the rest of our halloween events

This year was a really fun Halloween. Nate loved all of the Halloween festivities.

Here's a few more we did this week . . .

Serene Ward Trunk-or-Treat
Our ward has an awesome trunk-or-treat every year. This year they kept it simple with Halloween desserts {instead of the chili cook-off} which I have to say wasn't a bad idea after-all. We have a fabulous turnout and soooo many kids running around that it was easier to show up, eat some yummy desserts, trunk-or-treat and ride the adorable caterpillar train that has turned in to quite the fun tradition. They go on endless rides around the parking lot! Nate loved it. Unfortunately Wes had a big work dinner that night so he missed this one.




Abbie & Daisy's Halloween Party
On Halloween morning Abbie and Daisy had an adorable Halloween party at their house. It was filled with coloring pumpkins, playing games, a pinata, costume contest, etc. Ali & Tripp have mastered Halloween parties. We all had a great Halloween morning!

Halloween Night

We had a few friends over for soup before heading out to go trick-or-treating. We met up with a few families in our ward and went on a candy hunt. One of the families we met up with are the Crouch's who have the cutest older kids - which sure was nice for those of us with little guys! Alli Crouch was sooo cute with Nate. She held his hand took him up to every door.

I was very grateful for Alli since Nate was too cool to have his mom go trick-or-treating with him. I kept asking him if he'd go with me or hold my hand and he just kept walking saying "nope." He saw a dog in one house and walked right in to say hello to the puppy.

It was a great night out with friends. Nate loved being a lion and had a great time trick-or-treating. I think if I would have remembered a drink for him he would have lasted for a long time but he got thirsty and opted to go home for some apple juice.

Happy Halloween!

today's car ride.

First of all, Nate looked like this. He found these goggles at Aunt Sam's house and insists on wearing them.



We ran to the office this morning and on our way home, I handed Nate a new Elmo book. He was upset that I couldn't read it to him while I was driving. So after he threw the book a few times, I told him I wasn't picking it up anymore. After a moment of silence, he says:

Nate: "mom, i not happy with you."
Me: "Nate, you're not happy with me?"
Nate: "No, mom. Not yet."

We had the same conversation later in the day on our way to our ward's trunk-or-treat. I told him I needed a happy lion or else we were going home and going to bed. He apparently wasn't happy with me after that comment either and he let me know.

It definitely made me chuckle a few times today. I have to say that this is such a fun stage for me. I love hearing him come up with new things to say.

the pumpkin patch

Aunt Ali invited us to the pumpkin patch yesterday and we had a great time! Her ward had a group time scheduled so we paid $5 and Nate got to ride all of the rides and pick out a pumpkin to take home. His favorite part? He got to do it with Abbie. He's slightly obsessed with his big cousin.

As always, Nate was pretty fearless. We went to the big slide first and once his shoes were off he was climbing up the really tall rope latter all by himself. And he was doing alright until the big kids came up after him which pretty much scared him to death. Which meant mama was coming up with him. It was quite a hike to the top but well worth it. He had a great time and loved the big slide.

Luckily Aunt Ali was willing to go on a few rides with Nate that a big pregnant lady shouldn't be on. And Abbie filled in on one of the swing rides.



Nate & Abbie loved the swings.

Loved petting the animals.

And loved the train ride at the end.

The pumpkin patch was definitely a hit. Thanks Ali & Abbie for the invite.

I'm just a little excited that these little cousins get to go to the happiest place on earth together in December. Nate will be in heaven with his Marz cousins & Mickey!

Wes' 29 Birthday

Wes turned 29 on Sunday . . . so we celebrated all weekend!

The celebrations began on Friday night at Metro Pizza with my family. {I annoyed Sam and Wes with my picture taking outside of the restaurant while we waited for our table!} It was fun to get together with the Marz clan (we missed ya, Tripp) to celebrate Wes' birthday. And you can't beat Metro Pizza. It's a family favorite, for sure.




On Saturday, I thought we could all use some exercise so we took Nate on a walk on a trail in Seven Hills and let him play at the park for a bit before we met Tripp at Sam's house to help move some furniture.

Since our little world rarely revolves around Wes - I tried to make the rest of the weekend fun for him! I never thought I'd say this but he actually could use a few new items of clothing so I had a babysitter come over in the afternoon and we went to the Charleston outlets to shop for Weston R. We found him a few things and had a great afternoon out and about. Shopping without a toddler is heavenly!

