A trip to Chicago

Theodore had his first plane ride.  My oldest sister, Shannon, recently moved to Chicago.  Her husband got a job over there and while I am thankful for his job, I miss my sister!  So my mom, Sara, Theo and I packed our bags and went to see them.

We mainly went to meet this beautiful girl!  Maegan is absolutely adorable.

Sara and I did some sight seeing in Downtown Chicago.  We went to The Art Institute of Chicago.

And saw famous paintings.  Monet, Georgia O'Keeffe, van Gogh, Picasso.  We felt extremely cultured, almost too cultured.

So we went to Al’s and had Chicago style hot dogs and Italian Beef.

On Halloween we went Trick-or-Treating around my sister’s neighborhood.  My nephews were the Mad Hatter and a Hot Dog.  The Hot Dog thought his costume was hilarious and wanted everyone to say so.  When someone finally did, he was embarrassed.  Little kids.

We went to the Robert McCormick Cantigny Park where they give you tours of the mansion.

We also went shopping, watched Downton Abbey, ate deep dish pizza, went to Maegan’s blessing and celebrated my birthday.  It was wonderful to spend a week with my mom and sisters.

Hogle Zoo

The last weekend in October we made a trip to Salt Lake and went to the Hogle Zoo.  I love zoos.  I want an elephant, giraffe and zebra.    We didn’t know that the Zoo was having their Halloween event that day so there were a TON of people.  Theodore had a great time people watching.  I don’t know if he saw the animals.  It was a beautiful day.  Oh, there was a baby giraffe.  The cutest thing you have ever seen.

A Little Raccoon

All because of caramel apples-A Halloween Party

I invited a friend over to make caramel apples one afternoon.  My grandma sent up a box of beautiful green apples and after a failed attempt creating delicious caramel apples at mutual, I had to try the recipe one more time.  I don’t know if I should have.  It turned out my candy thermometer was twenty degrees off resulting in a solid mass of caramel on the apples the first time I made it.  The second time though, with two thermometers.  Delicious-a pinterest winner!  After my friend and I made them and ate them.  I was inspired to make more caramel apples to share with the whole world!  I backed down a bit and decided to invite a few girls in my ward over for a ghoulish lunch. We ate bones, caramelized witch fingers, mummy guts, spider eggs and so many more haunted treats.  We played a few games and had a spooky time!

p.s.  thank you pinterest for your lovely pins.  This is where I found the recipe.  You have to make the Apple Pie Caramel Apples.  Sooooo good.

For the Sake of Cuteness

A little run

In October my mom and sister came up for a weekend so Sara and I could run in a 5k.  It wasn’t legit at all.  I was a little disappointed that there were no numbers and they were not timing you.  The posters made it sound more serious.  It was a fundraiser for the elementary school, but come on.  It was still fun to run though (hahaha, it’s not really fun to run).  Also, it was the first really cold day of the year! Brrr.

Theodore’s First Haircut

It took a lot of courage to cut this cute curly mess of hair on a Tuesday night after bath time in the middle of October.

Strapped into the portable chair with scissors in my hand.

I cut it all off!

So cute, but all of a sudden I have a little boy instead of a baby.