Happy Holloween

You don't want to dress up!? I'll take the liberty of doing it for you.

Birthday celebration!

Oh, you think you will take my cupcake, do you?

So wait...you mean all these presents weren't for me?

So trick-or-treating may officially be tomorrow, but we had to try out some costumes ahead of time. Ben was Spider Man when we visited the Cow Town for some candy and of course a few random farm animals. What would any outing be without a few cows and horses thrown in? He didn't so much care for the mask, but it looked cute all crooked on his head. Henry will wear his costume tomorrow for the real deal.

We had a costume party to go to Saturday, and no matter how hard I twisted Chad's arm, he would not wear the Raggedy Andy costume from 2005 that we looked so darn ridiculous in. I mean, come on! We wore that downtown, to a party full of military people. But no go this year? I'll have to get to the bottom of this. Not that I wanted to wear it either (I did a little).

I started our holiday shopping this weekend. Watch out people - I'm getting all crafty up in here. I love Pinterest too much and I can't help but want to make everything on there. DIY mean quick, easy, and loads of fun, right?! Maybe not so much, but I wish I had half the creativity these people do. It's ok though. I can use their ideas to make my home and gifts look fabulous. No one will know - except for you. Shh.

I also need to mention that I'm no Joni Mitchell fan (sorry Glenda). However I am a HUGE Robert Downey Jr. fan. My wonderful hubby, who happens to know about my obsession with Mr. Downey showed me this video today. So now, not only is he a total hunk and actor, but he can sing?! OMG. Where do I sign up? PS. I love you, Chad.

Henry is one! Well, Wednesday anyway.

Pumpkin guts smell nasty

Ben names his pumpkin, Alice (after my grandma)

Super fun rice krispie pumpkins

How quickly this first year of Henry's life has passed. I can't believe my baby is almost one! Some things about my Henry:
*He is quite the mama's boy. He loves to snuggle his head into my neck.
*He still sucks on the two middle fingers of his right hand.
*While sucking on those fingers, he loves to have something soft snuggled against his face with his other hand. This includes blankets, stuffed animals, socks, you name it.
*He has taken 4 steps at the most before plunging face first into whatever is in front of him.
*He has 4 teeth on top and 3 on the bottom.
*Bedtime is 6:30 and he sleeps a full 12 hours. Amen.
*His brother makes him laugh more than anyone else.
*Blocks are his favorite toy right now because he can make lots of noise hitting them together.
*All food is good food to this little guy.
*If he is in a stroller, keep moving and he could go for days.
*If you scream, he will scream. Repeat.
*There are a few words he says clearly: mommy, daddy, no-no (for sure his first words!), out, baby, bye-bye, night-night, ba-ba, go, yummy (because all food is his best friend)

Go Irish!

More pumpkins!

Ready...set...launch!

Henry & Kate, in love

Cool slide

Finally, something Henry can enjoy!

That's right...look at everything but the camera

Pooping a pumpkin

Fun weekend at the patch with the Hays family. Someday Kate & Henry will be able to partake in the festivities, but until then they seemed content rolling around in their strollers and watching the other kiddos. Ben enjoyed it so much more this year because he could do just about everything. It took us more than two hours just to get to the pumpkin patch itself. We had to ride the train, do the slide, jump on the balloon, etc. Plus, mom had to have the pumpkin cheesecake. Yummy.

The weather is definitely cooling down, so I'm glad we made it there before it did. We have a high this week of 50 something. Woo hoo for chili!

Oh Omaha!

Absolute beauty

The Davis newlyweds

LOVE. Ben is scowling and Henry is eating a pumpkin. Perfect.

The Picking Family 5

He was nice to the bunny, but kicked the chicken. Uh oh.

They make tires that big?!

Awesome patch in NE

At the zoo. They had everything!

Ben's bear feet after a wee pee accident claimed his other shoes...

Desert dome at zoo

Inside the jungle at zoo

Downtown farmers market

Love this downtown. I felt like I was in a movie!

What a fabulous weekend visiting our dear friends in Omaha. They used to live in Wichita, and when they moved to Omaha we were (and still are) quite sad. However, now we have an excuse to visit the beautiful state of Nebraska. It was a picture-perfect fall weekend. The weather was cool and when the wind blew the leaves fell like snow from the trees. We did one of my favorite fall activities - pumpkin patch! We also visited the wonderful zoo. We spent 4 hours and barley made it through 25%.

Let me back up...our weekend began on Friday night as we began the 4 1/2 hour drive to NE. About an hour in, Chad realizes that he forgot the pack-n-play. Surprise. Last time he forgot the mattress part and poor Henry slept on cardboard and blankets. He didn't complain, but still. I digress...so I sent Jackie a message to see if they could pick one up for the weekend. I said crib, not pack-n-play. To a couple with no kiddos, JD heard crib. Full out wooden crib. Yup. Two hours later we get a call that he has put the crib together and realized there was no mattress. We about lost it in laughter. Sorry JD. I should have been more specific. While I really did feel bad since he can't get those 2 hours back, they did get us a pack-n-play as well and Henry did sleep comfortably for the weekend.

Saturday we went to the fabulous downtown to the farmers market. We tried homemade root beer, bought some veggies, and sampled some yummy food treats. Then we headed to the cheesecake factory for some pumpkin cheesecake! Wouldn't be the season without it. After lunch, it was off to Pooley's pumpkin patch. Second only to the one we go to in South Bend, run by ladies in their golden oldies. We took a hay ride, Ben had his face painted, and we enjoyed the pumpkins galore. There were even pony rides, a donkey, baby piggies, and my first fried Twinkie. It tasted like cake on a stick. Really good actually, but would never take another bite in my life. One was enough. We all bought pumpkins, which were eaten the next morning by a punk squirrel at their house. In minutes, he devoured them. Pumpkin guts everywhere.

On Sunday we hit the Henry Dooley zoo. A-MAZ-ING. It went on for miles. Lots of hills, gorgeous fall trees, carousel, huge jungle, real train ride, the works. I love that place and we will go back. Funny story. Ben had a pee pee incident. I guess he was very excited about the water fountain he was playing with. So he looks at me. I just knew. Then I looked down at the puddle forming around his feet. Potty training has been a struggle for the kid, but he has been doing awesome lately. Heck, when pregnant if I sneeze I can pee. So really, how is this any worse? So anyway, Chad goes to the car to get new clothes, but can't find the backup shoes. So into the gift shop he goes and returns with bear slippers. It really could not have turned out any better for the little guy. He had a blast growling at people as the passed, and everyone thought he was just cute as can be. Which he was.

We left for home after the zoo. I'm not used to the hills, and was fairly nauseous in the car. About 15 minutes from home, I sneezed and then proceeded to vomit into my hand. I knew it was coming and all the fresh air in the world wouldn't help. It didn't ruin my day or my trip! No way! We had far too much fun to let that bring me down :). Anyway, we love NE and our friends. We had the very best weekend and look forward to many more!

Also, we are expecting baby #3 in April :).