Superhero At School

Emma's classroom has a theme this year of superheroes, and being a superhero in different ways.  As part of this, all the kids were supposed to come (at least if they wanted to) dressed as a superhero, either a known one, or a made-up one.  Emma didn't really want to go as a mainstream superhero, so we decided to make one up.  She went as Wonder Meadows.  We got her a little cape, and some superhero hair clips, and added some lettering to the cape and her shirt.  She went with the Superman colors (or you could say the Wonder Woman colors).

Dinner with Elvis

Emma has become more and more interested in Elvis Presley lately, not sure why, but we discovered that a cute diner near us occasionally has an Elvis impersonator come and perform.  So we thought it would be fun to go check it out over dinner.  It was a cooky, but fun evening.  And the Elvis guy wasn't too bad.

Annual Fall Photo Shoot

Every year in the Fall we go take some pictures of Emma.  My favorite girl in my favorite season - it just makes sense.  I always love the shots we get, and am always amazed how good they turn out.  I guess with such a great subject they'd be hard to mess up.  And for the record, only one of these photos has been edited, and that one only by the tiniest margins.  The day was just perfect.  The lighting was wonderful.  Always one of my favorite parts of the season.

She always has to flash us a goofy look or two.

To top off the perfect day, we had a gorgeous sunset that night.

Camp Timberlee

Last week Emma went on a field trip with her class.  It was a long all-day activity.  They had to be to the school at 6:45AM and didn't get back until 5:30PM.  She had so much fun though.  Since he's never been on one of her field trips with her (I have been on many), Eric decided it would be fun to take the day off work and go with her.  I was so happy they had this fun day together.

There were several activities they did while at this camp.  They started off learning a few outdoor survival skills, including making a fire.  They were also able to pet and hold several different animals, go horseback riding, do some leather working, and do a team building exercise.  Lunch was provided in the middle of the day.  What a fun day though!  And the weather was perfect for them to be outside.

I love how goofy Emma is.  Not sure why she's making the
face she is, but I love everything about it!

In case you can't tell, that's a ferret she's holding.

Love her cute little feet.  This one was taken for my sister though.  She knows why. ;)

Leather working.

She made a bookmark.  One of the options was adding stripes, which she obviously did.

Team building exercise.  They had to all get across the rope swing.  Part of
this including figuring out how to reach the rope which was hanging in
the middle.  If any of the kids couldn't get across, they all had to start over.

Peanutized

Couldn't resist turning ourselves into peanuts characters.  I actually think they're pretty
accurate, even though we were somewhat limited by the options we could choose.

Chicago Symphony Orchestra

Earlier this month Eric was able to take Emma on a date to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.  It was a weeknight, so it made for a super late night (they didn't get home until about midnight), but it was worth it.  Emma loved it (as did Eric of course)!  In case you're wondering, they played several Brahms pieces.  The symphony is only a block or two from the bean, so they grabbed dinner and wandered over there before the symphony started.  The pictures are from Eric's phone, so the quality isn't great, but still capture all the fun.

September Fun

A couple standout activities from September were going to a cookout with friends and, of course, the super moon.  We went with several other families to a fun little campground where we all cooked dinner over the fire.  It was low key - everyone brought their own stuff.  But it is always so much fun to sit around a campfire and chat and laugh while the kids are having fun running around, playing games, and exploring.  The weather was perfect too.  Seems like it usually rains when we try this.  Sometimes we'll camp overnight too, but this year we had a really early saturday baptism to go to, so we just stayed late in the evening and then went home.

Exploring around one of the many paths, Emma was being silly.  I love this
silly walk.  It's just so her.  I'd be able to spot it a mile away as being Emma.

For the super moon we just went outside and looked up.  Great view.  We watched the eclipse happen and then enjoyed the beautiful orange glow from the moon.  We looked through Eric's old telescope, and tried taking a couple pictures.  The pictures turned out a bit blurry, but are still fun to look at.