Pumpkin Carving

Wednesday evening we headed over to Josh and Kelly's house to carve pumpkins with our small group. We had a blast. We got there and Hudson was in his Halloween costume as a monkey.

Hudson the monkey with all the pumpkins

Kelly, Josh, Mike and Sarah get started working on their pumpkins.
Heather, Matt and Meredith get their hands dirty cleaning out the guts.

Busy working; Mike and Sarah both had patterns from a book with skill level 3 out of 3! Josh (standing) printed off a pattern from the world wide web of Barack Obama.

Matt and Meredith are busy carving while Heather is looking for some different ideas for her pumpkin.

Mike and his finished jack o' lantern "3 Wolves at Midnight"

Josh, Hudson and Barack

The finished product glowing in the night!

I carved the one on the left with the skull and Matt carved the pumpkin on the right.

I carved a bird in it's cage on the backside of my pumpkin.

Mike's "3 Wolves at Midnight" and Sarah's owl, nice job you guys!

Josh's Obama pumpkin and Meredith spider and web.

Here is the whole crew with all the pumpkins. It was a night well spent with good food, good friends and good fun!

Heather's pumpkin in full use, she painted her pumpkin black and then scrapped off the paint, put a vase in the middle and it is now the center piece on our table with flowers in it, very creative!

dining room

Fall is here and with that brings more home projects. Last year we refinished our basement and this fall and into winter we are giving our main level a face lift. We started this weekend in the dining room. Here are some before pictures. Before we started it was a yellow.

Halfway through. We added bead board and a chair rail. We put the chair rail higher than a normal chair rail because we have a high top table. Heather is working hard!
The nearly finished project.

We just have a few touch up spots left to do and it will be done...on to the kitchen and entry way!

Murder Mystery Party

Saturday night, Heather and I went to a murder mystery party. The party was a 50's era theme and everyone was assigned a different character. We then were to dress like our given characters. During the game we found out different clues about each other and we had to try to figure out who was guilty of murder.
Derek and Joni all dressed up to go to the malt shoppe

Heather and I were the rebels of the group.
Slick hair and big hair make for a fun night!

Kim, Heather and Joni all fit their parts well!

A blast from the past.

The ladies of AFC (America's Family Coaches) having fun in the 50's!

The gang: Jon, Kim, Heather, myself, Joni and Derek

We had a rockin' good time at the party. Big thanks to the Caven's for hosting!

Night Eyes

Friday evening, Heather and I met up with Chad, Shay and Nathan to go to Night Eyes at the Blank Park Zoo. We met for an early supper at Applebee's.
Nathan is trying to decide what to order.

After Applebee's we headed over to the Zoo. The rain stopped and Nathan got into his costume. There was great discussion whether he was dressed up as a lizard or a crocodile or a dragon, either way he was looking good!
He was armed with his own trick-or-treat pumpkin bag and we were ready to go!

As we got in the doors, we saw everyone's favorite monkey, Curious George. Nathan was so excited he couldn't keep his eyes open.

Chad, Nathan and Shay heading into the Zoo to find some treats!

"This way guys!" Nathan says as he leads the way.
Heather and I found some "Wild Things" characters from my favorite book, "Where the Wild Things Are"

Nathan found a friend just his size.
Nathan showing Auntie Heather where to find the candy.
Nathan and his two princesses at their castle.

Nathan and I give a big "ROAR" as we head into the dragons mouth!

Night eyes...

...merry not scary.
The whole crew in the colorful pumpkin patch.

After the zoo, we headed back to our house to warm up and hang out. Nathan put on a drum concert!

He is a rockstar in the making

Nathan's imagination was running too, after his drum solo he noticed the column at the end of the staircase, which quickly turned into a fireman's pole.

From rockstar to firefighter...what a guy!

Marathon Update

Here are some more pictures from the Des Moines Marathon that Heather took on our camera.
Harbert going through the water station on the first leg of the relay.

Jen and Shay are running well, they have both picked up on Chad's running style of one arm in the air!

Over the bridge and to the finish Jen and Shay will go! That arm is still in the air.
Doing well in the 1/2 marathon, Shay gives a quick wave!

The fan club gets a workout too getting to the course.

Jen and Shay did awesome, here they are with their finisher medals!

Shay enjoying some breakfast pancakes, Nathan seems pretty interested in those pancakes.

Nathan trying some of Shay's pancakes and wouldn't you know, he likes them!

Coming down MLK on my way to the finish

Winning corporate relay team of Matt Harbert, Scott Patterson, myself, Caleb Brown and Anthony Cendana (in front)