The Lieslands

The kids have been pretty excited about buckeyes this year, and the prospect of growing their own tree. We planted a buckeye garden to further along the process. Each of the kids planted two and we’ll see what comes up in the spring!

We went fishing tonight at Saylorville Lake. Andrew caught our only fish of the year on his last cast. While the fishing could have been more sucessful, we did get to see a Blue Heron, a Bald Eagle, and a pelican. There was also live music from the marina across the water and the moon was very close to being nice and full.

After fishing we headed to TCBY for some frozen yogurt and the kids got to play the peg game, which Mari managed to master on her first try.

This afternoon we headed to the Wills Family Orchard to enjoy some fun autumn festivities. The kids had a great time in their corn maze and we left full of apple treats.

We put in a new sandbox for the Bean Sprout school. We ordered 9 tons of sand!

This evening we celebrated Susan’s birthday with the Liess clan. As usual it was a beautiful, late-summer evening.

The kids had their first day of school today. Andrew, 3rd grade, and Mari, 1st grade, continue their homeschool work. Elliot and Andy are in the Playgarden class this year. They were all excited to get going and had good days.

We finally got a good rain, and the kids jumped at the chance to go play in it.

Most of the baby preparation is complete and everyone is excited! Susan is almost 8 months pregnant and the baby is getting big!

Soccer practice starts this week. All three kids are playing this year. Last night Elliot had his first practice. There are only 6 kids on the team, but John let siblings join in and it turned out to be a rather large crew.

We hit the Iowa State Fair last night and had a great time. The kids always enjoy the eclectic mix the fair has to offer. This year we stumbled across a hypnotist’s show, which amazed and amused us all.

After flirting with it for years, we finally got a piano. Andrew has been interested for a while and has been playing around a lot on his keyboard. His third grade curriculum calls for a musical instrument so we think that now is the time. Hopefully his lessons will start soon!