Trick or Treat!

So, I'm a little behind in my posting. But I'm here to catch up and share our last few months with you. 

I think I left off with Halloween 2008. 

This was a fun, low-key year. I guess partly because Halloween was on a Friday night, so we didn't have too much time to play dress-up on our new street before Sabbath arrived. 

We did get lucky, however, and Maddox was invited by our neighbor/playgroup pal/Sabbath School buddy, Lillybeth, to a Halloween party at My Gym. She goes there every week for classes and was able to bring a friend to their Thursday evening party. The first few pictures here are of the fun they had at My Gym. 

Maddox dressed up as a Train Engineer and Lillybeth went as a Hula Girl. They were totally adorable and made me wish that this age could be frozen in time. (No such luck.) 

Maddox got to jump in his very first ball-pit. He was hilarious and wasn't sure what to think. He loved it, but couldn't figure out why he kept sinking lower the harder he tried to climb out. =)

Maddox and Lillybeth in the circle of crazy costumes, while the leaders sang fun songs with them.

My shy boy branching out a little. He prefers to play in places that do not involve other young children. He loves playing with the older kids instead.

Maddox's real costume this year was "Dumbo." He was, without a doubt, the cutest little elephant that I've ever seen. He didn't wear this one to My Gym for obvious reasons, but we got to use it on Halloween evening before sundown. He walked to a few houses on our street and got some loot that his Mommy ate. (I'm a sucker for sweets.) 

Mom bought him this costume and there is a short story behind the reason why. This whole last year he has been loving the Dumbo movie. One of the few movies that we let him watch. He's so sensitive and such a loving little boy, you can really tell by the things he'll talk about. Because of this movie, all year long he has loved to pretend that he is Dumbo and that I'm Mrs. Jumbo. He would get done with naptime/quiet time and when I would come to his room to get him, he would say "Can Mrs. Jumbo hold Dumbo now?" It was too precious. Then he would want me to hold him tight, rock him, and sing "Baby Mine" to him. That is a memory that I will never forget and I'm so thankful that we had all this one-on-one time together. 

So......here's Dumbo!

Chad came home just in time to walk the neighborhood with us. =)

My two guys. Maddox looks so tiny here.

Dumbo, Mrs. Jumbo, and my big ol' belly. He was so cute walking up to houses by himself and saying "Trick or Treat!". He definitely though he was big stuff. ;)

And my final picture of the evening.....the chocolate-induced daze before heading to bath & bed. 

Celebration of Magdalen Leigh's Upcoming Arrival

(Decoration in the foyer when people first arrived.)

Chad, Maddox, and I were very blessed to have some great friends here that pulled off a beautiful baby shower. I was thankful in the first place that someone was even going to give us a shower for a 2nd child, and then it turned out so beautifully on top of that!

Kajsa D. was the friend that offered to be in charge and she did an amazing job! She recruited some of the other moms from playgroup/Maddox's Sabbath School class to bring food items and got Rebecca L. to do all the decorations. And as all of you know, I love to decorate...so I got to go with Rebecca shopping for all that. It was fun to see what she had in mind! (Sorry that I don't know exactly who brought food and what they brought, but it was awesome.)

The party was at our house just because it was easier...and I can't resist having people over for any reason in the world. =) Especially now that we've moved, it's quite fun since there is plenty of space for entertaining. Anyway - Kajsa really knew how to pull this thing together. She did a large chunk of the food, made some mean meatballs, had yummy fruit platter and veggie platter, and even made me a diaper cake!! She may have made more of the food, but I'm not sure who made what. Here's what I do know: Brooke C. brought Monkey Bread (yum!), Connie B. brought quiches, Ami W. brought cupcakes for the kiddos, Rebecca L. made the Pumpkin Cheesecakes for the cake, Shelly C. sent over a cream cheese dip with a pumpkin spread, and I'm sure that I've forgotten a few things but I can't remember right now. 

We got some great items and are very thankful for them. Mom was able to be here that morning and she brought my Aunt Sandra with her. That was the first time Sandra had been here to see us in a few years. Becky and Josh had driven up the night before, so Becky got to be photographer for the day. It was great! No pics of Josh and Chad at the shower because they hit the road when Kajsa arrived to set up. Chad said it was just too many girls for him. ;) I wonder how he's going to handle having a daughter later on. Ha!

