palmer fall festival

i got an email from a friend in our ward about a children's fall festival a few weekends back and decided to check it out with brynn. steve had to work that saturday (end of year fiscal year for the finance/budget department in the air force) so we tagged along with our neighbors. it was such a beautiful day, so it was nice to not worry about bringing a butt load of warm jackets, gloves and other cold weather paraphernalia with us. brynn had a blast winning prizes at the little games they had spread out over the place so it was nice to not have to worry about entertaining her. of course i was EXHAUSTED and wish steve was there to help me, but we didn't stay too long so it worked out ok. here are a few of the little games she played:

picking the duck with an X so you could win...a rubber duck! you can never have enough rubber ducky's at bath time. steve enjoys this too when he takes his weekly bubble baths.

tossing a ball into the pigs mouth. brynn definitely has her mothers 'arm' and didn't actually get the ball in, but they were still nice and gave her a little farm animal finger puppet.

bowling...again, brynn decided the game was much more enjoyable if you just wacked the heck out of the pins while holding onto the ball the whole time. that's my girl!

digging for potatoes in a trough of dirt. she walked away from this little stand with a red potato and nasty soggy carrot and was not too impressed. of course i forgot to take these items out of my purse for a few days so you can imagine how EXCITED i was to discover them...nothing like looking like a freak at the grocery store digging for your wallet only to come out with a limp carrot and a "WTH" expression on your face.

posin' with our neighbor (her best friend, prince charming, and future husband if you ask her) thomas in the animal petting area. i didn't let her stay long as the area was filled with pig and sheep crap and i didn't want that stuff tracked in my car.

i promised her that she could pick out a pumpkin on our way out, and this is what she choose. i tried to convince her to find one a little larger (as it was the same price), but she was dead set on bringing this "baby green pumpkin" home. it sits in the middle of our table where she can admire it all she wants.

haven't had a picture in a while with brynn, so here ya go. trust me, its much MUCH better without the belly in it.


the leaves started to change colors the very end of august/early september around this area and i failed to take pictures of them when they looked amazing! so here, are a few pictures from the palmer area on our way home that are just ok...the colors were much more vibrant then below a week before, so maybe i can catch them next year.

i have to explain this next picture so you can fully appreciate it in all it's glory. on the drive into palmer, we passed this smoking uncle rico van off on the shoulder and i was immediately curious as to what was making it smoke! it seriously looked like a barbeque, but i wasn't sure as i was driving and had to be responsible and watch the road. so, i told myself i would stop and take a picture if it was there on my drive back. to my joy, it was so i pulled behind it pretending to look at a map in case someone saw me. just as i snapped a few pictures, a scraggly middle aged man emerged from the drivers side and spent the rest of the time i was there admiring his tires. i wanted to get a picture from the front too as it was just too odd! but since i was alone with brynn, i didn't think it was such a good idea. this guy obviously lives in this pimped out van complete with a bike on top, some sort of smoker/heat source next to the bike, with lots of tarps. definitely makes you appreciate what you have. i felt awful for finding this humorous at first.