Awaiting the Great Pumpkin

I love fall.  I try to deny it every year.  It signals the start of winter and I loathe winter.  If it weren't for the Christmas hymns at church, I would attempt to sleep straight through from Nov. 1 through about March 20th or so.  God, that would be a great nap.  So I claim not to even like fall since it gets dangerously close to winter.  But once I'm in it, I remember how great it is.  First of all, I love to put canned pumpkin in everything.  Cookies, muffins, oatmeal, pancakes, smoothies...I may try to do some sort of a diy pumpkin face mask.  Who wants to be my guinea pig for that one?!?  Secondly, I love football.  HA!!!  If you know me, you know that I DO NOT have the attention span for the sport of football.  I don't have the attention span for most sports, although volleyball and the NBA both put up good fights.  However, I do love the atmosphere of football and I do enjoy a good tailgate.  Especially when the tailgate has shots that come in glasses made of ice.  And when Tosha is there and we can make up our own games instead of pay attention to football.  Thirdly, I love hoodies.  I mean, who doesn't?  They are the comfiest piece of clothing ever invented.  There are a smattering of other reasons why I love fall, I'm sure I'll get to them eventually but for now, here is a pictoral sampling of how this Saturday was a perfect fall day:

  Mom, Willa and I went to the Downtown farmer's market.  There aren't too many left so we thought we'd best take advantage.  Then we had an early lunch at The Green Gateau.  Yum. I think I could eat there every day and not get tired of it.  Oh and see those pretty, jewel-toned beverages?  Half price sangrias.  I guess they figure if you are brave enough to drink before noon, it should be half off.  We also popped into an antique store.  That is always a fun thing to do with my mom.   Between the lunch and the next event, I tried to get a car wash.  That sounds simple enough, but car washes these days are pretty high tech, and I'd had a sangria, and I swear the light that is supposed to tell you when to stop malfunctioned.  I'll spare you the details, but 50 minutes later, my car was a little shinier.

The rest of the afternoon was spent at the Adams' family 1st Annual Wing-Off.  What a fun activity and a perfect day for an outdoor football party!  Tiffany and Raymonn have a great new house (with some envy-inducing furniture;) and a fun yard for the kids.  Willa had so much fun with her friend Adah (who has envy-inducing hair, complete with a feather!) and some new friends, too.  A good time was had by the grown-ups, as well.  I think the Huskers even won, on this fab fall day.  By several goals.  Home runs??  Touchdowns?!?  Anyway, I want more fall days just like this before my 5 month nap.  Bears eat 20,000 calories a day before they hibernate.  I think I could do that...

And I just remembered another reason that I love fall and it is that I love mums.  I did not take this mum picture, but I do have several really lovely mum plants in my flower beds, courtesy of the old residents.  Thanks for the mums guys!  It almost makes up for all the wallpaper and the lacy curtains!

Ikea loot

I stinkin' love Ikea.  Maybe I wouldn't love it so much if I lived in a city that had an Ikea but I don't.  Or maybe I wouldn't be giddy about going there if I were rich and didn't need to take advantage of plastic bag organizers for $1.99 but I'm not rich.  The el-cheapo Swedish meals in the little cafeteria don't hurt either.  We spent the last day of our vacation at the new Ikea in Centennial (Denver).  We allotted for about 3 hours.  We stayed for about 6.  Oops.  We got back to Lincoln at 4am.  Totally worth it.  Here is what I can remember of our final shopping list: 
-Hopen bed for master bedroom
-Expedit bookshelf w/five openings for living room
-curtains and other gear for Willa's closet makeover
-15 or so white picture frames
-stuffed dog
-measuring spoons
-salad spinner
-tiny table and chairs for Willa's tea parties
-a few things for the Petermann bean
-aforementioned plastic bag organizer
-toilet bowl brush
-kitchen light fixtures (3) and bulbs

I think that was all.  I am anxious to get it all put together and start making Willa's room a toddler wonderland:)

Fooled by a 2 year old

My favorite!

