2 little pumpkins

After picking up our pumpkins from a local fruit produce stand (love them!) it was pumpkin carving time. For the past few years we have played it safe and only allowed Ava to color on her pumpkin. But this year we decided to pull up our britches and bring out the knives (more like the barbie sized sword). Below is Team Reidy.


As you can tell, Reid didn't quite know what to do at first.


Much better little buddy.


Here is Team Ava. Ava was totally disgusted by the pumpkin innards at first, but then she totally dove right in and wanted to help.


This year we let Ava design her own pumpkin face. I personally think she did an awesome job.


The finished products. Reid was still a little confused about what was going on!


Any guesses on who was the inspiration behind Reid's pumpkin? Look no further than Reid himself. Notice how the pumpkin only has 5 teeth; same as Reid. And yes Kassie, Reid does only have 5 pearly whites. Ava and myself were the same way.


Well there you go. Hope everyone else has a great time getting to carve their pumpkins. Here's a little tip that made the whole experience go a whole lot smoother. I picked up a plastic tablecloth from the dollar store this year. After everyone is done with their master pieces you just gather the whole thing up and throw it in the trash. Nothing easier than that! Oh, and who else uses those battery operated candles inside their pumpkins? Aren't they great?!

Just another visit to the farm

Wait a second, something seems a little different. The people at Thanksgiving Point decided to deck the farm out for the Halloween. I especially enjoyed getting to read the gravestones in what used to be the garden.



Ava is becoming quite the little Mommy to Reid. She gets him food when he's hungry, gives him toys when he's upset, oh, and I can't forget about getting him out of his pack n' play after he woke up from his nap. That's what a Mom would do, right? When asked how Reidy was able to get out of the crib, she happily retold the whole event. It seems that Ava heard Reid crying, went in to check on him, proceeded to climb into the pack n' play, pushed Reidy up and over the side (head first; which she quickly added that he didn't cry), once he was on the ground she gave him his blanket, favorite stuff animal (Froggy) and took out his binky and threw it back in the crib (since he is only allowed to have his binky while he is sleeping). No Reidys were hurt in the process thankfully. But we did make sure to talk about how only Mommy and Daddy can take Reid out of the crib.


Autumn is in full swing here. Just loving the yellow trees.


You know Reid is enjoying himself when he starts pointing at everything in site.


Oh wise billy goat, when will we ever get to live in a house of our very own? {Hmmm...I see it very near in your future*}




To top off the lovely outing, Ava got to ride a pony. This time she rode without me walking beside her. She's getting so brave. So proud of my little cowgirl.


*More on the house front to come in a future post!

Are sugar cookies a Halloween tradition?

Well they are in this household. Nothing like getting to decorate spooky ghosts, bats, pumpkins, and even some spiderwebs. Sure gets us in the Halloween spirit. Plus, how often do you get to use black frosting?

Reid and Ava's birthdays are less than a week apart, which means we did this exact same activity when she was Reidy's age. Here's the link to the post, in case you were curious to compare the 2. Below are my two Sous Chefs all ready to roll.

For a kid who puts EVERYTHING (no exaggeration) into his mouth, thankfully he didn't try chowing down on the cookie dough. Maybe he thought it was play dough?

But he did put this in his mouth.

Ava has really stepped up to being a little helper in the kitchen. Not only did she help make the dough (recipe found here), she was a pro at cutting out all of the cookies. It was nice not having to do it all myself. Thanks Ava bug.

While waiting for the cookies to bake I took a few pics of Reid. It helped that he was buckled into his highchair, so he had no choice but to oblige. Here's my cute brown eyed baby boy.

Here's Reid rocking 3 teeth on top and 2 on the bottom. Lack of teeth does not hamper this kid in anyway in the eating department.

This is the look that makes me putty in his wee little hands. So sweet.

After baking all of our cookies we had some major frosting to do. This year we used this recipe. Tastes good. The frosting sets up nicely so you can stack the cookies after they dry. And it taste good.

Here's Ava's step by step instructions on how to frost the perfect cookie.

No complaints here.

Here are the final products. The spider webs were so easy and look sweeet. It was Josh's idea to add a spider to the cookie and it adds a nice touch.

Sidenote: If you're thinking of swinging by for a quick visit, the cookies are almost gone.

