Summer is gone and in fact, we're into Fall and Halloween now! Here's an update of the last couple of months!

First, some pics of the kids wrapping up swim team. Catey and Chase are both rock star swimmers!!!

Here's Catey in the lane second away from you:

Winner!!!

Chase is in the middle lane, getting ready to take off:

Here's Chase taking second place in breast stroke, his favorite stroke!

My kids got hold of the camera and were playing around with making Cherry art. I know it's totally random, but it was too neat not to post here.

And, if you haven't heard yet, we got a new puppy, Kevin. We crate train, and Catey crawled into the crate and took a shot of what it looks like from Kevin's perspective.

And heeeeeeeeeeere's Kevin!!!

Kevin loves to give kisses!

Kevin and Maggie started off rough, but now they play pretty well together. At this moment, they're gnashing teeth together behind me at my desk in my office.

Kevin is very cute. Strangely, he often seems very catlike. He will find little crevices and curl up in them to sleep. Here he is curled up under one of the furniture pieces.

Kevin yawning in my arms after one of his many naps:

On weekends, I will also run along the W&OD and the kids will bike along with me. We often head down to the creek and catch crayfish. The kids decided they wanted to bring two of them back and put them in the fish tank. I was sure this would be a failed project, but after several months, those crayfish (and all the original fish) are still alive. In fact, the crayfish have grown considerably!

This year, we skipped our usual vacation to OBX. Instead, we did several mini weekend vacations, including this one down to Virginia Beach for chrissie's 25 year reunion. We stayed with our new friend Erin and her family. They are awesome. Here's us with Erin at the reunion:

For actual reunion pics, most of them are posted on FaceBook, so if you're friends with Chrissie and Erin, you can see them there.

A few weeks later, we went down and stayed with Erin again so we could run the Rock-n-Roll Half Marathon. It was my first half, and I really enjoyed it. This is a great venue, with bands every mile. The time flew by and I had a great time. Chrissie and I stayed together for the entire race, and that probably helped me enjoy it more. Here's a shot of us after we crossed the finish line:

And our official finishing certificates.

We did our annual white water rafting trip again. This year was a much smaller crowd and included rafting virgin, Mark Ponte! Here's a shot of Chrissie enjoying the water:

Here's Jim going through Dimple Rock!!

And Chrissie following right after Jim:

Followed by Fong, who made it through, only to dump on the small rapid after Dimple:

Mr. Ponte showed no fear on his virgin trip, tackling Dimple like a pro:

After lunch, per tradition, everybody jumps off Jump Rock. Here's the chain reaction of everybody daring death:

I often get out of the raft, and hike along the edge to get videos of folks going through various rapids. I got a little surprise on one of my ventures. Can you see what's in the water staring me down in the middle of this shot?

Catey and Chase both had birthdays. Most of the pictures weren't very good, but here's the few that turned out well:

At the end of the summer, the Ida Lee Outdoor pool closes, and on the last day, they let in all the dogs. We had my sister and her family out also with Yugi to swim in the pool.

For one of our mini-vacations, we went to Busch Gardens and Great Wolf Lodge in October for Howl-O-Scream. The kids LOVED Howl-O-Scream. We stayed late for the super scary stuff also. The guide says that the "5 pumpkin" rated stuff is for teens and above, but they really weren't that scary. The kids enjoyed even the scariest sections.

Punishing Chase for not cleaning his room, and Catey for talking too much. :)

Walking through a ghostly forest:

The trouble with Trolls:

Chase braving the battering Ram again. He handled it much better this time than two years ago:

They had a rockin' party at the Oktoberfest section. It was pretty corny, but the kids enjoyed it with lunch.

Chase and Catey got serious for the Cursed Kastle in 3D.

And, if you've never been to Busch Gardens, you should know that it is more than just an amusement park. They are a rescue facility for wild animals that have been injured such as this giant owl. They also have wolves, bald eagles, and lots of other critters that they've rescued and care for.

Here's us with an American Kestrel falcon. It's the smallest falcon in the world. They rescued this one from a park where it was found freezing to death as a baby and given to Busch Gardens to care for it.

Here's some of the wolves. Fitting for Halloween.

One section was decorated like the plague, with real bones and rats all over the place... ewwww.

And, there's beauty everywhere. This is a gorgeous willow growing over one of the many ponds and streams.

As the day goes on, scary creatures begin to wander the park. Normally they sneak up on people and frighten them. But, afterwards they pose for pictures with their victims. :)

The kids loved the scary characters wandering the park. The scariest was the guys with real live chain saws (chains removed). They'd popup at rev up the saws scarying all the park goers. It was really a great time... we will definitely be making this an annual Goodrum Family tradition!

We spent the night at Great Wolf Lodge, and the entire next day playing at the water park. Here's the kids underwater at the wave pool.

The wife enjoying the waves

Catey getting read to go down one of the many slides:

Catey crossing the ropes:

Here's Chase conquering the wave wall:

And here's Catey!

One of the attractions is this giant bucket that dumps water over the fort the kids climb in (lots of slides and water guns in the fort). It's about a thousand gallons of water that get dumped every 3 or 4 minutes on the fort.

Chase has joined the cub scouts and we went camping at Cunningham Falls State Park. It was an excellent camp ground, and Chase and I hiked from the camp ground to the falls, taking a few pretty pictures along the way.

At the top, there was a little whirlpool where the water was spiraling down between some of the rocks. I opened the lense a bit, and took these pretty shots:

And guess who else had a birthday!!!

And, lastly, Halloween is upon us. Chase decided to dress up as the Grim Reaper:

Catey was a beautiful angel, complete with adorable halo.

Death and the Angel... they actually go together so well if you think about it!

Here's Aran and Morgan, who were visiting before we all went down to the Leesburg Halloween parade.

Here's everybody at the parade. The Leesburg parade last forever, and there's no trick or treating until it's over. This year, it got cold, and we left early, but it was still fun for all.

And that's it! I'm looking forward to a wonderful late Fall and winter!!!