Spend Overs, Honey Harvest and Pumpkin Patch

Piper had a spend over with her friend Hazel a few weeks ago. They had so much fun and it was super cute to kind of hear them chatting way, so excited to be staying up late.  It was 9:30pm before they finally fell asleep, which is pretty late for Piper's usual 7:30pm bedtime.  At around 9:00pm when I went up to check on them, Piper asked "if it was midnight?"    

Hazel and Piper on their first spend over at 17 months

Oh man I love these boys!  They are so darn cute in these hand me down PJ's of Pipers.  Jett screamed at first, but finally came around to the ballerina's and Calvin had no problems with his pink monkeys.  I don't think I'll ever get over how cool I think it is to have twins.  Watching their differences and interactions together is so interesting and fun.  I love seeing them play together.  Piper was around friends her own age a lot, but she always seemed disinterested in the other kids and pretty much did her own thing.  These buddies are always together and totally play together, they chase each other, bounce a ball back and forth, zoom cars, look at books together or play with their own toys, but somewhat near each other.  How lucky to be a buddy!  

Holy honey!  Our bees were busy this year.  It is so fun having the hive in the front yard and watching them busily buzzing away and returning with heavy loads of pollen on their legs.  It is a beautiful thing to watch and such a cool hobby.  Not to mention the successful harvest of 67 lbs of honey this year.  Go team bees!  Yum!

We had the extra help of my mom in town for the honey harvest this year which was a huge help to have her keep the boys busy, as it is an all day project to extract the honey, filter out the floating wax and dead bees and of course fill all the jars.  Piper's favorite part is being the official honey licker which is an important role to keep a tidy work space while filling the jars.

Speaking of my mom...Grandma Linda is officially retired from her 25+ years working at the Seattle Public Library.  Yay! She now has the freedom to come down for several weeks at a time.   We have a great connection with the landlord of our old rental 2 blocks away and we can rent the apartment above the garage as our official Grandma headquarters.  This works well for the longer stays and makes for a fun special treat for Piper to have spend over's with Grandma.

We love all the extra help with the kids and of course they love all the extra love and special attention from Grandma.  And there is the added bonus of my mom constantly helping to clean, wash dishes, run to the grocery store and fold laundry.  My house has never been so tidy!  =-)  

Our play group all met out at the pumpkin patch last Friday.  What a beautiful day full of fun.  We got to do a hay ride and feed the cows, try to catch chickens and pet bunnies and pigs, and play in the hay maze, tube slides and obstacle course.  After all that we forgot to pick a pumpkin from the field!
  

Feeding the cows was an exciting event, they basically chased the tractor we were riding on until we stopped.  Piper and Jett loved feeding the cows, Calvin was not so sure and kept a tight hold on Grandma.

With a day like this, I can officially accept that summer is gone, but only because our Fall has been so nice.  I even snuck in paddle board outing during nap time, what a beautiful day.  Thanks Grandma!