We got home just in time for the BYU football game. I knew Wes wanted to watch it so I took Nate and we intruded on Kiley/Brandon/Hadley's afternoon out as a family and met them at the carousel at The District so Wes could have some peace and quiet doing his favorite thing - watching sports!

Sunday was his actual birthday which was a pretty typical Sunday. Except for the fact that I was in the kitchen for h o u r s {which never happens} making dinner {his mom's lasagne/bread/salad} and the famous Griffeth chocolate chip applesauce cake! We had dinner and the McDonalds came over to help us eat cake and icecream. Happy Birthday, Wes. We hope you had a fun weekend. Enjoy your last year in the 20's!

a cowboy hat that fits his noggin'

Since Nate absolutely l o v e s being a cowboy - Wes got him a real cowboy hat. This hat replaced his 0-6 month Gymboree cowboy hat that has always been to small for his big ol' head.

Nate is in l o v e with his new hat. He even asked me to take pictures of cowboy Nate this week. So here you go - pictures of our little cowboy.

Meet Samantha Jane

My dear friend Mimi in Phoenix had her second baby girl today, Samantha Jane. I will forever tell this little girl that she was named after my family - my lil' sister's name is Samantha and my middle name is Jane. I know that's not the case . . . but I'm running with it anyway.

Congrats Mimi & Dan! I can't wait to meet this little girl. We're increasing the chances of our kids getting married with you having girls and me having boys!

Oh, and a special shout-out to Mimi's sis-in-law Amy for my play-by-play of the status of Samantha's delivery! I felt very in-the-loop. :)

"tank-oo, mom"

Nate has turned in to quite the little chatterbox. He talks our ears off all day long and we love it. I love seeing his little brain work - coming up with new words, phrases & even sentences to tell us what he's thinkin.

My absolute favorite saying that I hear all day long is "tank-oo, mom." (thank you, mom). If I get him a drink, he says thank you. If I tell him he's handsome, he says thank you. When I put him in his carseat, he says thank you in the cutest little voice.

Yesterday after his nap we sat at his little table and colored for a bit. He stopped coloring, looked up at me and said, "mommy my best friend." That made my week - I love this kid.

Haunted Harvest

Our Halloween festivites began last night at the Springs Preserve Haunted Harvest with my sister Ali and her family.

What safari animal is Nate this year?

His first Halloween he was a monkey.



Last year he was an elephant.



And this year? A LION!



And let me just say that he loves being a lion. He growled all night long last night and told us all day today that he's a LION. I had to get one more year out of him of being a cute animal. I'm sure by next year he'll want to be some kind of character or something scary!



Ali invited us to the Haunted Harvest last night at the Springs Preserve. They frequent the Springs Preserve but we'd never taken Nate there so we were excited to go. To say that Nate was excited to go Trick-or-Treating with his cousins is an understatement - even though he had no idea what trick-or-treating was {he was barfing all Halloween night last year.} We all had a great night!

We went Trick-or-Treating . . .



Nate scoped out his treats a few times. Luckily he didn't notice that Wes ate half his candy before we left the place!



The little guys did a little Halloween coloring . . .



And played some carnival style games! Nate loved throwing all of the balls to try to knock things over and he's loved playing with his prizes today.



The weather was nice . . . even though we've had another little heat wave. Nate was a little toasty in his costume but he didn't seem to mind. We had a great night kicking off our Halloween festivities - thanks Ali & Tripp for inviting us to join you. We had a great time.

i sooooo have a 2 year old little boy . . .

Today was interesting with my {2} year old little boy. I'm calling his behavior a phase with fingers crossed that it passes soon.

I'd been trying to get together with my friend Nikki (I went to highschool with her hubby) for a long time and it finally worked today. We met at a park and let the kiddos play. Nate and Tessa played pretty well . . . as long as Nate left her alone! All was good - we packed them up and headed to Cafe Rio for lunch. Nate was hungry. And probably tired. And a little sick of his mama trying to play catch up with a friend instead of giving him her full attention but we were doing alright. Then he started throwing things {a new behavior} so I got everything out of his reach. Or so I thought. We were done eating and he somehow grabbed my tostada tray and flung it around like a cowboy. Nate and I {and probably Nikki and Tessa} were COVERED in lettuce, rice, beans, dressing & a piece of Nate's quesadilla. You can imagine the stares we got with a few smiles from moms who totally understood. This is not typical behavior of the Naters but he's doing more and more stuff like this lately. So like I said - hopefully it's a phase and he remembers his manners soon. He knew he was in trouble when I dragged him to the car and we didn't get our usual Nielsen's i-cone afterwards. After a few minutes of silence in the car, he said, "sorry throw food, mom."

