Happy Halloween!

My cabbage patch doll and Lego

We had an impromptu Halloween party when all the grandparents decided they wanted to see the costumes!

We stayed toasty warm by the fire

Madelyn cuddled with grandpa while Ben went trick or treating

Then it was time to organize the stash!

Hope you all had a great Halloween!!

Sunday = Fall Day

The spirit of fall hit me full force today. I woke up deciding today was going to everything I love about this time of year. Here's what we did, in pictures:

Of course we still had to carve Madelyn a pumpkin. And of course we still hadn't bought a pumpkin but I needed to hit up the grocery store anyway so we headed off to Meijer for dinner supplies and a pumpkin. Then I gave Nick explicit instructions on what to carve:

And he did an awesome job! Don't mind the fact that you are going to see pictures of Madelyn in this outfit for 2 days. We had to put her in it for the photo with her pumpkin and then of course, she had to wear it on Halloween.

Then her dad decided to do her hair and convince me that she needed to be Cousin Itt for Halloween. Sad thing is, she could totally pull it off. I just can't bring myself to cut her hair yet but I think the big day is getting closer.

While they were playing beauty parlor in the other room, I made these pumpkin seeds. They are addictive - consider yourself warned!

After all the pumpkin carving glory, we took this maniac for a walk in the woods. He goes absolutely nuts chasing after squirrels and running like a wild man. Madelyn is working on clacking her tongue which we have decided is her squirrel call. She is trying to help Ziggy hunt.

Then it was time for dinner. I made Chicken Noodle Soup.  It was amazing!

And blueberry pie! Yum!

Then it was time for bed for Miss. Madelyn. Read her a Halloween book and tucked her in, just in time for Nick and I to catch the newest episode of The Walking Dead.

Happy House Holiday Challenge - Week 2

Good news - we made it through the week!!  Bad news - I didn't accomplish everything.

Make the bed - 6/7 - Now onto the excuses. My mom's dog got fleas and since Ziggy spends tons of time with Cedar we just assumed he had gotten them too. This turned our weekend into "Operation Flea Removal". Not fun. Normally, if you just have a dog with fleas it isn't as bad but because we have cats and they could have gotten them too we had to wash every single soft surface in our house. That much laundry resulted in not making the bed one day because of the laundry backup. Thankfully, we never found a flea so I don't know that Ziggy actually got them but better safe than sorry. I have never vacuumed my house so much. Ugh!

Empty the sink - 7/7! - Go me!

Deep clean the kitchen - done and done! The really good news....our dining area is attached to our kitchen and I wasn't sure where to stop the deep clean so I already did this week's deep clean as well! I am going to deep clean the bedrooms this week instead. I'm not sure if that will be part of the challenge but I figure they could use it.

Here is what I learned in deep cleaning my kitchen.

1. I accumulate a lot of stuff that I never end up using. I wound up with at least 4 bags of food, dishes, dish towels, utensils, etc that I either forgot we had or we haven't touched in at least a year. I was feeling motivated so out of the house it went! The big purge felt good!

2. Cleaning with a mobile baby puts an even greater challenge into the Happy House Challenge. Madelyn wants to be a part of everything and I wound up vacuuming her pants many times because she just loved crawling in the dirt.

3. Deep cleaning for me = Extra projects for Nick. As I was crawling into crooks and crannies to clean every cobweb, I also managed to find little things I need Nick to fix in the kitchen. On his todo list now: repaint the kitchen trim and touch up some peeling tiles on the floor.

KITCHEN BEFORE

KITCHEN DURING aka - my helper

KITCHEN AFTER

please ignore that open drawer - didn't realize it until just now and I'm too lazy to go take another picture.

Madelyn's 11th month!

Heat of teething = sad baby

One more month and Miss. M is the big one year. And I am one sad mama bear. I love the little lady she is becoming but I definitely miss her squishy baby days. Well let's recap.

Food - She has definitely starting making her preferences known. Right now those favorites are scrambled eggs, corn, peas, bananas, yogurt, string cheese, bread and mushrooms. Nick and I tried giving her some mixed veggies that included corn, peas, green beans and carrots. This girl picked out every single pea and corn kernel but wouldn't touch the carrots or green beans. I even tried cutting the green beans to resemble peas. Didn't matter. Now she likes to put all the food she isn't going to eat into her cup holder on her high chair. And once she's done eating, Madelyn decides to share her leftovers with Ziggy by dropping each piece on the floor one at a time. Ziggy has figured out this game and lays under her high chair the entire time she eats. I am amazed by how much food she manages to put away - must be a growth spurt!

At Dad's 30th birthday dinner

Teeth - Nick and I better start saving now for the inevitable braces. Her teeth are coming in the most bizarre order I have ever seen. She got another one this month. One of her premolars made it's debut. I don't know which one since there aren't any other teeth back there to use as a reference. This tooth was a beast to get through. Poor Madelyn had all the traditional teething symptoms. Runny nose, slight fever and just generally out of it for a few days. She wanted to spend most of her time in her crib knawing on her pacifier and being left alone. Fortunately, she kept up her eating and drinking habits so she didn't end up getting sick. She has just started this process again in the last day and I think we've got another tooth on the way. Poor girl!

No teeth pictures but here she is enjoying one of those warm fall days

Tricks - Madelyn's newest trick is giving kisses. If you ask for a kiss, she will tilt her face up to you and thrust her chin/lips out so you can give her a kiss. She then likes to repeat this 10-20 times.


Loves - I found an idea on Pinterest to wrap a different Halloween book for each day in POctober and use that as a countdown to Halloween. She makes a beeline to the book bucket everytime I put it on the floor and can't wait to pull out a new book. Miss. M is getting better at unwrapping the package and loves reading each new story. After I finish the book, she will spend the next 30 minutes or so flipping through all the books from the previous days. This kid loves to read and it makes me estatic!

Pets - Madelyn has definitely started interacting with the critters more this month. For some reason, Fang enjoys the abuse and will seek Madelyn out when she is playing and then roll around near her while Madelyn tugs at her tail and "pets" her belly. She is surprisingly gentle with the animals and squeals everytime she is able to touch one of them.

New friend - Just one day shy of Madelyn's 11 month birthday, her newest friend Lilian Eaton joined the world! Of course we ran right up to the hospital to meet her and capture a picture of the two newest BFFs. Congratulations Georgette and Chuck!!
Overall, a great month!!

Holiday Challenge

I have been following Molly at My Happy House for awhile now and always creates these organizing/cleaning challenges. They are super simple and don't take a lot of time but I can't seem to get over my laziness and actually participate. Well not anymore folks, I am joinging the My Happy House Challenge! I am hoping by blogging about it on here, I will hold myself accountable and actually complete this challenge. In her post, Molly shares that Thanksgiving is only 6 weeks away! 6 weeks! Stop it! This is even more frightening because Miss. Madelyn was born 1 week before Thanksgiving which means I not only have the holidays coming up but a 1st birthday party as well!!

If you want to check out the challenge head on over to My Happy House!

Sibling love

Like I said - Madelyn thinks Ben is just super.

Eating fruit at Uncle Caleb's football game

Having a serious conversation about where to put the Halloween window clings