Back at the beginning of October when Halloween decorations went up Mason found a love for pumpkins. Every time he walks past our pumpkins he stops and points to them one at a time and I have to say, "Mason's pumpkin, Daddy's pumpkin, Mommy's pumpkin" as he points to each one. He would point out pumpkins at the grocery store, as we drove down the street, on TV, anywhere there was a pumpkin he knew about it. I guess we can just add this to Mason's obsessions list. 
When it came time to carve his pumpkin Mason would not stick his hand in it to pull out the seeds, but once we got the seed out he loved playing with them. Then he decided to scoop all the seeds back into the pumpkin where they came from. (Sorry about the pictures, our camera was on some funky setting.) 
Mason was thrilled when his pumpkin had a lid he could take off and on. 
The finished product. 
Mason was a monkey for Halloween. His favorite part of the costume was the "Nana" he got to carry around. 
Mason was Curious George and I was the Man in the Yellow Hat. 
Scott dressed up as Mickey Mouse for Trick-or-Treating because Mason just discovered Mickey Mouse and loves him!! He realized Mickey Mouse is on his diapers so if you ask him where Mickey is he will point to his diaper (most of the time it is his pants he actually points to, but he knows Mickey is under them.) 
Mason enjoyed Trick-or-Treating but didn't really understand the concept of filling his pumpkin bucket with candy. He would get a piece of candy and when I would try and help him put it in his bucket he would hold it out and babble something to me. I'm pretty sure he was telling me, "Mom, why do I need to go get more candy when I have some perfectly good M&Ms here I haven't eaten yet." We would end up stopping to eat the candy then going to the next house, then eating the candy, then going to the next house. I don't think Mason ever had more than 2 pieces of candy in his bucket and we didn't end up going to very many houses. 
We went down to Scott's work to go trick-or-treating around the office with Mason's friends Jackson and Halle. We were sad Katelyn wasn't there.
This was the giant bouncing bubble. Mason wanted to do it with all the big kids and was getting bounced all over the place and laughing hysterically the entire time. 
They have these sheds filled 2 feet high with corn. It was a mix between a sandbox and the pits filled with balls. 
Grandpa took Mason on a bike ride. 
Once Cannon got going on the bikes we couldn't get him off. 
They had all sorts of slides for the kiddos to go down. 
Kennedy had fun crawling around the pumpkin patch. 
Don't mind my cheesy smile. 
We didn't take Mason in the real corn maze at all, but he really liked the mini corn mazes. 
Daddy and Mason went on a tractor ride through the pumpkin patch.
Here I am with Kennedy and Mason. These guys come to the tailgate every week, but usually come home with me so we can take naps (yes me too) while everyone else goes to the game. 
Mason, Scott, and crazy Uncle Beetle in front of the Camp's cougarmobile. 
We don't just tailgate, we tailgate in style. 
Going to the game 2-3 hours early to tailgate has its disadvantages like missing all the other NCAA football action....oh wait, not if you're at the Camp's tailgate party where they have a satelite hookup and you can watch all the games while tailgating. 
Here are the masterminds behind every tailgate, Brad and Tyson (in the middle). Thanks guys for all you do to make every game a fun time.
Every year August brings with it an end to the summer. The end has always been defined for us by the first day of school; but this year, with no one in our family attending school, there has not been a specific date to tell us when summer is over. I was really excited and thought this meant our summer could go on for another month or two. So, when I found out that last week was the final week Scera Pool was open I realized this is the end of summer as we know it. The pool has been Mason and my second home this summer with us spending almost as many afternoons there as we spent at home. Mason loved the pool from the very first time I took him and his love has grown over the summer. Now I have to be careful driving down State Street with him because if we pass the pool he starts to cry when we don't stop. I know that we can still play in the backyard pool and sprinklers, but its just not the same. Now that the weather is actually a little cooler we will have to replace pool time with park time which Mason really loves, too. I am now faced with the problem of finding new activites that get us out of the house and entertain Mason during the winter months. I have been looking into places like Little Gym or things that we can sign up for, but I haven't found anything I am sure about yet. Do any of you have suggestions? Please let me know even if you've just heard about fun places to go or fun things to do with toddlers. We will miss the pool greatly and can't wait to go back next year. Since we missed a whole summer of blogging, here are some of pictures of Mason enjoying his summer. 