Thanks to everyone for such a great party!!!! I have made such great friends here with so many other moms and am so thankful to have moved closer to most of them. Life is so full and sweet right now!  (Now for the pics!)

Rebecca did such an amazing job decorating! And then when Kajsa started bringing all the food in the combination was amazing. This is our sunroom where all the food was placed and it truly was beautiful. 

Maddox couldn't wait until we were ready to eat, but I'll forgive him this time. ;)

Me piling on the food. I seriously was sad afterwards that I couldn't eat more because it was sooooooo yum. But they left me with most of the leftovers and if you know me well, then you are well aware that I ate them for every meal. I adore leftovers. 

Last pic: a perfect example of me having NO CLUE what to do with little girl's outfit accessories. I'm slowly learning....

Thanks to all these amazing friends and family that were able to join me that day! Now if I could just feel organized about her upcoming Christmastime arrival! =)

Random Shots From Home

Just a few shots I took during the last week of October. Before all the costume festivities came along. =)

I'm just at the point where I can start really enjoying our home and I wish I hadn't been so busy up until now. The weather was so perfect and I'm sad that I didn't get to enjoy our deck/patio/backyard like I wanted to before it got too chilly in the evenings. 

One evening while Maddox and I were eating dinner, I saw this amazing sunset and tried to capture it. It's not very good as a picture, but it gives you an idea of what we can see every evening from our sunroom, kitchen, and backyard area. It is beautiful and we are so blessed to have found this home. 

Both of these shots are taken from our deck that is just off of our sunroom. The colors were amazing!!!

Inside the house, I took this one of Maddox eating haystacks. Of course, the only non-blurry one (because I kept forgetting to turn on the flash!) is of him looking so sad about haystacks. In reality, it's the only way we can get lettuce in his body! We eat haystacks a LOT. Haha!

The next day (day after baby shower), I was downstairs just putting things away, doing laundry, etc. I heard Maddox yelling to me from upstairs and I kept saying, "Wait a minute...I'll be right there!" But he kept calling to me. As I got closer to the stairs, I could tell he was saying, "Mommy! I'm too big for this! Mommy! I don't need to get in this!" 

I started thinking - Oh great. What is he doing? But I had no idea. When I came upstairs, I found him in Maggie's room and he was stuck in the Bumbo chair. (For those of you who don't know what that is...it's a squishy chair that you can put little babies in to help them sit up, even if they can't do it yet.) Poor Maddox is crazy about that thing! We had just gotten it the day before and he had not seen it until then. He was so excited, but was cracking himself up that he was too big and his legs kept getting stuck. Silly guy! Here are the two pics I got. 

Stay tuned for Halloween fun and pictures to come! 

Backyard Camping

Chad had been dying to "camp" in the backyard with Maddox since we moved. So, since we had a bunch of stuff going on around the house that weekend and no real time to go set up and actually do that...Chad set up the tent, etc, during the day one Sabbath and they hung out.

The set-up. Complete with chairs, tent, and sleeping bag inside. 

Kicking the ball around a little on the patio.

Playing more ball around the tent. (I'm actually amazed at how well he can kick like he's playing soccer at 2 years old.)

What more can you ask for in a tent? Somewhere to lay down, your juice cup, and a Thomas magazine (catalog)!!

Hold still for a picture, please. =)

Okay, now you'll see a few pictures that show Mr. Maddox's imagination. He is hilarious! He's always wanting to make us pretend food. His favorite is burritos. Not sure why, but that's his pretend food of choice. He pretended that the tent was his kitchen and would come to the door and ask us if we wanted some and then he would run back in and "make" us something and bring it back out. It was so cute. 

Here I caught him saying "Would you guys like some burritos???" 

Chad got to hold the grapes that Maddox got us and let him "eat" them.

"Hey, look! Here's your burrito, Mommy!!!"

And my precious boy giving me my pretend lunch. I love this kid!!!!

I might just eat HIM up instead. =)