Happy Halloween

We had a fun Halloween this year.  The kids had the day off school so we went to the kids book fair and got a Papa Murphy's Jack-o-pizza for dinner.  It was cold at trick or treat time - about 40 degrees with a stiff wind - so we didn't trick or treat for that long.  Here we are getting ready to head out.  Anna was a black cat, Matthew (with coat on here) was Luke Skywalker, Grant was Darth Vader and John was a stormtrooper without a mask.  And I was Alice in Wonderland.  I didn't have a stormtrooper mask for John but I was pretty sure he wouldn't wear it anyway, so oh well.  I was actually not sure what the two little boys were going to be since Grant kept changing his mind.  But we figured something out at the last minute.

This dress, that I made while I was in college, was roomy enough for my 8 month + pregnant self.  Nice.

 Here's Anna after de-cat-ifying a little bit.

 Matthew as Luke Skywalker

Here's Darth Vader without his mask.  Grant was so cold he just started crying and asking to go home after 20 minutes out there.  I took him home while the other kids hit a few more houses.

And a stormtrooper without a mask.

He still looked cute though.  Although he really fought putting on any kind of costume.

Here we are heading out for some trick or treating.  So cold!!

They don't need tons of candy anyway.  Happy Halloween everyone!!

Carving Pumpkins

We've been busy, busy, busy around here lately!  But we finally had a free night where we could carve our pumpkins!  Scott gutted all the pumpkins for us, except for Anna's.  She wanted to gut her own.

John stickered his pumpkin instead of carving it.  He had a little bit of trouble figuring out which side of the sticker was sticky.  It is confusing.  ZRA!

Grant and Anna picked green pumpkins.  As it turns out, green pumpkins are really easy to carve. Soft green pumpkin flesh!  Grant helped me design the face and I carved it.

 My pumpkin

 Anna gutted hers and carved it herself.  Way to go Anna!

And here is Matthew with his finished pumpkin.  He didn't want to gut his.  Too messy and gooey.  But he did carve his on his own.  The black on Matthew's face was the the remnants of some face painting they did at their school fall festival party today.

Here are all our pumpkins on Halloween night!  That's Scott's on the left.

And here's a bonus photo courtesy of Anna.  She punched holes in this ghost she got at school, brought it to me and told he it was a "hole-y ghost."  And as an even more random side note, last year Anna was sad because some kids at school called her "the smallest kindergartener."  She is short relative to her peers and a little sensitive about it.  Today she told me that some people at school call her "little smarty pants" and then proudly explained it was because she is little and also smart.  Glad she is focusing on the positives!  And per her parent teacher conference we had this week, her teacher agrees, she is a smart cookie!

Anna Riding her Bike

Anna has been practicing riding her bike a lot. A few weeks ago she was able to ride a little bit if someone else helped her get started.  And now she can get started all on her own!  Great job Anna!!  Matthew helped her practice a lot.  And the nice weather we've been having here has allowed her lots of practice time.  Hooray!  Here is a short video of her getting started all by herself.

The Pumpkin Patch

and our 9 year anniversary!!

Today Scott and I celebrated our 9th anniversary.  We went out to lunch with the two little boys and got takeout for dinner.  It was great.  We also went to the pumpkin patch in the evening with the kids.  We had planned to go this weekend to pick pumpkins at Eckert's, but when we drove by there on Saturday after the soccer games, the line for getting on the wagon to the pumpkin patch was so long it looked like it would literally take hours to just get on the wagon.  So we left...immediately.  I have never seen it that busy at Eckert's.  Soooo, after checking that they still had pumpkins left in their patch after the Saturday hordes came through, we decided we'd try for a weeknight.  And Scott got off a little early tonight so it was perfect.  Here are Anna, Grant and Matthew on the wagon.  We didn't have to wait at all.  Nice.

 

John was excited and kept saying "apple" or "pumpkin" all along the wagon ride

We passed a lot of apple trees.

Anna strikes a pose at the pumpkin patch.  Once we got there and beheld the 30 acres of pumpkin patch they had, we understood how they could still have pumpkins.  However, there weren't many small pumpkins left.  The hordes must have gotten those.  Only large-ish pumpkins left.

We looked and looked for some reasonable sized pumpkins.  John kept getting stuck behind large pumpkins blocking the path.  Grant did his best to rescue him.

 Four guys all looking for pumpkins

 Some of those pumpkins were as big as John

 Scott found some good ones

 We started collecting some winners.  Anna really wanted a green one.

Here are the kids with their final selections.  It was hard for them to look at me since the sun was so low.  We had a fun time looking for pumpkins!  And I was glad to do it on a less crowded day.  Now I feel like making pumpkin pie and pumpkin bread and pumpkin gooey butter cake.  Mmm

And here are a few pictures from our anniversary lunch!!

We went to Olive Garden.  John insisted on sitting in a regular chair (vs. a high chair) and ate lots of breadsticks!!

 Grant hid under the table for a lot of the time but at least he was quiet.

He missed our dessert of pumpkin cheesecake though.  Oh well.

 I tried to take a selfie of us.  See, I was there too.