That's one way to turn off the light

A few seconds after this picture was taken Reid decided it would be a great idea to hold onto the pot rack and rock back and forth. Bad idea buddy. Good thing his mama was there to make sure he didn't have a big fall. But now I can't trust him in the playroom all by himself. It would not have even crossed Ava's mind at this age to stand in the sink to get to the light switch. Boys.

Mandatory October post

You can't get into the Halloween spirit without a trip over to a pumpkin patch. So here is our yearly pumpkin patch post. Just a little suggestion to the people at Cornbellys, next time make sure the rocking chair isn't facing straight into the sun.

Here's the princess of the pumpkin ball.

One of Reid's favorite activities at the pumpkin patch was the sandbox filled with corn kernels. Much protesting was heard from this little boy when it was time to move on to another activity.

After seeing how much fun Reid was having getting buried in the kernels, she of course had to do the exact same thing.

It doesn't happen very often, so Reid enjoyed every minute of getting to walk around all by himself. Luckily Shelby came with us, so we had more eyes to make sure the little ones didn't get into trouble.

I placed Reid smack in the middle of the hay maze to see what he would do.

After wandering for a bit he eventually found his way out. He's one smart kid. But I was shocked that he didn't just do what Ava did (see pic after this one).

Here's our little rule breaker! It's kinda hard to tell,but she's walking on top of the hay.

The whole gang took a ride on the hayride.

Slides, slides and more slides. They could of just had only this at the pumpkin patch and Ava would of been more than pleased.

She might be small, but Ava is not afraid of a challenge or of heights.

Towards the end we decided to try out the "jumping pillows". Those things are not some wimpy little pillows you snuggle with at night. The pics below are with the kids on the toddler one, but just wait till you see the one for the bigger kids.

Reid enjoyed the pillow for maybe 30 seconds. Really wasn't his thing.

He would rather watch from the sidelines. Plus, he just couldn't resist playing with those flags.

Here is the other "pillow". Ava looks like piece of lint on that thing.

If you can't tell by the expressions of all the kids in the pic, this ride wasn't too thrilling. Maybe it was because we had too high of expectations from the other cow trains we've been on. Where are the speed bumps? The spastic weaving through the corn maze? And the crazy speed demon behind the 4 wheeler that drives so fast you've gotta hold on to make sure you don't fly right out?

Here's Ava trying to ride a tricycle. Sadly she's still too short to ride one. Anyone had any good experience using those bikes with no peddles?

One our way out Ava made a side trip over to the old firetruck.

Good thing she did because this was absolutely Reid's favorite part. He could not get enough of getting to sit in the driver's seat.

Here are the kiddos working together trying to get the firetruck moving.

There was another successful trip to the pumpkin patch. Since we are newbies to living in Utah, are there anymore suggestions of fun things to do in October?

Cruising the Alpine Loop

Our Saturdays are quickly filling up, so we made a quick trip to the Uintas to see the beautiful fall colors. About half of the trees had started to change. I just loved seeing all of the yellow everywhere.

Special note: this picture was taken while the photographer was standing on her seat (in her car) and out of the car's sunroof. Nice. My husband had a moment of genius.

Of course, on the drive home Ava requested that we 1} get a picture of her in front of a tree 2} the said tree must not have any green leaves 3} the leaves must be purple. We tried our best.

Want to know the secret to getting Ava to smile for pictures? We take 2 pictures. The first one is of her smiling and in the second picture she gets to make a silly face.

Ava couldn't get enough of all of the prettiness outside. She even collected a few leaves to bring back to Nana. Can't wait till the leaves start changing on our block and we can start collecting more leaves.

Once home I had to continue our autumny day, so we made Pumpkin Spice Cookies. Ava kept sneaking little morsals of the dough while we were cooking. Which I totally supported because 1} she needs every calorie she can get 2} there are no raw eggs 3} pumpkin is packed with lots off good stuff. It's a super fruit? veggie? It's just awesome :)

Silly face trick works again. See above picture for proof :)

The finished result.

Tip: Before popping these babies in the oven, dip your finger in water and and smooth out the tops of the cookies. Otherwise your cookies will look like they have grown spikes.

Ava gives these cookies a thumbs up.

Happy Autumn!