first minnesota visitors!

we LOVE LOVE LOVE when visitors come! especially when it's "ahno" and james. maya calls annie "ahno" and we call james her boyfriend because she has always had a crush on him. she had to sit next to him, hold his hand or go "find" him. she was so happy to have two people come and visit her. i'm sure she thought that they came just to see her. we had a great little visit, and the time went too fast, but we were so happy that they could come see us. we went to the farmer's market, mall of america, made lettuce wraps and apple pie, evan and james went to a hockey game, and annie and i saw the secret life of bees, all in all a fabulous weekend. thanks annie and james for coming all the way to visit us, we love you!

 

"ahno" and james

 

MY FIRST HOMEMADE APPLE PIE-this should be shocking to many of you who know that my mom is a fantastic apple pie maker and has a tradition of making apples in the fall, that it has taken me until now to make my first, but it was so fun and i'm happy to report the pie was quickly eaten.

 

maya doing her FAVORITE thing: throwing rocks into a river.

 

here is a picture of annie and i and my belly at 8 months pregnant. notice that not too many things are fitting. i have all sorts of great winter attire and it's ALL too short. boo.

Fall is here

 

 

 

 

Fall has definetely arrived here in Minnesota. Loving the fall colors, the lower temperatures (remind me that I said this when I'm FREEZING to death sometime around February, wondering when spring will ever come), the warmer clothing, although not much of mine fits anymore, apple pies, cider, and anything pumpkin. Maya and I have been eating cream of wheat every morning, I think it's a necessity here in Minnesota. We took Maya to an apple orchard where she ate her weight in apples, and we brought the rest home. And since then we've caught Maya hiding in the living room when she was supposed to be in bed, nibbling an apple. We have a little lawn now, and raked our leaves only to find that Maya had thrown about 50 rocks from our flower beds into the grass. She's the best helper ever. :) We raked and mowed, then the next day it looked as if we did nothing....that's enough to make you not want grass in your yard! But, we are loving fall and I'm not raking again until all the leaves are off the trees.

Good news

Found out this morning that Evan passed the bar! Hallelujah! We won't have to move back home with my parents! We're so proud of him....all the hard work of law school and spending an entire summer studying paid off. And he gets to keep his job! And we can now pay our dental bill that is crazy since we BOTH have to have some work done! Bummer!

Maya is busy writing on her feet right now. Although we have her write on paper, she LOVES to write all over her body.

We're getting a camera this weekend! Glory be! So I won't post any random pictures anymore. Yay! We're on a hunt to find some good apple cider and apples for making apple pie this weekend. The best thing about being pregnant in the fall is all of the deliciousness we have from baking. Made some amazing cinnamon rolls for conference weekend, which was incredible if you didn't get a chance to see it, and we'll have some apple pies going, some mulled cider and hot chocolate along with a list on my fridge just of sweets. I think my babies just really like sugar. Or is it me? :)

Heard tonight

"Dad," Maya says standing by her door. It's bedtime and Evan just put Maya in her bed and is in the kitchen hiding.
"Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad," in tiny little whispers getting a little louder.
A pause.
"Guys?" Maya says wondering where her parents are hiding.

Camping

We lived! Actually, not only did we live, but had a great little weekend. It was the last warm weekend on the horizon here in the freezing tundra so we opted to take advantage of it. We decided spur of the moment, as in Friday during the day to head out. We took little provisions, making it at easy as possible, and only ventured about 30 minutes away. We went to a great little park and had a scenic little campsite with a pond 100 yards away. Maya was in heaven. She sat herself down in the dirt as soon as we let her out of the car and went to town throwing rocks and other debris into the bushes. She thought she would be able to throw rocks into the pond from where she stood: we had Evan hold her to make her feel like she could "make the distance" better. :) We roasted hot dogs, Maya ate 2 whole ones....you know she has this thing for hot dogs only when camping and at ball games. We made smores and sang campfire songs, and I was trying to remember all the fun songs we sang at the Rawlinson campouts. It was a beautiful night. And Maya slept great. And I was even comfortable! A happy little weekend.

