October Awesomeness

Wow October has been chocked full of events from the 1st to the 31st!  Lots of pictures to share too: 

I ran my 11th half marathon on Oct 1st.  This was the first time I have run by myself and Will and the boys cheered me on.  It was fun to know I was going to have a small cheering crowd throughout the race.  I expected to see them maybe twice but they kept popping up all over the race course, it was a lot of fun.

This was definitely not my fastest half.  But I knew it wasn't going to be and I didn't care.  I'm to the point where I just want to run, have fun and enjoy it and not worry too too much about my times.  

Meet Color Kitty.  (Grants latest addition to his Stuffed Animal family)  We went to Cracker Barrel after my race to celebrate and Grant just felt he had to have this little cat.  He forfeited all his allowance money and brought her home with us.  She had already had many adventures with Grant.

ORLANDO FLORIDA/LEGOLAND TRIP!:

We all survived our longest road trip yet and had an amazing time with family!  

Our Mission:  All Catron Sisters and Parents arrive in Olrando Florida for a weekend of family fun and LegoLand!

  We took 3 days to get there.  (2.5 hrs driving Wed night, 6 hrs Thursday, and 5.5 hours Friday).  Then our return trip was 2 days 6.5 hours one day and 7.5 the next.

Faces from the back seat:  

The boys are such good seasoned travelers they did great!  They journaled, played video games, watched movies, ate LOTS of snacks, and only asked us how much longer about 20 million times. 

We traveled there and back with Mom and Dad.  We all drove in our own vehicles but stayed at the same hotels and night.  It was great to have them there to greet us and visit with everywhere we went!

Once we made it to Orlando we got to check into our cool resort for the weekend and meet up with everyone!

Here was a much anticipated (by the boys) a pokemon card trading session:

I call this "cousining"

To say we were all excited to go to LegoLand would be an understatement, it was pretty much a dream come true!  There were 16 of us in the group, and we were a bit slow moving at times but we all enjoyed the day from the opening of the park to the close.

Mini land was very cool!  (I probably could have spent another hour there by myself just studying all the little details.)

SISTERS!

The Castle Kingdom world was one of our favorites. 

4D movie (and a much needed break from the heat)

All the kids!

After Legoland we had a fun family dinner at Chuy's and all the kids got the coolest balloon art!

Here is the view from our Balcony.  The pool was very big and mostly shallow, perfect for kids.

The view from Sally and Annie's Balconies on the other side of the hotel.  I could almost touch the Epcot ball in Disney World.  We could see the fireworks from there every night.

I spotted an Otter at the pond one morning and watched him play for over 10 minutes.  (pictures weren't very good)

TWINS!!

How many Catrons, Rowlands, Stahr's, and McQuaids can you fit in an Elevator??

Kids at the Lego Ninjago Movie.

Beautiful sunrise on our last morning.

So long Orland and Family we had a wonderful time!!

Back to life in the real world.  Rex and Grant both entered pictures in the Fairview Heights Park Dist annual fall/halloween kids picture contest.  The 1st day we got back Rex came home with a paper that said his picture had been picked as one of the top pictures in his grade.  We went to the cake and punch event that evening where the winners were announced and Rex won 1st place for 2nd Grade!!  He was very excited...not to mention he got $20!!

Rex's picture is the 3rd one at the top and says Happy Halloween.

Fall boys

We've been playing hide and seek in the evening at dusk, the boys have a new favorite hiding place...

We had our 1st sick day of the year.  Luckily Rex recovered quickly and no one else got it. (Although Grant tried very hard to be sick)

Both Rex and Grant got selected as student of the Month for their classes this month!  (This was the day Rex was home sick so he had to miss it).  They are both very good students we are very proud of them!

Will has been to 2 different trainings this month with his ILEAS (Swat) team.  First he was gone for 3 days to Indiana for a whole team training.  Then he got to go to Mississippi for a week for an advanced range course.

I've been a chaperone several times lately.  Grant's class went to a pumpkin patch, Rex's class went to Purina Farms, and both classes went bowling for 1st Qtr Good behavior.  Whew.  

This is the 1st Semester Awards Assembly Rex won the Reading Award in his Class.

HALLOWEEN FUN:

Pumpkin Carving time (the same pumpkins from my Garden) 

Rex tried sticking his hand in the pumpkin this year....but only with a glove on.

They turned out so GOOD!!   

 Iron Man and Captain America!! 

 (were hoping it more of a Avengers Assemble kind of night and not Captain America Civil War)

Grant had to do a Kindergarten Book report where they picked a book, and then decorated a pumpkin like their favorite character from the book.  Then they will all talk about their books on Halloween day at School.  Grant's Favorite book is the Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett. (we read it all year long)  So we decided to turn Grant's pumpkin into a Gingerbread House!!  Grandma Cindy helped A LOT, they both had a great time and it turned out so cute.  He is very very proud of it!!

Deer Party in the backyard!