Mason playing drums on Rock Band. 
Mason is obsessed with lawn mowers. Whenever Scott mows the lawn Mason has to mow with his lawn mower. 
Rachel and Mason on 4th of July. 
Mason really likes to balance things on his head and he's pretty good at it. 
Mason putting on daddy's shoes before bed. This is the smile he gives me whenever I get out the camera. 
Mini putt putt. 
Playing with blocks. 
Popcicles....yum
As the mother of a 1-year-old, when I count teeth I am generally counting to see if the number has increased, but last night this was not the case. It all started with a trip to Home Depot for family home evening. I will be the first person to admit I have an extremely busy and mischievious little boy who can get into his share of trouble, but on this outting he was being a good little boy and was just walking up and down the isles with me looking at all the fun stuff. We were waiting for someone to come help us in the bathroom section where there happened to be a vanity model set up on the floor of the isle. Mason did nothing more than touch it and the whole thing collapsed on top of him. The solid sink top came crashing down on his little mouth and needless to say his mouth began bleeding perfusely. This is not the first time Mason has cut his mouth and blood has gotten all over so I was pretty calm as I picked him up and tried to comfort him while I asked an employee, who saw the whole thing, where a bathroom was so I could clean him up and see what was wrong. I took him in the bathroom and pretty soon we had what looked like the sight of a massacre with blood all over his face, clothes, hands, and arms, and him smearing it all over my face and clothes. A poor little girl came walking in to use the bathroom and was quite terrified. I eventually got the bleeding under control and got us cleaned up the best I could before going with Scott to fill out an incident report. At first it looked like Mason's lip was just pretty mangled and bleeding, but after a little while Mason opened his mouth big enough that I could check his teeth and to my horror his top left tooth was hanging out of the socket. I FREAKED OUT!! This in turn made Mason get really upset and Scott had to calm us both down. We ended up taking Mason down to Riverside golfcourse where my parents happened to be golfing with our dentist, Chris Crawford. We got to take Mason in a golf cart out to the hole they were on. Mason had been whimpering and occasionally crying up until this point, but the golf cart ride seemed to make everything better. Chris informed us there is nothing we can do because it's just a baby tooth, but that there is no damage done either, because it's a baby tooth. Mason will just be missing his tooth for the next 6-7 years until his permanent tooth grows in. Other than that his lip and mouth will heal and he will be just fine. I am so grateful that Mason is okay medically because it could have been so much worse with all that heavy stuff falling on him, but in all honesty I am grieving the loss of his tooth. I cried all last night at the thought of my little boy's sweet grin never being the same. Every time I look at his fat lip, that for the time being covers the missing tooth, I feel myself tearing up. 
Mason has been a champ through it all. We took him home and gave him popcicles just as the doctor ordered. It took him all of 5 minutes to realize he was getting special treatment and he immediately tried getting several things he normally is not allowed. That's when I new he would be fine. He has been his happy wonderful self all day today. Home Depot has taken full responsibility for what happened and said that any model on their floor is meant to be handled and a 24 lb little boy should not have knocked it over. They are helping us make sure everything is okay with Mason and that no complications will arise from this. They have also offered Mason a very generous compensation for what he's been through. We will put the money in his bank account for when he is older and consider it a gift from the tooth fairy. Tonight we will leave his tooth out and hope the tooth fairy will bring him something fun for being such a brave boy. 
Here is Maso-Magoo with his very sad Mama. 
This is one of the last pictures we have of his full grin. I sure will miss it, but I'm sure I'll love his new grin just as much. After all it's the boy behind the grin that makes it so great!
Later we did fireworks together, where Mason was introduced to sparklers which he had a hard time keeping his hands off. 
Then came the poppies. Once Mason got the hang of stomping on them, the real fun began. He was hilarious!! All of us, adults and kids, gathered around and watched Mason stomping and laughing and stomping and laughing. I tried to get a video after he'd been doing it a while. It doesn't capture it during it's peak, but you get the idea. 
Most importantly Mason got to play with his cousin Kayla and all the Murray kiddos.
