Halloween and Fall Fun 2013

Almost caught up here. . . Halloween!  Martin's Favorite Holiday! 

The new neighborhood still seems too good to be true to us.  The neighbors are all incredibly nice (as we were moving in we were invited to a BBQ to meet everyone, we have an offer to watch Ben if I go into labor in the middle of the night, we have gotten chocolate chip cookies brought to the door. . .) and they have a ritual I guess of like a Secret Santa but with Halloween stuff.  We got a basket so had to go delivert two. .

 Mino enjoyed it immensely and every night after we did it he wanted to go out and hand out pumpkins.
The weather changed from summer, to two beautiful fall days, to rainy and cold.  I was scared that we missed the opportunity to go to a pumpkin patch or apple orchard but we had a break last weekend and hightailed it out to pick out pumpkins.  This place actually was pretty sweet and had so much more than just pumpkins - it was full on entertainment for little ones.  We went to Pinehaven Farm and it happened to be the halloween party so Mino got his first taste of "Trick or Treating"

There was a huge petting zoo area with goats, sheep, cows, mini donkeys, chickens, Emus, bunnies and kittens.

Martin was more excited than Ben about the donkey.

I attempted to document his height, he was too enthralled with the gigantic slide next to me to smile.

There was a train for him to cruise in even.

There was a show with a puppet dragon but he was too scared to watch it.  They had a pumpkin cannon as well but that was an absolute no go.  Mino has reached the age where things scare him. It surprises me what scares him and what doesn't.  Puppet dragon = scary, dark tunnel slide = fun.

 

 After all the adventures, big prego Mama was tired so we grabbed our pumpkins and hit the road home.

 

 

Ben is very proud to be able to tell everyone which pumpkin is his, which is mommy's and which is daddy's. 

The real day arrived.  After having Kate and Claude over for Mino's party we all decided it would be fun to have them come trick or treating, they brought Jack O'Lantern Pizzas and some sweet costumes and we hit the road in our new hood.

Ben co starred as Cowardly Lion with Abigail as One Smart Cookie.  I was a ripe banana, Claude was a Packer Super Fan and Kate was a witchy woman.  Martin sported his Red Sox Gear but thought a beard (all the Red Sox grew facial hair leading up to their World Series Championship the night before last) would be too much for Ben, so just went as fan.

Abigail was the pro trick or treater.  She didn't stop grabbing for candy until it was out of reach.  I was very impressed with her skillz.  Ben was scared for the most part.

After we got home Ben wanted to show off how he brushed his teeth or something, Abigail watched but would not let anyone near her candy.  It was pretty darn cute all in all.

Bens 2nd Birthday

Ben is officially two.  Slightly less fancy than our trip to Argentina to turn 1, but still a good time.  Nana and Granddude made the trip from WI to hang out and it just so happened that the Therriens were in town to visit with Abigail en route to PA to meet their new triplet grandbabies and were able to stop by and have some cupcakes with us.  He is waaaaaay into lions at this point in his life.  These are my feeble attempts at lion cupcakes.

He got super shy when we started to sing happy birthday, he grabbed my arm and wouldn't let go.  He wouldn't blow out the candle either.  My little ham clamming up in the spot light.

 

Now that he is two he is free to put the moves on his lady friends.

We needed a little help getting stuff done around the house as I am pretty much useless with anything other than folding laundry or shuffling things from here to there.  So while it was overall a pretty bad weather weekend, we had a little break and the sun came out and we got some fun pics out in the yard.

Here is the deuce brewing at 36 weeks.

After the weather switched back to rain we opened gifts inside.

Ben got a big stuffed Lion and some clothes from Nana and Grandddude and an Iron Man doll and Big Wheels from his mom and dad.

His actual birthday he had to go to daycare, but he came home with a little crown so we did it all over again and he was waaaaay less shy.

New House!

We did it.  We got our house.  After a summer of searching and one that we though was the one that didn't work out we closed on our MN pad on Sept 6.  What a great feeling.  It is amazing to have so much more space and a walls we can paint and put holes in.

The view from the livingroom is what did it.  While house hunting we had two goals.
1) A good school district
2) Something other than another house in our back yard or a big fenced back yard. 
We found a place on a lake - amazingly in our price range. It was a quick decision on our end. The sellers didn't expect the place to go so quickly so we had to wait a couple months after the offer to actually close, but soooooo worth it.

We decided that we loved our kitchen so much in Boston after we redid it that we would just do it here before we even moved in.  We had a month overlap with our rental and owning the house and felt that "hey, if we are on a lake, we want to see that lake from every room" so we knocked out a wall that was separating the kitchen from the rest of the living space.

To enjoy views like these. . . .

We have a little beach with rocks and ducks and Ben and Martin have good father son time skipping stones and quacking at the ducks

Here is a terrible view of the kitchen after.

And here we are officially moving in.  I love this place and can't wait to set our roots here!!!!!!