Friday Five!

-We took our window a/c units out this week which means that it must really be fall!!  It's always a little sad to do this since it means we are officially done with warm weather.  I'm okay with winter, but I hope that this year it won't last as long as last time! 

-Yesterday James turned 5 months old!  I can't believe he is so big!! Our pediatrician told us to start James on rice cereal at 5 months and I was thrilled :)  We gave him his first bite and......he wasn't the biggest fan.  It is always so fun to give them food for the first time.  They don't know what they are doing and make a huge mess.  Starting solids is always a work in progress and messy so I was glad the doctor wanted us to start a month earlier than normal.  The sooner we start, the sooner we are through this phase and moving onto baby food and puffs.   Bring it on!

-Milwaukee does trick or treating a little different than most.  Instead of doing it on Halloween, each neighborhood association picks a night and time and that is that.  For us, that night is tonight. It will be the first time Elise will do "real" trick or treating; or door to door trick or treating. Usually we have gone to the medical school and go around to all the offices.  I'm excited to take her out and see how she does.  I think she'll love it!

-We had some company over this weekend I made lasagna roll-ups. It's a fun, simple twist on the classic and I think they all liked it! If you want to give it a try, you can use the recipe I used here: http://www.cookingclassy.com/2012/02/lasagna-roll-ups/

-I checked out the book Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? by Mindy Kaling and I was already laughing out loud a few pages in.  It is one of those hilarious books about nothing in particular and is the perfect read for a busy mom of two.  If you need a good laugh, grab this one!  It will be a fun, quick read!

Elise-isms

Elise is SUCH a talker!!  She has a huge vocabulary and is constantly using words we didn't even know that she knew!  She keeps us laughing all day long with the things she says and we thought we'd share a few of them with you!

Zack: Elise, you are so sweet. 
Elise: Yeah, it's my purpose.

As we were taking a walk though the park: It's a fun neighborhood

Zack taught Elise the song "Little Bunny Foo Foo" and when he sings the part where the fairy will "turn you into a goon" Elise says "Nooooo!!!"

Pro: Elise loves to read The Book of Mormon
Con: Her favorite people are Laman and Lemuel

After removing her bib: I'm free!!!!

Elise: Mom, are you pumping milk?
Me: Yes
Elise: Good job mom!

Me: Do you want hot chocolate like Dad?
Elise: Yeah!  Actually........ no.  Just milk.

After walking in from taking out the trash: You came back mom!!!

Upon completion of building a fort with dad: This is respectable. 

Oh Lissers.  So sassy.  So sweet. So loveable.

Latest Projects

Even though things have been pretty busy around here (and I apparently gave up on blogging-oops!) I've still found the time to get a project finished here and there. 

 

First up: crayon rolls!!  Our ward opening social had a silent auction to raise money for our ym/yw programs.  People signed up with baked goods, babysitting, date night baskets and all sorts of hand made items.  I was really impressed with every one's talents!  I made these two crayon rolls as my contribution.  They are a fun and simple project I was able to make with scraps. If you are interested on a tutorial, you can find it here.

 The next thing I made was a cardigan onesie.  I love these!!  They were so so simple to make; easily took less than an hour.  Best of all is how adorable James looks in them!  I used this tutorial to make them.  I also made some bow ties too but don't have a picture of those.

 Next item is a temple/garment/dress bag.  I offered to teach some ladies in my ward how to make these for one of our Relief Society activities.  Only a handful of women signed up to make them, but that's ok!  It made teaching much easier!!

 I love how it folds up and it also has a large pocket in the middle for your shoes, envelope, etc.  I love the fabric as well.  I don't know if you can see but there are bees on it which I thought was perfect for a temple bag, ha ha.  I followed this tutorial but had to do some guess work in the end.  It wasn't the easiest tutorial to follow.

Finally, I made these adorable owl hats with my moms help while she was in town.  Several of my friends have made them for their kids and I used to make crochet beanies in high school all the time so I knew I could make one too.  It was really fun to crochet again and was a fairly simple pattern to follow.  If you want to make one I used this tutorial.

Grandma came to visit!

Zack was in Utah for a few weeks in September so I convinced my mom to come out and play with us!  Even though she was just out here a few months ago when James was born, it was nice to have her here again because this time I hadn't just given birth so we could get out and go do fun things!

My mom always comes bearing gifts (like any awesome Grandma does!) and brought a book for each of the kids.  Elise loves hers and anytime we get it out she says, "Grandma go that for me!".  I love walking in and seeing them reading.

 My mom and James were good buddies on the trip.  It was really nice to have an extra hand with the kids after doing it solo for two weeks.

 We did awesome things like going to the zoo and having staring contests with the lions.

 Letting Elise play on the footsie wootsie.  I'm hoping that she'll never learn that it will turn on if you put money it in.

 Said hello to Molly the cow.

 Played on the tractor.

 And slid down an elephant's ear!  Grandma also paid to take her on a ride on the carousel too.  So spoiled!

