It took Mikayla a few houses to get down the concept of trick-or-treating, but once she did- she was ready to take the neighborhood. She kept asking to go to the next house once we finished with one. It was really cute.
On the way home. We went so far that she got tired and needed a ride on daddy's shoulders. How do our 3 faces look? Any resemblances?
Finishing up on carving the pumpkins (of course it was done in a diaper for easy clean-up)
All dressed up as a lion.
Look at our awesome horse carving. Matt's mom got us a magazine that said to use cookie cutters and a hammer. Brilliant!
I love the fall time in Albuquerque. There are so many things to do. We have the state fair, balloon fiesta, and the most wonderful weather to do so many other things. This is the first week where the temperature is finally getting cooler, which is welcome. These pictures range from September to present day. Hope you enjoy.
Picking out the perfect pumpkin at the pumpkin patch. Looking at the bunnies at the pumpkin patch. You can kind of see a bunny in the picture, it is on the porch.
Riding the cow train. We actually did not make it for long because she got scared.
Riding the hayride to the pumpkins.
We attempted the corn maze. They let you do it at night and it is haunted-I have no desire to try that. It was overwhelming during the day time.
Picking out a pumpkin. This one may be too heavy.
Family picture at the botanical gardens.
My friend Kate came in town, and we had so much fun. Our kids are only about 2weeks apart. John and Mikayla had a blast together.
John and Mikayla looking at the baby elephant at the zoo.
Kate, Mikayla, and I at the balloon glow.
At the Balloon glow during balloon fiesta.
Special Shapes Morning during balloon fiesta. Doesn't Mikayla look warm.
She loved the cow. Thanks to her grammy she now says that cows say "eat more chicken". Can you guess her favorite restaurant!?
I love this picture. Matt's dad got her the shirt.
So at the beginning of summer I said that I was going to post some pictures from our backyard, well that did not happen. So here they are! This was quite a process as we did all the work ourselves (with help from family- especially my dad). Can you believe that Matt and my dad made that patio themselves!? If you never saw our backyard before, we started with the Sahara desert. It was nothing but sand, and I now hate sand for all of the years I had to sweep and vaccuum it until we finished our yard. And "dirt" we have, we had to bring in since it is seriously sand.
This is off to the side of the backyard.
Our first garden. I had to convince Matt this was a good idea, but now we both like it. We built the planter thanks to the inspiration of Loretta's garden.
It is hard to see from here, but when sitting on the patio, you have an amazing view of the city. Doesn't my flower garden and wedding lace vines look great! (My mom helped with those as when we planted them a year and half ago, I had the worst morning sickness)
Our patio.
The amazing brick patio that my dad and matt made. We still need to go up on our wall because now we have neighbors.
Mikayla is very much into dressing up. So the other day, matt, mikayla, grammy debbie, and i went to lunch and then gymboree and played dress-up. Mikayla got the cutest little outfit. Don't you think the hat is adorable! She also got a bracelet, and of course sunglasses like mama because she has to wear them everytime I have them on and if I put them on top of my head, I have to move hers also. :-) Then on Sunday night for our dessert making (our new Sunday tradition for the 3 of us) we made chocolate chip cookies. You have to check out this video of Mikayla waiting for them to come out of the oven.
Ready to go since I have all of my accessories. Quite the little diva.
This summer we had a hard time coming up with a place to go for our vacation. I had asked my students if they had any ideas, and as typical high schoolers, most said we should go to Cancun (one suggested we go to Taos :-) ) We had always talked about seeing Chicago, so we thought why not. Well it ended up being the perfect choice. Matt and I have always taken vacations that were to relax and not make plans, but we knew this would be different. We were actually going to see the city, and we had Mikayla with us so we would have to do fun things in the morning, and then what we wanted to do in the afternoon while she slept in her stroller. So this is the first trip that we actually made an itinerary for and researched A LOT. The research paid off, it turned out that through our membership to Explora and reciprocity plus being teachers, we did not have to pay for a single museum! (That probably saved us $200, my friend Katherine Kruger would be so proud). We went to a lot of museums, Navy Pier, a boat tour (which we found a coupon online for), the Magnificent mile, and of course a Cubs game. For those of you that do not know, Matt is a huge Cubs fan, so this was like a dream come true to go to Wrigley Field. Plus we had wonderful Chicago hotdogs and pizza. We had a wonderful time and highly recommend Chicago! Now we are on to thinking about next year's big trip (we already have a few small ones planned) so if you have any ideas, let us know. Right now we are thinking Washington DC. We have seen most of the west, so we are now branching out to the East.
On the boat cruise of the river and Lake Michigan. Go Cubs! What would vacation be without eating brownies for breakfast.
Walking along the magnificent mile. I love this picture because it shows Mikayla wanting to dance instead of walk!
Taking an evening walk along Lake Michigan.Waiting for our deep dish pizza.
The pizza was wonderful! Thank goodness it was easy to run in Chicago because of the altitude because we definitely needed to work that off.
Isn't this adorable. Some pictures are able to capture personalities, and I think this gives a glimpse into Mikayla's.
This is a video of Mikayla playing in Millenium Park at the fountain.
I know that I am not the best blogger to begin with, but Matt and I decided to get rid of the internet at home since we both have it at work when school is going. This is our way of cutting out unnecessary costs since I am going part-time next year and will only be working 3 days a week. So my blogging will not be consistent, though it never has. But I will blog when I am at my parents'. I already know my next post is about our finished backyard.
We took Mikayla to the mountain because she had not been to the ranch yet. Being up there brings back so many memories of growing up and spending some of the summer up there. She loved being outdoors all day. She is definitely not an indoor girl.
Here Mikayla is with the stick that Nana gave her. She is admiring the flowers. Mikayla always had a stick in her hand. If she lost it, or a caterpillar happened to crawl on it, she needed a "new stick". Nana and Mikayla are finding and smelling the wild irises.
Pampa and Mikayla are standing by sign that my dad had made for the spring he made so that the deer would always have somewhere to drink, even in a drought. It is so pretty up there. He named it after my grandma.
Matt, Mikayla, and Pampa are looking at the logs getting ready to be loaded up soon. Isn't it amazing that all of these logs needed to be thinned so that the land can be healthy and not overgrown. It looks so much better in the areas that have been thinned.
Mama and Mikayla sitting on a rock by one of the streams. In this stream is a threatened fish. Which means there are only about 1000 of them left, so they are on their way to being endangered, and this particular stream has about 250 of the 1000 left.
On the way home. We went so far that she got tired and needed a ride on daddy's shoulders.
How do our 3 faces look? Any resemblances?
Finishing up on carving the pumpkins (of course it was done in a diaper for easy clean-up)
All dressed up as a lion.
Look at our awesome horse carving. Matt's mom got us a magazine that said to use cookie cutters and a hammer. Brilliant!
Waiting for our deep dish pizza.