Happy 9th Anniversary Scott!!  Our trip to Wisconsin last weekend was sort of like an anniversary trip for us.  Maybe we will go somewhere more exotic next year for our 10th anniversary.  We'll have to see what next year brings.  :)

34 weeks

Anna drew this picture of me today.  I like how she made my tummy just sticking straight out.  I also like that I am wearing red heels.  :)

I am 34 weeks and 2 days pregnant.  And I feel sooo HUGE!  It's funny to me because the baby has been measuring small for a while and yet I am so big.  :)  For the past three weeks I have been taken off my "high risk" pregnancy status, which is good.  The baby has grown big enough recently to be in a normal size range.  I'm going in for another ultrasound in a week and a half and depending how baby is measuring then I may be induced early (37 weeks if she is too small again) or may be left to go the full 40.  Sooo, right now I feel like I'd rather just be left to go full FULL term, but if I was going to be induced in 2 weeks or so for medical reasons, I probably wouldn't be too sad about it.  Cause I am already SOOO uncomfortable and still looking at 6 more weeks.  How is this baby too small? Seriously?!? I'm hoping baby is still doing ok and there aren't any problems, but I'm looking forward to this being over.

Here's an actual picture of me today.  I was not feeling great today.  Nauseated, uncomfortable, ginormous, TIRED!!  I feel 40 weeks pregnant already.  Six more weeks...six more weeks.

Great Wolf Lodge

We drove up to Wisconsin Dells to stay at the Great Wolf Lodge.  Wisconsin Dells is kind of like the Branson of Wisconsin.  It's a vacation spot - people have vacation homes there.  I didn't know that before our trip, but it was pretty there by the lakes and rivers.  Here we are getting ready to go into the lodge.

 The kids all got little wolf ears to wear

We spent the first afternoon at the water park inside the hotel.  I didn't take any pictures 'cause I didn't want to take my camera down to the water area.  We had a lot of fun though.  Everyone went down some water slides (appropriate to their age) and had a great time.  After several hours we came back and did a little trick or treating in the hotel and went to dinner.

 We tried deep dish pizza again at UNOs this time

I liked it better.

The next day we went to breakfast, drove around Wisconsin Dells a little and then went back to the water park for four hours or so.  Here is Anna getting ready to head down to the water park.

 John was excited to go too

 After we got totally worn out swimming we got some ice cream at the ice cream place in the hotel.

Then we played MagiQuest in the hotel.  It's an interactive scavenger hunt game where you use an electronic wand to find different things and activate different things throughout this 4 story play/scavenger hunt area.  The kids really liked it.  It was cool and doing the whole thing takes 3 - 5 hours.  We did part of it the first day and then I just couldn't go up and down the stairs anymore, so I took some of the kids back to the room and we rested a bit while Scott helped Matthew doing some of the "quests."  

 Then we got ready to trick or treat again - this time we wore our costumes.

Anna was a black cat

Here we are trick or treating.  John was Batman and Matthew was Luke Skywalker.  We brought a Buzz Lightyear costume for Grant (his costume from last year) but he told me that night that he wanted to be a vampire instead.  I tried to explain I didn't have any vampire costumes handy.  So he decided to be a wolf (with Great Wolf Lodge ears) instead.

 Here is everyone part way through trick or treating

 Happy Halloween!

It was a busy day and we went to sleep pretty early!

The next day I took John to the outlet mall adjacent to our hotel.  We only went to a few stores, but here we are at the Disney Store!!  John was such a good shopper.

Scott had the other three kids playing MagiQuest while I shopped.  They got all their quests completed and started on their "adventures."  They had fun.

Here are John and Grant playing together after we came back from shopping.  We headed home shortly after this - back to Illinois!  Wisconsin was very pretty - lots of fall colors!  And we had a great time at the lodge.  It was good to get away one last time before the baby comes.

A few stops in Chicago and Wisconsin

While we were in Chicago I wanted to try authentic Chicago deep dish pizzas.  We asked around and did some research and went to a highly recommended place, Gino's East.  Once you order it takes 45 minutes for the pizza to be made, which was a little painful with all the hungry kids.  Luckily they got their good sooner.  Here is Scott with a slice of our "Chicago Fire" deep dish pizza.  Scott liked it.

Here are Anna and I with my pizza - she wanted to braid my hair while we waited.  I did not like the pizza so much.  The crust was really hard and crusty.  It was ok, but I wasn't that impressed and probably wouldn't go there again.  We tried the deep dish pizza at UNOs the next day (a national chain) and I liked that better.  Hmmm.

We really didn't see much in Chicago, but we did drive over and see Lake Michigan.  The kids didn't seem to believe that the lake could look so big it was almost like an ocean until they saw it.  We saw lots of pretty fall colors while driving up to Chicago as well.

And then on to Wisconsin.  Wisconsin is one of the states I have not been to yet.  And now that I have been there I only have FIVE more US states that I haven't been to (North Dakota, Minnesota, Michigan, Nebraska and Alaska).  I was hoping to hit Michigan and Minnesota while we are here in the midwest, but I don't know if we will make it.  Anyway, across the border in Wisconsin we stopped at the Jelly Belly Warehouse to have a free tour and learn about Jelly Belly beans.

We learned the Goelitz candy company (that started Jelly Belly's) started in Belleville, Illinois (right next to where we live) and then moved to Portland, Oregon.  So the kids thought that was neat.  Here we are waiting for our tour.

It's not a factory, just a warehouse, so we drove around the warehouse in a little tram and got to watch little videos and see cool displays at the different stops.  We weren't supposed to take pictures after this starting area, so no pics of our tour.

After our tram tour we got free candy and visited the gift shop where we bought LOTS of candy and jelly beans and got a nice %20 military discount.  They had a candy sample bar so you could try different candy and jelly bean flavors.  My favorite was the chocolate dipped jelly beans.  Matthew bought some Bertie Botts beans and Anna got the sparkly princess beans.  We got a bunch of other stuff too.  Even though it doesn't sound exciting to tour a warehouse, we really liked our visit!!  Scott and I both thought it was better than the Ben & Jerry's factory tour.  :)