Choo Choo!

Hurray for a day full of adventure!  On Friday, Daddy got to do a little golfing, while Connor and I took his first train ride into the city with some great friends.  Kylie shared her double stroller with Con - I told him he'd better get used to it!

About to board the train.  Choo choo woo hoo!

Grayson (26 mos.), Levi (30 mos.), Kylie (10 mos.), Connor (12 mos.)

Storytime at the big children's library.

Yeah.  Connor was interested in all of the OTHER books!

Bubble time silhouettes.  

Poppin'!

"Whatcha doin' up there, Kylie?"

The big 2 year olds played on the computer while Connor, Kylie, 

and some random friends had a great time in the baby/toddler area.  

He loves to hand things to people.  I hope that will transfer to good sharing. :)

"What?  We're busy!"

Hehe.  Levi and Con having a face off.  They were both face planting themselves in and out of this cushion - although Connor was crawling and Levi was leaping!  Good alliteration, I know...

After quite a good walk through some very pretty neighborhoods, 

we found ourselves at the perfect picnic and play spot.  

Good pushing, Levi!

Ahh.  Content. 

This looks like it was Connor's first climbing wall experience, 

but really he just wanted to taste the mulch.  I tried!

I see you, cutie girl!

Okay.  My friend Carey and I ventured downtown while I was still pregnant with Connor, and we read in a brochure that there was a building that had musical wall panels that lit up (we imagined you could play a tune, like each panel played a different note).  We walked and walked and found this parking garage that had a brightly colored outside, right near the train station.  We pressed all over the wall, and nothing!  We must've had the wrong building....

So on Friday, we took our long walk back to the station and Daniela said, "Oh!  They can play with these musical wall panels while we wait!"  And BAM!  She presses one and it plays a sound somewhere between a telephone ringing and a fairy wand waving.  Oh, it lit up too.  Man oh man Care - where did we go wrong?!  I think Levi and Grayson found every one that played all around the building!

Getting ready for the chugga chug to begin (it's electric, not too much chugging!).

Trying to take a train pic.  Meltdown city!  We had SUCH a great day though.

When we got home, Con was supposed to go down for a nap (um yeah, didn't happen) and I went to get some groceries.  Laura had driven down to spend the night and met me at the store.  Now get ready.  This is BIG NEWS!
When we got back home, Jonathan was waiting outside with Connor to greet us.  We were carrying things in and little boy was all smiles and excitement and I said, "Wait!  I think I just saw a tooth!" Now come on.  I check his gums like every stinkin' day so I thought no way was it true.  We went inside and he was laughing away while I tried to pull down his lower lip and SURE ENOUGH, a tiny white sliver of a tooth was showing!

Wooooooooooooo!  At 12 months and 25 days, Connor cut his first tooth!  

I definitely don't have a picture.  Ha!  I'm sure it will show up more soon!

I had gotten some chicken thighs a while ago because they were on a great sale, but wasn't quite sure what to do with them.  Good old Rachael Ray!  She had a recipe for prosciutto wrapped rosemary chicken thighs - and we had a bundle of fresh rosemary from the farmer's market!  I also did homemade rosemary bread, Food Network Magazine's "copycat" of the kind they have at Macaroni Grill.  My husband did the grilling, of course - it was a joint effort dinner.

Yum-O!

For dessert I made pumpkin cheesecake, an Emeril recipe.  Did you know that there is a shortage on pumpkin this year because of all the storms?   Not in this area, but definitely in the north, and there is a shortage of canned pumpkin down here.  Luckily I got one giant can when I spotted it a week ago.  Emeril wanted me to make a vanilla wafer and pecan crust, but I opted for ginger snaps.  He also wanted me to use a 12 inch springform pan, which I didn't think about until I pulled mine out and saw it was about 8 inches.  NO WONDER I had to buy TWO POUNDS of cream cheese.  Holy guacamole.  So, I halved the recipe and it worked out just pumpkiny delicious!

I did not take a picture of the cheesecake, but I did take one of this little gingersnap candy corn treat bowl I put together for Jonathan while I was baking.  He may as well have started singing "My Favorite Things!" :)

Splish Splash Sippies

Made the switch to the big tub...LOVES it, of course.

We're trying rice milk this week.  So far a success.  He liked soy milk but then I read some things about soy that may or may not be bad (not enough research) and decided to give the rice milk a try.

Sure, put the sippy cup inside a toy and then lift the whole toy to drink.  Innovative?  Yes.

September Ends, October Begins

During the last week of September, we got to have a fun playdate at a friend's house.  We were late (trying to let Con still get his morning nap in) so I didn't take many pictures at all - just in the few minutes before we headed home!

Ethan showing Connor how to get in and out of his tent!

Levi (and Jessie!)

"Hey guys, are you in there still?"

Two Sundays ago, it was actually (what I would consider) chilly when we were getting ready for church at 7:30am!  I didn't know if this sweet hat and sweater would fit little boy by the time it was cold enough to wear it, so I was excited to pull it out of the closet!

My birthday was last Thursday...Jonathan brought home a special cupcake for me with a purple (my favorite!) heart and a few other goodies.  We had had a rough week before that with Jonathan working on the Christmas recording 24/7 and me just busy with Connor and my little bit of "work".  Thursday was the first night we were able to just relax together, so we got Chili's to go and had a good night in!

Friday morning Jonathan got Connor dressed for the day and let me sleep a little longer - and brought me some breakfast in bed - woohoo!  He picked out these 18mos. jeans for Con to wear (which I thought were too big still and hadn't put on him yet) and they were perfect rolled up a little.  Perfectly adorable that is.  :)

Awesome Autumn Family Time

Today began with a scenic drive out to our favorite farmer's market.  We hadn't been since mid-August and there were lots of new crops being harvested, and a guy selling alpaca wool and knitted/crocheted goodies (have you ever felt alpaca wool?  SO soft!). 

Puzzled over the 15 varieties of lettuce!

The cute town where we go to the market happened to be having their fall festival.  We walked around a little and got to see some sweet animals!

Funky chickens

Uh oh, honey!

Adorable.

Yeah, I let him touch this one briefly, it didn't bite!

I couldn't believe they had a camel!

And yes, I broke out into a rousing version of "Alice the Camel"

Looking like a freak - but that thing had big teeth 

and I had no food for it (except my fingers!)

Alice only had one hump.

When we got home, we had lunch and Jonathan got to work on chili.  It has finally cooled down a little here and we were looking forward to making our first BIG pot of chili for the season.  While it was simmering, we walked down to our neighborhood fall festival.  Connor loved the music and did a LOT of clapping when we stopped to watch the cloggers.  We walked back home and all 3 of us (um, 4 Otto and possibly 5 baby, can't tell yet when it's sleeping!) took a nap.  Not a long enough one in my opinion, but delightful nonetheless.

Dinner!  Mmmm.  Connor's in pureed form - also the first time 

he had beans.  He seemed to like it (yay!).

After dinner, bath, and pj's, we headed back down to the fall festival because they were having a movie at dusk...with free popcorn and soda.  Pretty much the selling point. ;)

Self portrait.  Oops!  But aren't the boys so handsome?

Is it starting?

Having some sunset milk with a good view from Daddy's lap!

Toy Story 3!

After about 30 minutes of the movie, we decided it was time for our little boy to go to bed.  Luckily we had seen it before! :)  What a great day.  Probably shouldn't write that we ended it with scrubbing our bathrooms, but they needed it and it was the only time we had!  Oh well - sparkling bathrooms to shower in tonight!