Soccer Starts

Fall soccer has started up and our first games were yesterday morning. Our weekends for the next nine weeks will be looking a little like this:

Henry's team this season is The Hot Shots. He is playing with one friend from pre-K and has four new teammates and an amazing coach! Go Hot Shots!

Henry made two goals and an assist in the first game. After his first goal, he ran to his coach for a high five.

Love this shot! Coach Joe Bill said Henry was an animal out there.

Even at 8:30, Henry was a sweaty mess.

But this boy finally loves soccer 

and is having a blast.

When Will wasn't cheering on his brother, he was busy reading a book, of course!

Will's game was immediately after Henry's. They both have dark green jerseys this year.

Will's team is the Alligators.  

Go go 'Gators!

Soccer season is busy for sure, but we have made some incredible friends through soccer and love watching our boys learn new skills and become better athletes. Fall soccer rocks!

Lately: Cub Scouts, Homework and Two Museums

We have had another busy week! Will officially join the Cub Scouts a few weeks ago and just got his uniform last weekend. He has been busy learning the Cub Scout promise and is working on the other items so he can earn his first badge!

Henry got his first homework assignment this week and completely surprised me by loving it and working on it for almost an hour. (His homework is only about 10 minutes each night, but he worked ahead and did the extra enrichment assignment.)

The boys had their first early release day of the year. We celebrated our free afternoon by having lunch with Daddy at the MFAH and then visiting the Children's Museum. I know I've said it before, but early afternoons are the only time to visit the Children's Museum. The boys love the grocery store and had plenty of time to play cashier!

On Thursday, we went to the members preview of the new Disease Detectives exhibit at the Health Museum. They had children's crafts, food and of course the first peek at the new exhibit.

This exhibit was completely interactive and so much fun for the kids. There were three patients, and for each one you had to examine the patient, study the symptoms and analyze blood or other samples to determine what caused the illness -- just like doctors and lab techs do.   

Henry took this patient's temperature and listened to his breathing. We figured out he had the flu! Another patient had malaria and the third had E. coli.

Here is Henry with a model of influenza

and tuberculosis.

Will learned about Lyme disease, which we heard a lot about this summer in Maine and Vermont. 

They even had Disease Detective signs! You know my boys love a cut-out.

The boys decorated germs too. This is Henry's

and this is Will's.

Also this week, I started taking a photography class and purchased a new camera after discovering that my Canon Rebel from 5 years ago is hopelessly out of date and the reason for so many dark pictures in low light. I played lots with my new camera, and Henry was a always willing subject. I have lots to learn but am really excited about it!

The big news for Henry was that, after six months, he is finally graduating to the real violin. We are proud and excited, and happy to hear Henry play his first Suzuki variation on the E string, squeaks and all. 

And of course you can still find Will with a nose in a book most of the time. He got to celebrate his love of reading with a special luncheon at school for the Millionaire's Club, which is HISD's summer reading program. His name was even announced over the loudspeaker for having read the most books (113 chapter books!) this summer and he won a t-shirt.

Fall is always a busy time for our family, with weekends full of soccer, fall festivals and family outings, and school days full of music lessons, homework and soccer practice, but we love it. 

Harvest Moon Celebration

Did you see the Harvest Moon last week? It lit up the night sky after soccer and the boys and I were mesmerized! 

By coincidence, we had read By the Light of the Harvest Moon by Harriet Ziefert the night before and discovered that the Harvest Moon is the full moon closest to the fall equinox, which was Sunday. In the story, the farmers work late into the night, bringing in the harvest by the light of the moon. Once the farmers go to bed, leaf people appear magically on the wind and have a harvest party complete with bobbing for apples, stacking pumpkins in towers and a full spread of fall desserts. 

The boys and I decided to throw our own harvest celebration and learn about the moon at the same time. (The teacher in me can't resist!) We got our moon books together and planned crafts, a science experiment and cooking. In addition to Harriet Ziefert's story, we read The Moon Seems to Change by Franklyn Branley, Long Night Moon by Cynthia Rylant, Thanking the Moon by Grace Lin, and Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert. Long Night Moon and Thanking the Moon were good stories to show the importance of the harvest moon in Native American and Chinese cultures. 

Because the leaf people throw a harvest dessert party in By the Light of the Harvest Moon, we decided to make our first pumpkin pie of the season. The boys are such good helpers.  

My dad's secret to a delicious pumpkin pie is to add one cooked sweet potato to the filling. It makes such a difference in the taste of the pie. Here Henry helped me mash up our baked sweet potato.

The best part is getting to eat the dessert!

Next, we got messy with puffy paint to make our own moons. The recipe for puffy paint is one part glue to three parts shaving cream. Mix it all together in a bowl and dig in!

 We drew our moon shapes on sturdy cereal boxes and got to work.

I love how the puffy paint dries and actually looks like craters on the moon! 

Next was our science experiment, which we got from The Moon Seems to Change. This book is the perfect expository text to explain the moon's phases to young elementary school children. For the experiment, you need a flashlight, pencil and orange. We drew a line around the orange and put an X on one side. 

The orange is the moon, Henry is the earth, and the flashlight is the sun. Henry turned in circle holding the orange slightly above his head, with the X facing him. I aimed the flashlight at his orange and as he turned, he could literally see the phases of the moon. It was a great experiment that both boys loved doing!

Our final craft was to make a leaf man. We read Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert and of course, By the Light of the Harvest Moon features leaf people as well. We had fun gathering our leaves at school and in Memorial Park. This is Henry's leaf man. Can't you almost see him running off to enjoy a harvest celebration?

After learning all about the moon and celebrating the harvest, now we just need another cool front to head our way and bring fall weather back to Houston!

Fall

Yesterday was the autumnal equinox, the first day of fall, and it was fitting that Houston had its very first true cool front blow in over the weekend. After three or four months of hot, sticky, sweaty weather, every Houstonian I know is more than ready to welcome fall with its cooler temps, plethora of pumpkins, and many opportunities to get outside and play. Yesterday was no exception for our family. I started the morning with my first run in three months. I am happy to admit that I am a fair-weather runner. When it is 80 degrees at 6 am, I am a happy, sweaty power walker. But once the temps dip back into the 60s, I'm excited to get outside and run. Yesterday was the perfect day to get my run on again!

After church, we loaded up our car with a picnic lunch and headed to Memorial Park to eat. I don't know what it is about a picnic, but the food somehow tastes so much better when eaten outside, with my favorite people. Lunch was so simple but so good!

After lunch, we headed over to the Arboretum for a hike. Will took this picture of Gene and me because we finally got some good hiking bags so we can lug water and cameras along without killing our backs. You can't really tell from this picture, but our bags suit our personalities perfectly. Mine was a gift from the National Wildlife Federation, while Gene's, which says Peace, Love, Understanding, was a gift from The Economist. 

We hiked a bunch of new-to-us trails around the Arboretum,

checked out the pond, 

and saw all kinds of wildlife, from dragonflies and butterflies to turtles and cardinals. We even spotted a big hawk (Henry thinks it was a red-tailed hawk) soaring high above us!

The Arboretum is such a special place for us. We are so lucky to have a beautiful natural spot in the heart of our great big city.  

Our day ended with dinner al fresco at Piola. (Thanks, Katy, for the recommendation!)

Yesterday was just a little taste of fall, since warmer temps are heading back our way, but I am so glad we spent a gorgeous day outside. We are so looking forward to spending many, many more hours in the great outdoors in the coming months.