A Busy, Fun Week

So here we have some of my wonderful Portland friends. We were cracking up when Julie's neighbor was taking this picture. He said S*** every other word and I'm not exagerating. It was pretty hilarious to us at the time. I was wondering if he could get through a sentence without his favorite word. I'm going to go with no. Anyway, Julie hosted a fun little get together and we all had such a blast. We talked until 1:30 in the morning, which I haven't done in so long! We had such great conversations and it was so rejuvinating. I am a person who needs to have close girl friends and I have been so blessed my whole life to always find amazing women who inspire me and push me in different ways. Most of you who read this blog are included in this category so MWWAHH! I love you all!

We have been having some gorgeous weather so we have been spending as much time as possible outside since those gray, rainy days we love so much are right around the corner. Ugh. Notice that my child is wearing pants here. Yes, it actually happened. She has worn pants for almost a week straight without much fuss at all. I honestly didn't think it was going to happen without a massive meltdown every morning, but Bri is adapting nicely to life without summer dresses and bare feet.

Our friends Jeremy and Liz came to visit from San Francisco this weekend. It was great to see them! We hung out at the Farmer's Market in Portland on Saturday. Lots of good stuff there, but the highlight was definitely Brighton's balloon red heart flower with pink leaves and a purple hummingbird. (The balloon man was pretty creative). When the guy making the balloon gave it to Bri, she looked like he had just given her a million bucks. She was so proud of her balloon flower and had to take it everywhere we went for the rest of the day. She showed it to everyone, and of course gave everyone a turn smelling the flower because latex has such a fantastic scent! Here she is smelling her flower one of the hundred times she smelled it that day.

We also went to Cacao and got some drinking chocolate and it was heavenly! Mmmm. If you live in Portland, do yourself a favor and go get some!

We had two Halloween parties this week. The first was at our neighbors house. Costumes were required, which I thought was great, but Don was less than thrilled about. :) It was fun. There were lots of crafts for the kids and it was fun to catch up with all the neighbors. Bri spent most of her time upstairs playing with their little girls' barbie house. She thought it was a great party.

Party number two was with our ward. It was pretty chaotic, but fun. There was a chili cookoff, a costume parade, Halloween bag decorating, and of course, a little trick-or-treating. Bri thought it was pretty great to go from room to room getting candy. She seems to have forgotten that she got a bag full of candy last night and I'm not planning on reminding her. I'm sure she'll get plenty more on Friday.

Brighton loves dressing up! We debated about whether or not she should be Cinderella for Halloween because she dresses like Cinderella a couple of times a week anyway. I'm glad we ended up going with Cinerella though because she was in heaven showing off her beautiful gown, glass slippers, and sparkly crown to everyone. Plus, the girl makes a pretty adorable Cinderella!

Pumpkins, etc...

There hasn't been all that much to blog about lately. I've had Walking Pnemonia for the past few weeks and that's been pretty fantastic. Boo! I hate being sick. Hmm, what else...we've pretty much just been low key, hanging at the house lately. Exciting I know.

It's been rainy, but yesterday was finally sunny so we decided to go to a pumpkin patch. It was quite the task even to get there. Bri is, as many of you may know, a total princess. She wants nothing to do with any article of clothing that doesn't sparkle or that isn't a dress. It's been getting cooler so we are trying to get pants on this child, but let me just say, it is no easy task! She was so excited to go pick out pumpkins and go on a hay ride, but not if it meant that she had to wear pants. This was day three of making my child wear pants (I'm so mean) and it was just too much for her. She said that she would stay home so she could wear a dress and she stuck to it for a good hour, which in toddler time is quite awhile! Finally, the prospect of picking out her very own pumpkin beat out wearing a pretty dress and she put on some pants. In the end, I think she was glad that she cooperated because we had a great time. :) Ever since Disneyland, these little hands go up anytime we are about to go over a bump in the road, go through a tunnel, etc. So of course they went up when we were on the hay ride because, it is indeed a RIDE.

The pumpkins were all too big for her to carry, but that didn't stop her from trying. She kept asking where the baby pumpkins were because these were too big! On our way out, we did find some little pumpkins that were just her size. :)

Brighton loved running through the pumpkins. She ran and ran and ran and luckily didn't trip over too many.

Picking up pumpkins wasn't working too well for this little lady so she switched to picking flowers for awhile.

She loved riding in this wagon. The whole way home she asked if we could go back and ride in the wagon some more. It was a great fall day and we all quite enjoyed our visit to the pumpkin patch.

And this is where I found her the other day. I asked if she was looking for something to eat and she said, "No Mom, I'm just building my yogart castle." Oh, of course, a yogurt castle, I should have known.