14 Years - Anniversary Weekend

So for our anniversary this year. The weekend started with going to Evans Family Farms (you can see the details of that on this post though). After that we were feeling pretty lazy so we just hung around the house. We did decide to go up and visit Marie for a bit after Cara's nap. She offered to watch Cara for us while we went out to dinner together. We had chosen to go to Marie Calendar's since I hadn't had in ages. To be honest, it wasn't the best food. Marie mentioned a different dinner place, and in hindsight I think she was warning us of Marie Calendars haha. But it was nice to say we got to have a meal alone before minion comes.

After we took our time at dinner (without a child it's funny how you suddenly have a lot more time to talk about random topics and suddenly the service seems slower haha) we went back to pick up Cara and head home. It was nice to have a meal out, but I feel bad that I didn't really get dressed up or anything. In fact I was probably very dressed down for having such a date night.




Some silly videos I got from the weekend. Cara is being so silly seeing herself in the camera haha.

Sunday morning we got up to our usual routine: big Sunday breakfast (french toast), groceries, laundry, and relax until the Skype call at 4. While I was putting the grocery list together Larry surprised me with more anniversary gifts! To clarify: we agreed a few months ago that I just wanted a 2019 planner (so I can get a head start on planning at least through January now before the baby comes) and I'd get him these cool auto feeders for the fish (to make being away in the hospital or on any trips easier for us to make sure the fish are actually get fed as much as we normally feed them). I did get my planner, but Larry also always gets me something that's meaningful to the year we are celebrating. This year was 14 and I guess that's Ivory, so he surprised me with this pretty lace dress, a cute ivory long sleeve cardigan, and a pretty necklace (it was a nest with 3 eggs, but I asked and the eggs don't really represent anything, it was just ivory and he knows I like necklaces). So of course I felt guilty I just got him the fish feeders. Even if it was agreed upon, I feel like we're that lame couple from Beetlejuice that we don't really surprise each other...only it's just me. Larry is always surprising me. I owe him one haha.

When we went to the grocery store I decided we needed to get our pumpkins so we found a couple good ones and put them up with Cara to hang out with...I think she liked it:

I also decided we needed to have some wassail made! It is such a great cooler weather drink and I've been dying to make it for a few years. Why not do it this year? I wasn't doing much in the way of Halloween stuff so I could at least make a new recipe. It also turns out I've been mispronouncing that name this whole time. I thought it was pronounced like wah-sigh, but it's like wah-sail and now I feel all silly saying the wrong name for SO long haha.

So other than that we just enjoyed the weekend and had lots of fun. I'm definitely getting drained of energy so it might have been our last eventful weekend until after this baby is born. So until I do have anything blog worthy...Happy Anniversary to us!

Evans Family Farms

So one of my biggest goals was to visit a pumpkin patch/farm area for Fall this year. I'm not sure why it became so important, but I thought it would be a fun little tradition to incorporate. I wanted to find one that had a petting zoo and when I found one that had that PLUS a train and pony rides and seemed to be fairly budget friendly (like $3 per adult and kids were free friendly!) I was SO excited. Yes, I did find one that was free, but it was further away, where as this one (Evans Family Farm) was just down the street so it worked to fit in one morning before lunch/Cara's nap. I was so excited to go and see Cara with all the animals.

We really lucked out because we got there really early and no one was there to collect money. There were some little girls in this booth by the entrance, but when I asked if that's where we pay they just said "I don't know" and walked away. We didn't see adults until we were close to leaving, but no one checked for tickets so...EFF if you are reading this, I guess we owe you $6? But I'm guessing if little girls were in the booth maybe it's not that big of a deal?

This family farm was so cute and small, but perfect for us! Cara loved the animals (she really could only pet the horse and the pig, but she still loved seeing all the different "kitties" as she calls animals). She really loved going through the tunnel and walking around the jumping pit area. But her favorite part? By far the train ride! She got to ride it all on her own (talk about feeling like she's growing up so fast!) and when it was done she wanted to go again. As much as I wanted to let her, we didn't technically pay for it so I felt one was enough of a ride, plus they went in the same circle twice so that was enough. We did also let her walk around the hay maze too and she seemed to have fun with that. It was so cute watching her navigate through the whole place and the maze, she is such a little adventurer!

