Ahhhhh this is my favorite time of year. I love that things start to cool down enough that I don't have to water my lawn all of the time so of course this means that we don't have to mow the lawn either. This time of year also means no more weeding HOOOORAH!!! (Insert fist pumping action while saying this. It's the only way to get the full effect.) But absolutely best of all is that Fall means that the leaves are turning and MOST important of all . . . HALLOWEEN!!! We always go to at least 2-3 pumpkin patches in October. I think mostly because Brian doesn't want to see me pout about not getting to go to all the neat ones that they have around here. We went to the patch at the Red Barn this weekend to pick out little ones for the kids to paint. I think that the best thing that I found was the praying mantis that I tried to convince Brian and Mike to pick up. What a couple of sissy's! Who would have thought that a small little bug could turn my hubby and father in law into whimpering little girls! :) We did find some cute pumpkins for the kids Dallen kept picking one up only to put it down 2 seconds later for the one that was perfect! Seriously though I really did think of taking that cute little bug home for Bri. Maybe that's why he keeps looking at me out of the corner of his eye every time that I walk into the room. He knows that I have sneaky intentions! Something else we do every year around this time is Brian taking the fam on a drive up into the canyons so that we can see the leaves changing. This has very quickly become one of my all time favorite traditions! The mountains and canyons this time of year are absolutely beautiful! The only draw back I would have to say is the hiking. There is seriously few positives that I can come up with where you combine A great big woman chasing after kids who have way more energy then should be humanly possible UP HILL! This just tends to make me fell grumpy. . . I feel the need to cheer my self up with a brownie.

Ok better now. This year we went up Payson Canyon which was a new one for us. This is my new favorite spot. As we drove up the canyon we saw a sign for Maple Lake. Now this could have gone either way. We knew that it would be either a super cool place where the lake was surrounded by pine trees and the maples that were turning colors or it could be a mud hole. Lucky for us it was not a mud hole. We got to show the kids what cat tails were. I think that Kaden and Dallen were disappointed to find out that they were plants and not cats that had been buried with their tails sticking out, but hey that's little boys for you. We were really disappointed that we hadn't brought our fishing poles though. The fish were literally jumping out of the water. It was just such a neat place. I'm going to have to talk Bri into taking us back there. Something tells me that I'm not going to have to twist his arm too much though.

My favorite picture of Maple Lake

Our most recent Family picture. . . Get it while you can cause it will be the only one for a while.

Cutest punkins I ever saw!

Finally the perfect one. He only picked up and put down every other one in the patch!