

 Photobomb!

 Rachel discovered that candy corns can turn her into a vampire!

It was a fun-filled 3 weeks of break. We managed to get ONE thing on my to do list done, but lots of fun was had, so we'll call it a win. Now it's back to school and back to the regular routine. Thank goodness. :)