Tour of the Fire Department!

Yesterday morning we headed out to a picnic meet and greet of area geocachers.  We did this last year, and it was really fun!  Lunch is a potluck, and the area we meet it really awesome--there is a covered pavilion, a playground, built in grills, basketball courts, and the whole thing is fenced in!  We played at the playground first...

 It was a beautiful fall day!

 This little boy is getting more and more self-sufficient at playgrounds :)

 There is also a whole area with these nice swings!

 Cute brothers :)

 Hanging out with the statues

 And the fox statues.

 We were having a plenty good time eating and hanging out, but then the fire chief of Dumfries Triangle Volunteer Fire Department Station 503 offerred to take us back to the adjacent fire station and have a tour (his wife organizes the picnic each year)!!!  Um, yes please!!!

 Jackson loved sitting in all of the different trucks!  Graham only wanted to check them out from a distance...

 Seeing all of the controls

 Trying out the big seat

 Jackson was a great listener on our impromptu field trip!  We learned that fire engines carry hoses and other equipment to pump water while fire trucks carry the really big attached ladders.

 This was as close as Graham would get to sitting in the truck!

Fireman Jackson :)

We had a GREAT time on our private tour--made all of our days!  We also got loaded up with new hats, coloring pages, crayons, water bottles, band aid carriers, etc.!  

Trick or Treating and Friends at Stonebridge

I don't really think the picture below needs a caption!  LOL

Stonebridge Town Center hosts a Trick or Treat event a week before Halloween, and it is so fun to have another reason to wear our costumes!  Extra fun was that quite a few of our preschool friends all came as a group to go together!

Isaiah and Jackson with Noah and Amanda in front of them

Sweet Lillian loves Graham--she is so good at making him laugh :)

Lillian, Noah, Jackson and Isaiah :)

Vaughn, Alex, Noah, Jackson and Tag-along Graham

So cute posing by the pumpkin!

We all met at Wegmans and trick-or-treated through the store.  They do a really awesome job with employees dressed up in full costume, games, and about 10 stops for candy!  Then we ventured out to the rest of the shopping center for some more trick-or-treating in and out of restaurants and stores.  Josh met up with us about halfway through (hooray for extra hands!), and then we went back into Wegmans to all eat dinner together.  It was a tad chaotic, but overall a really fun night for friends!

Family Camping in Prince William Forest

The four of us went camping!!!  And, we had a wonderful time!!!  There was a lot to coordinate between work and school schedules, soccer games, all of the gear, campsite location, and nightfall.  We had our sights set on a campground near Fredericksburg, which would have been great last weekend since we had the long weekend to work with.  We would have just left Saturday morning and avoided the bad Friday traffic.  This weekend, however, we needed to leave Friday afternoon, so heading as far as Fredericksburg just wouldn't have worked with Josh getting home from work, loading the car, and setting up camp before dark.  We solved all of those problems by camping at Prince William Forest, which is practically in our backyard!  We had flexibility with time, and we were able to take both cars since it was so close, so we could bring pretty much anything.  

That being said, we still had to fight the dark and wet wood as we set up camp Friday night.  I was SO proud of myself since I set up almost the whole 10-person tent while Josh and the boys went to get firewood.  Josh worked so hard on the fire, and he finally got a pile of wet wood to burn!  Hooray!  After some dinner, we laid Graham down, and then Jackson got a little extra time to stay up which included s'mores :)

Love the face!

In the daylight, I showed off the tent I pitched :)  We LOVE it!  It was brand-new for this trip, and it has so much room!  Each of the boys has a separate "room," and Josh and I got a touch of privacy.  Last time we camped, we all were in a four person tent with a pack-n-play!

Playing around in the morning in new jammies.

Our pre-lunch activity was playing at one of our favorite playgrounds--The Bear Playground near the visitor center in the park.

Riding the bumblebee

That smile...

I like this one of the boys looking at each other

Such a climber!

We had SUCH a relaxing weekend, which we ALL needed!

Playing a little soccer

I think the light in this picture is so neat

Brothers :)

Tag!

Just relaxing!  Graham took a good little nap after lunch, and we played some Simon Says with Jackson, read a lot of books, and had a little quiet time while Jackson worked on building a small Lego set we brought with us.

After Graham woke up, we took a walk around the campground, and this was so much fun!  I loved seeing how other people set up their sites, and it was nice to see some new faces.

Collecting some more firewood on the way back to our site.

Pretty!

Of course, Graham thinks he would be an excellent helper with Lego building...

Little (ish) hands

Roasting hot dogs for Graham and Jackson's dinner

Josh and my places all set for our dinner of sausage, potato and pepper packets.  SOOO good!

Flat Stanley joined us on our camping weekend :)

Camping selfie!

Yesterday morning was a bit chillier, so we snuggled up under blankets and ready books by the fire!

Playing

A little more playing at The Bear Playground on our way out.

Steering

Posing with the big bear

And, then, Jackson posing with the big bear :)

Waiting for the leaves to fall down--this was a fun game!  We headed home shortly after this for lunch, naps, and soccer!  What a fun new family memory :)

Rewinding to before camping, Jackson has a Jog-a-thon at school!  It was on Friday right before we left.  It was a really nice day, and he has a great time!

Jackson is just on the left side of the middle running :)