After lunch we ran to my friend Nancee's house so she could wax my eyebrows real quick. We come in smelling like Cafe Rio with clothes covered in mexican food. Seth was asleep so Nate played well by himself but then my prego nose started smelling something. 1). he took his smelly shoes off - his feet are STINKY in those shoes. And 2). he pooped. Not crazy behavior but poor Nancee was left with a mexican/smelly feet/poop smell as we walked out the door.

{side note: if anyone reading doesn't know about Nancee and her amazing waxing/facial abilities . . . call me! She's flexible with times and she's fabulous!}

It's one thing when your kid does things that only affect mom or dad. But today we certainly put on a show for Nikki & Nancee! And to think I'm doubling the trouble in February.

31 flavors

I've always LOVED baskin robbins icecream. It's for sure my favorite icecream joint. So you can imagine my excitement when the one near me (Eastern & Horizon Ridge in Smith's parking lot) is doing .99 kids cones Monday-Thursday. It's really just a single scoop of icecream. They don't skimp on the portions.

And the owner of this BR is absolutely adorable. We went last night and Nate must have charmed him because he brought him an entire cup of gummy bears and kept handing us coupons to come back! I love it when owners are actually in their store being friendly with customers.

A few of my pregnancy LB's will definitely be from .99 cones at Baskin Robbins. Although the kids cone makes it so I don't get a double scoop!

{this promo may be at more locations than just mine . . . that's the only one i've seen though so far!}

Nate the {cowboy}

While I was at Art in the Park last weekend, Wes took Nate to the Boot Barn and my dad tagged along for the ride. They ended up leaving with cowboy boots for Nate. To say that Nate L O V E S them is an understatement. They are even rubbing his legs raw but he doesn't seem to care. Now he can be just like his dad, grandma & papa with cowboy boots.



He not only wants to wear his boots ALL of the time but he wants his cowboy hat, too. Too bad the cowboy hat is a 6-12 month hat that I'm pretty sure has been too small for his noggin' since birth. But he insists on wearing it. One of these days I'll get him a bigger one.

While at the cabin this weekend . . . he was our little cowboy.

another weekend at the cabin.

We made a spontaneous trip to the cabin this weekend with my parents. We wanted to go one more time before winter hits big time up there so this weekend was it.





Nate absolutely loves being up there. He constantly wants to be outside either walking in the forest looking for deer or riding the cabin cars (4 wheelers). It makes it really easy to entertain him!



Nate loves to walk through the forest saying "deer, where are you?" He saw quite a few deer . . . these were right outside the cabin.



Nate rode cabin cars with Wes and Papa . . .



{he loves his helmet and goggles}






They took him over to feed the horses. His eyes LIGHT up when he sees the horses. Maybe he is a real cowboy.





And when he needed a short break from the outdoors, he played trains inside.

On Saturday afternoon, Wes' cousin Dave and his cute family were able to come up to visit from Hurricane. Dave & Lynnette recently moved there so we get to see them a little more often. They have two boys and in a few weeks they'll have a little girl! Nate had fun playing with them.

Jackson & Kaden Rogers

Wes taking them for a ride on the mule . . .

Nate and Jackson running through the forest looking for deer. I swear they would have walked for miles!



Eating some dessert.

Thanks Dave & Lynnette for coming up. It was fun to see you guys.

We had a nice little getaway in the mountains. It was a little chilly at times but it felt great after enduring a really hot summer. We didn't have anything on the agenda this weekend which left us

some time to relax {when Nate was asleep, of course!}. We read, played games, took a nap, watched alot of sports, etc.

While we were packing up to come home, Nate kept saying "more cabin." We're glad he likes the place.

Wes and I determined that we've hit the "chatterbox" stage with Nate. He talked our ears off the entire way home!