There was a bonus that they also had little kitties and puppies that didn't mind kids and so she got to pet them as well (the puppies were really young and energetic and smaller than any of our cats so Cara was really excited about them). Unfortunately, there wasn't pony rides, but since we got in for free I figured we got our money's worth. We didn't pick any of the pumpkins since I wasn't ready to get them this early in the month, but they did have a great selection!

Overall, I'd totally recommend this farm! Even if we did pay. They are in Lehi so they are really close to us, it is pretty small, but they definitely had enough to keep kids entertained and Cara had such a fun time, which is my favorite part!

And now for the cute train video:

Silliest Night Games

So this has become one of our favorite little night games. Larry does "scary daddy"/monster noises and Cara has learned that I am safe and he can't get her if she gets to me first. It's really funny how much she gets into it and how excited she gets. I finally caught it on video one night and just had to share the adorable-ness:

New Memberships

So we got some unfortunate news after we got home from our Georgia trip: tumbling class is no more. I'm pretty sad about this for a few reasons:

1. We only got to take her to 3 classes! We had to miss one from our trip and then the one after our trip was already planned to be off for fall break (or something). I was hoping to at least make it up to November before maybe pulling her out IF we were going to do that (depending on how I handled childbirth round 2 and how things were adjusting with two kids, etc. etc.).
2. It was doing exactly what we wanted! Cara was socializing so well within the 3 classes she had. She was feeling more comfortable with strangers, she was getting used to the routine. By the last class she went to she only complained during stretching time, but she was so used to doing the rest AND was learning how to go up a play slide and down it all on her own. I was seeing the progress I really wanted and hoped for with this.
3. I bought maternity workout clothes...I don't work out while pregnant so I probably won't use these again and so now I'm out the money for those and only got 2 uses out of them (I ordered them after our first class). Such a bummer

Now the reason it got cancelled was because we were the only ones who were staying in the Saturday class, everyone else moved to the Tuesday morning class. So in the business sense I get why it got cancelled, but we can't make it to the Tuesday morning class so there goes that. Even though I was telling Larry that I wasn't sure how many more classes I'd be able to make it through with how tired (and bigger) I've been getting lately, I still didn't want to quit and take Cara out of that environment, so I did some brainstorming and decided maybe we needed to look at some memberships at some other fun places. Namely, Thanksgiving Point and the Living Planet Aquarium. Both would be GREAT for winter when we have two kids that need to get out and have fun, both were decently priced (only 6 visits to each and they pay for themselves), and with one of them we could leave the girls with a grandparent and let them take it and they could use the membership and get in for free! Plus they both have fun kid areas to help that socialization part, and with Thanksgiving Point they have outdoor and indoor areas so it works year round when I feel they need outdoor area. I figured if we went to each one once a month, then within a year it's perfect. Plus both offer such great learning opportunities and discounts on food and the gift shop too!

Overall, I'm sad there's no more tumbling because it was working so well, however, I'm really excited to have these memberships and to take Cara there to run around and eventually our little minion will get to enjoy these visits as well!

Cara and Puppies

So my grandma was having issues connecting to her Skype account and we were having difficulties getting her on it so I volunteered my brilliant computer hubby to help her get it figured out (we had done this once, but she was still having issues so we figured this time we really had to get it figured out for her). Luckily the weather was pretty good so we were able to let Cara run around quite a bit outside AND inside grandma's.

Well grandma has a few dogs running around and since Cara isn't quite used to them I found it very entertaining watching her with them:



Isn't it funny how excited but nervous she is. We've found if they are her size or smaller she's much better with them. If they are bigger than her she's a bit more nervous and will just keep her distance.