THIRTY-SIX

 

Since we've been getting some unusual and lovely rain, the toads are coming out! Theo caught this one at school. 

2022 week thirty-six

For the long Labor Day weekend we drove up to Oklahoma. 

The first morning there was stunning and misty and cool. 

The kids were up before the sun and in the pasture ready to catch all the grasshoppers. 

Theo told his teacher he was going to Oklahoma, when she asked why he said, "To catch grasshoppers (duh)." 

He was very successful. 

There was definitely a hurricane of grasshoppers. Every step you took in the pasture there would rise up a little flurry of creatures.

Bones and bugs and tall grass -everything a boy could want. 

Erica and Melvin very generously took us to Krebs, a city known as Oklahoma's Little Italy. The food was great and we had our own little room to ourselves. Matt was a complete animal and had a migraine so he had to go throw up. The Crownovers will never invite us back. :) 

Theo digging in the dirt while Matt built some raised beds for Erica to try to make up for his migraine behavior. 

I spy three little monkeys in the tree. 

Theo forgot his bug net so he had to make do with a tennis racket. You can see the smoke rising from the ground where Melvin was roasting one of their former goats. 

He was up before the dawn to prepare the fire and let the goat roast all day in the ground. When he finally flipped off the cover there was a very dramatic burst of smoke. 

Unwrapping the African and Thai curries. Everything was so fantastic. He invited coworkers over who respectively refused to eat: lettuce, peaches, fish, or condiments of any kind... He made them eat goat. They were such great sports. Though I will say I don't give them too much credit for being brave because the goat was so delicious. 

Monday morning we left at 5:30 so we could make it to a friend's birthday party where 
Matt face painted for all the kids. Theo saw other boys getting creepy clown faces and snuck to ask Matt to give him a Joker face. Then he was embarrassed and wanted to wipe it off. 

Matt graciously just kept trucking with the kids that day while I went grocery shopping and mowed our jungle of a yard. They went to Buccees and then they went swimming at the cousins house. We had such a fun long weekend. We fit in probably 3 weekends worth of activities into three days. Theo teared up when he thought about how long it would be before he could go back to Oklahoma. Then he promptly fell asleep at 6pm.