 We also went to the children's museum.  I had actually never been before and we all had a very fun time.  I was so impressed with all the cool exhibits.  Elise could have stayed there all day. Here she is playing with the puppet show.

 There was another one that was a farm so naturally Elise was in heaven.  She wasted no time in grabbing the wheel barrel and getting to work!

 Harley-Davidson has a big presence here in Milwaukee and they had a fun area with a bunch of bikes and helmets and such. It was cool.

 One of the favorite exhibits for both of us was the grocery store.  No detail was left out and she had such a blast shopping, working in the deli and the bakery too.

 Capturing sweet story time with Grandma.

 One of the days we made our way out to Cedarburg!  We had both been before but my mom found out that there was a quilt museum there so we had to go again.

We had a fun time wandering the streets and shopping in their stores.  We had pizza from Tomaso's and then had dessert from the Creme and Crepe Cafe.   

 As you can see, it was delicious.

 The next day we went to Madison.  Neither one of us had been there before so it was fun to go someplace new. Madison is about an hour and a half away from Milwaukee. I love this picture because James is being so cute and smiling and Elise is so mad that I'm taking another picture.  Ha!

One of the biggest reasons we wanted to go to Madison was to check out the farmers market.  They have it rain or shine from April-November.  It is along the perimeter of the capital building and is really big!  Elise saw these girls "sliding" down the steps and had to get in on it.  She loved it. 

 One of the booths was selling honey and brought some of their hive along with them.  It was pretty cool to look in and see!  We got lots of fun things from the market like cookies, jam, tomatoes and some cute tote bags!

 When we were finished with the market we went inside the capital and looked around.  It is very beautiful on the inside and we had a fun time exploring. 

 After the capital we were all hungry so we went to a place called Ella's Deli.  It was recommended to us by some friends.  They told us it's great for kids and it was!  There was lots of these fun things hanging from the ceiling. 

 I so rarely get a photo of Elise looking at me and if I do, she is usually smiling like this.  I'll take what I can get, I guess.

 The best part about Ella's is that they have a carousel!  Elise was spoiled by Grandma and the ride attendant and got to go three times!

 Everyone was very sad to see the baby whisperer go.  Here she is rocking little James to sleep.  So sweet. 

It was a great visit!  As always, it was too short for me.  We had so much fun and got to do lots of really cool things.  My mom has now done more things in Wisconsin than Zack has.  Poor guy- med school takes up a lot of time!!  While she was here we also worked on some fun craft projects that I'll show you in another post.  Thanks for coming out mom!  We love you so much!

End of Summer photo dump

We had summer-like weather through the middle of September so we were able to squeeze in lots of fun outdoor activities before it got too cold!  Here are a BUNCH of photos from the last weeks.  If you aren't interested in seeing a bunch of photos of my cute kiddos then this may not be the post for you.  Otherwise, enjoy!

 

Sometimes I put James in bed with Elise. Usually she loves it. She giggles and asks if he can sleep with her.  So sweet.

 We went on a walk one night and Elise insisted on bringing her stroller and her baby.  Monkey see, monkey do!

 Zack had been on call and didn't get home until 8am so I needed to keep the kids quiet. I decided to take them on a lunch date to the mall.  Elise had a blast. She wasn't happy that I only let her have one quarter when there were so many possibilities.

 I let her throw a few pennies into the wishing well.  She then said, "Mom!  I want more money!!"  Me too, Elise.  Me too.

 We went to a play date out at Bradford Beach with several friends from the ward.  It was such a beautiful day. 

 She loved getting all dirty and digging holes.

 Here is a picture of most everyone who came!

 Our neighborhood park got a sandbox put in this year.  I have a love/hate relationship with it.  Elise LOVES it though so I guess that is what matters.  Here she is with Daddy burying some of her toys.

 I took Elise to Target to me and she kept hiding on the shelves.  Silly girl!

 Our friends, Max and Luke, turned ONE!  They had a big birthday party and all the kids had so much fun!  There were 3 pools and a slip n' slide set up. 

 Elise and Tinzley enjoying their cupcakes

 We went several more times to Lake Aizen for swimming.  It wouldn't be right without some Sprecher root beer!  Elise loves it!

 Elise went on her very first date!  She went with Dad to go get some ice cream from Baskin Robbins!  They both had a lot of fun!

 We took many walks to the park.  Well, I walked and Elise was pulled in this bad boy.

 I went to pull out the broiler tray in our oven and found this inside!  It melted a little bit, oops!  Elise yelled at me for "breaking" it but then decided it was still use able.

 I can't resist taking pictures of this smiley guy on our walks. So handsome.

 Elise getting buried in the sand.

 And finally, some beautiful chalk drawings at the park! 

We had so much fun this summer!  I can't believe it has already come and gone!!  My mind set was off a little this year since my goal was to make it to the end of May to have James. So it seems that the rest of the time has just flown by!