1st day of FALL

The leaves aren't exactly this bright, but I'm patiently awaiting them to turn these colors. The first day of fall found it's way to Minnesota, but was windy and warm. Yuck! I'm ready for the fall to actually happen. And although there really aren't mountains to speak of here, the lakes at sunset are amazing, and are quickly becoming a favorite of mine.

Loving

We haven't ever lived close to a Trader Joes. Now one is 10 minutes from home. Maya even gets to shop with her own mini-cart. She wandered around sneaking turkey, large chunks of cheese, pita chips and anything else she fancied into her own cart.

Bless Minnesota

There are a few things that I LOVE about Minnesota:

*We can leave any unwanted items behind our garage in our alley and by the next morning they have disappeared. Case in point, we moved up here with an old record player and stereo that didn't work. We set them outside, and the next day they were gone! Now, how's that for fast junk removal?

*On another note, in nice neighborhoods people throw out amazing treasures....I found an ottoman on the side of the road. I am not too ashamed to pick up things off of the side of the road.

*Fall is coming....the air is crisp and I can see the leaves changing. I can't wait to break out sweaters. Evan had a job offer in the south and I was so excited knowing we would be moving to a colder climate just to wear sweaters and such.

*I met a friend who happens to know EVERY amazing thrift, consignment, great music venue and truffle shops in the city. What more could I ask for?

Minnesota state fair, or money sucker as Evan called it

So we decided to take Maya to the fair. It's insanely big here in Minnesota, bringing in 2 million, yes your read that right, 2 million visitors in the 9 days it's open. I thought it had to be fantastic, so today we went.

Well....it was, I guess I should start with the positive sides of the fair:
* Maya was able to see animals, which she adored, pigs, sheep, cows, horses and goats
* The lemonade was sensational
* The pretzels were divine
* We didn't have to pay for parking
* Took our 2 year old on a little river raft ride and she LOVED it. She rocks.

Not so great parts of the fair
* $11 just to get in!
* No room to move at all, 250,000 people-ugh!
* I didn't see any jewelry the entire time (this is why I go to fairs)
* Sickening displays of food one can get on a stick: sausage and eggs on a stick, pork chops on a stick, belgian waffle on a stick, fat bacon on a stick, meatballs on a stick, pig in a blanket on a stick. Seriously, I don't get nauseous even when pregnant, and this was making me nauseous just reading the signs for the food.
* HOT!

We walked to our car and Evan said "what a money sucker!"

Catching up

We returned from our hiatus of real life last week, taking a great break in Utah. We loved being amongst family, friends and of course the mountains! Three weeks seems like a while, but it's never enough time to see everyone.

Evan was able to go backpacking with is brother and had an amazing trip, coming home smelly but with a grin for a week. The downside of that trip is that he stepped on our camera...which means, yes, we now have broken two cameras in about as many months! Drat! Oh well, could be worse, but for the time being we don't have any pics to post, so just imagine some really great pictures of us. :)

I loved being in Utah for the end of summer, and although everything becomes brown and dries up, I love it. I love the gardens, the veggies, the flowers, and the mountains. I was able to take a long walk with my mom up the mountain and it was just incredible. I forget what it's like to live just below something so magnificent.

Maya was addicted to "Papa," (Grandpa) which she affectionately calls him. She followed him around whenever he was home and when he was gone would say, on the verge of tears, "Papa der?" meaning "Where's Papa?" She still says that occasionally now, and so this week we have had lots of telephone calls to Papa during the day.

We made the long trek back to Minnesota and stopped in the Dakotas along the way, long enough for Maya to see some buffalo, which she was giddy to see. We were happy to return, I was happy to have survived 22 hours in the car again! Evan started his first day of work, and I couldn't believe that the "school" phase of our life is over. It's all we've known, since knowing each other-9 years! A long time. But real life has to happen sometime, right? Maya and I are slowly figuring out what it's like to not have him home for lunch or home for the day by 4pm...but we're pretty excited to see his bus stop on the road in front of our house. Maya ran across our lawn and our neighbors squealing at the top of her lungs yesterday to greet her Daddy. So sweet.

Life is good.