Happy Halloween!

Happy Pumpkin Day to you mad scientists in Blacksburg, and all the bats in the New Mexican belfry, and all my other ghoulish readers, from our happy haunt!

I'm behind in my posting!!!

Last weekend we went to Roanoke, where there are many trains. This, apparently, is what Roanoke is famous for, to the extent that Roanoke is famous at all. lots and lots of trains. And a very big star.
I'm not entirely sure I understand this. Its a really big star, on top of a hill. At night it lights up. Its multi-colored. Apparently it started out as a Christmas decoration, and is now the symbol of the town (if you ignore trains). In that regard, its a remarkable monument to some serious spin. Ordinarily when you forget to take down Christmas decorations, you get heckled by your neighbors, and yet here, in Roanoke, you can leave your Christmas decor up for 60 years or so! Its not that we're lazy! Its the symbol of Roanoke! Seriously! We're not making that up just because we can't be bothered to take down Christmas decor from 1949!

Anyway, there is also Science in Roanoke.
Uncle Nick likes Science.Miss Jenn likes Science too. Really, she does. Thats not an I-don't-like-Science face. Seriously.

See, she looks a little bit happier with Science in this one. Sorta. Maybe if Uncle Nick hadn't zapped her on the nose, she'd be happier with Science.
The Widge didn't get zapped, and he loves Science. He loves Science so much, that we spent four hours in the Science Museum. We learned important science stuff, like really big tongues are funny.
And also: gee I'd feel much better if this plane had wings.
And: hey, these giant nail tables are cool!

So, in conclusion, if you like trains and science, go to Roanoke, The City That Also Has A Really Big Star.

a scant few photos for now

I have a million photos (give or take) from our weekend in Roanoke. here are three for now:

Pumpkins off the vine

How do you judge the sincerity of a pumpkin patch? This one looks fairly sincere to me.


Went to the Temple Hall Farm for their maze (which they cleverly spell MAiZE), and Festival of Fun yesterday, and it was, in fact, fun. We did the maze (if you see the photo on their website, we did the birthday cake section. The part with the words is apparently the night-time maze, although the thought of wandering through a cornfield in the dead of the night, in the middle of nowhere is too much to consider). I don't have any in-maze photos, although we were certainly in long enough to take several. The Widge was a trooper and walked most of it, and even lead the way for a while, although his success rate at picking paths was fairly low.

Instead of maze photos, please enjoy this photo of the Widge with some pigs:They also, as the Widge explained to Uncle Stan today, had goats, cows, turkeys, chickens, horses, and ponies. We especially like the ponies because they're small and fuzzy. We don't quite like them enough to take a free pony ride, though. We did ride the cow train, and there would have been photos, but apparently Dzia was unsuccessful in that attempt, because there are no cow train photos on my memory card. I have a hay ride photo:
yes, the Widge looks bewildered in basically all the photos. It was an exciting day, what with the pigs (who also ran in pig races, which is our favorite type of race. Its clearly far superior to NASCAR in every way), the hay fort:

which you could also go through:
the pumpkin picking (which lead to pumpkin washing today:)
the corn cannon (note to da Boy: can we rig up a pine cone cannon in the yard?), the maze and cow train (maybe its better I don't have photos. A non-professional-photographer-and-therefore-technically-not-qualified-to-comment friend pointed out the horrific blurriness of my photos recently.) and, best of all, the corn box!

yup, its a box filled with corn.
it totally merits three photos.


Also, for general info purposes, check out the Backyardigans. Even if you don't have kids, you'll enjoy the music and quirky plot lines (I'm thinking of you specifically, Stan, and also Matt). Beware, they are Canadian, like Max and Ruby, and are clearly part of a conspiracy for our entire entertainment culture to be fully controlled by Canada (stay tunes, this may eventually develop into a full-fledged conspiracy theory.) Anyway, you can even see them on you tube, if, for some reason, you don't want to be bothered actually watching Nickelodeon. I much prefer them to Yo Gabba Gabba, which I unfortunately saw about 5 minutes of today.

Trees!

visited the VA arboretum today!
the Widge loved it, because there were rocks to climb and fields to run though. Luckily for him, it wasn't until the end of our visit that I noticed a helpful sign asking visitors to not climb on rock walls, since they are apparently a preferred residential zone for friendly neighborhood copperheads.
Look, there's the Widge with Grandma! Grandma is the real nature fan here. I think nature is just swell, but not so much so that I'd want to actually maintain any of it on an ongoing basis. Grandma, on the other hand, is an aficionado, she maintains all sorts of natural things, like her yard, the houseplants, the dog, the compost heap, etc. The Widgie is deeply grateful to Grandma for having such a nice yard.And I'm sure the rest of you are grateful to Grandma for taking the photo of me!