The Rhodes Family

Pumpkin Carving in Tuscaloosa, Al

Daniel and I took a road trip to Tuscaloosa this weekend to carve pumpkins with Ben and Sarah.  Ben and I did discuss at one point, that if someone had told our fifteen year old selves, that one day we would be carving pumpkins together in Alabama, both with American other halves, we would have found that hard to believe.  But anyway, on with the pumpkins..

 

Daniel and Sarah dig in:

 

 

Jazzie came too, she kept a close eye on the neighbourhood squirrels:

 

I don't think Ben had ever carved a pumpkin before, obviously not too impressed with the process:

 

Sarah became fed up with his lack of enthusiasm:

 

Just kidding:

 

I think we started drinking at about this point, so I put my camera away and used the iphone to record the results.

 

Sarah's (did I mention she's an artist?)

 

Daniel and Sarah proudly display their efforts:

 

That was it for the pumpkins, after that we moved inside, and i wowed them with my secret recipe of butter/garlic stuffed hamburgers.

But this morning, after a massive breakfast, we headed to the University where Sarah is teaching for a semester, and had a look around.

 

Iron Giant sculpture:

 

 

The obligatory iphone self-portraits:

 

Impressive buildings:

 

And that was it, then we got in the car and drove five long hours home.

 

Iphone Goings Ons

A few things that we were up to this weekend:

 

Daniel - cute as always.

 

He had to come to crossfit me, and snapped this of us all working out.

 

Abbie got stung again by a hornet, it caused a nervous breakdown, and she spent almost the whole day recovering from it in this position.

 

Bow season opened, and Papa Dusty came over while Matt was practising, gave it a try.

 

Real hunters never wear a shirt.

 

Daniel and I spent Saturday afternoon with Bill out at the lease.

 

I would have thought Daniel was perfectly suited for sitting silently in a stand for hours on end, but no, every ten minutes - whisper, whisper 'I'm hungry', 'this is so uncomfortable', 'how much longer' etc etc

 

Beauty berries in the yard to wrap things up.

Garden Club

Friday afternoons are 'club day' at Daniel's school, which means all the 5th graders picked a club they would like to be in, and they meet and do 'club like activities'.  Somehow, Daniel wound up in Garden Club, taught by the art teacher - he's very nice, but somewhat lacking in gardening knowledge, so I somehow became recruited for garden club coach.

Bill's company donated a lot of our material, so far we have built three raised beds, filled them, and got some veggies growing.  The kids really are a lot of fun to work with, some of them had no idea that food actually grows in dirt.  Here they are putting the soil together, and planting out some seedlings.  We've done a mix of seedlings, and direct sow.

 

 

 

A couple of quick pictures from my iphone yesterday afternoon, we're having some nice success.  The biggest challenge will be getting them to eat some of it:

 

A little note about the iphone:  Bill and I both got the new 4s this week, and I'm really having fun with the camera on it, so probably lots more iphone photography will pop up on the blog.

It's The American Way

Hard to believe I've lived in the states for about 17 years now, but I'd never shot a gun before this afternoon.  So, Bill and I headed out into the country this weekend with some friends to take a tactical safety gun class.  It was kind of scary for me, I'd never even handled a gun before.  My aim was pretty poor, so all the folks hoping I can help out during the EMP - I'll stick to cooking.

 

Me - badass:

 

My friend, Brianne - super badass:

 

Elizabeth - focussed:

 

I expect I'll get a call from the SAS any day now.

Eleven

Eleven today. We love you, Daniel.