I think Willa told her first lie while we were on vacation.  I mean, sure.  She has said things before that aren't true, like that the scratches on her arm are from a tiny bear or dad only let her eat 1 marshmallow before breakfast but this one was a well thought out lie.  We were having mini-bagels and cream cheese for breakfast at our little cabin and Willa was just licking the cream cheese off the bagel and not taking any bites.  I tried to tell her that she should eat it and that she needed lots of energy for hiking and she seemed ok with that idea.  About 10 minutes later when we were all ready to head out the door, the bagel was completely gone!  I was pretty surprised that she ate it that fast, but I didn't see it anywhere and neither did Brad.  I asked her if she ate it and she said "All gone.  In tummy."  Silly me, I believed her.  Probably even praised her for being such a good eater.  We stepped outside the cabin and there on our little porch, was a bagel with the cream cheese all licked off.  No bites taken out of it.  Willa faked a look of shock and then looked from her stomach, to the bagel, to me with a look on her face that first said "I have no idea how that got there" but quickly changed to "I am so busted."  I asked her how her bagel got on the porch and she looked down and said.  "Threw it."  What on earth.  I couldn't not laugh but I also realized that its hard to explain to a 2 year old why you shouldn't tell lies.  She also told us on this trip that she poops Pound Puppies.  It is possible in our family that we talk a little too freely and openly about poop.

Up a mountain without a motor? Is that even possible?

If you know Brad, then you know that he likes anything that he can ride that contains some sort of an engine or the ability to make him go really fast.  I thought it might be a struggle to get him to enjoy hiking, since all of his past experiences with mountains have included either a dirtbike, a 4 wheeler, a snowmobile, or a snowboard.  And then there is the whole "I have a torn acl and refuse to get it fixed" thing.  But, Brad was a trooper.  So was Willa for that matter!  We hiked both days that we were in Estes.  The first day was more of a nice walk in the mountains, very laid back and not at all challenging.  Maybe a mile or two.  The second day, we decided to try a different route and it was a little bit more gnarly.  Lots of rocks, some narrow paths, several signs warning us of bear season and how the bears can smell you from 5 miles away.  This path was rumored to be about 1.3 miles long, with a lake somewhere in the middle of it.  That is, if you can read a map.  I am horrible at reading maps and I somehow managed to get us on the wrong trail after we left the lake and it was loooooong.  Miles long.  It was chilly and drizzly.  It was still fun, though.  We had a baby backpack that we put Willa in on the rough patches, and for her nap.  She slept in that thing for like an hour!  We did not get eaten by a bear, although we did have a plan for if one happened to snatch Willa off the trail.  It involved me punching it and Brad stabbing it.  As far as wildlife goes, we did see some unusually friendly chipmunk things, a few elk, and some giant wild turkeys.  It is mating season for the elk right now, so we got to hear the really sexy cry of the male elk trying to attract a lady elk.   If you are wondering what it sounds like to hear an elk use a pick-up line, it is something like a cow with bad allergies dying a slow and painful death.  Ask Willa to do the elk noise for you.  She is pretty good at it. 
Now for some pictures:

There is probably no more obnoxious class of citizen, taken end for end, than the returning vacationist

I cannot even begin to tell you how much we enjoyed our little 3 day jaunt into Colorado.  I will try to let the pictures do it for me, with just a few interjections:) 

Here we all are, the first morning of our time in Estes Park.  After driving all day Monday and spending the night in our adorable, cozy little cabin, we roamed the streets of downtown Estes in search of...SALTWATER TAFFY!  (and fudge.  Mama likes her chocolate.)

Can you feel the intense excitement?!?  I love how old-fashioned the taffy shop felt.

After we had our sugar fix for the day, we headed to Rocky Mountain National Park for our first hiking experience.  I may just lump all the hiking pictures together in the next post as they are very pretty, but mostly self explanatory.  After the hike, we had dinner at the Estes Park Brewery and we had a little fire in our fire pit back at the cabin.  And then (and I'm almost embarrassed to say this) we watched season 5 of Dexter.  On our vacation, we spent approximately 5 hours watching Dexter.  We are completely hooked on that crazy murderer.  I aaaalmost thought I saw a tiny tear form in Brad's eye when the last episode ended.  Not because it was a sad episode, but because we don't have Showtime and therefore we will have to wait another year for season 6 to be on DVD.  Sorry, back to cute pictures of the kid.

The second morning in Estes (and last full day there) we started the day at a really nice little coffee shop called Kind Coffee.  If you're ever in Estes, you should caffeinate there.  They had really tasty bagel sandwiches and some seating, as you can see, just right along the rushing river!  It was so peaceful and just the most perfect way you could possibly start your day.  We spent quite awhile there, throwing rocks and sipping lattes.  After breakfast came more hiking.  A bit more hiking than we bargained for.  More on that later.  Once we had returned from hiking and had thawed and cleaned ourselves, we went out for a very nice dinner, complete with martinis.  A quick clean-up of the cabin ended our last night in Estes.  It was perfection...Thursday morning we were up bright and early for the trip into Denver for our Ikea fix.  A bit more Ikea than we bargained for.  More on that later, too.

Although our trip was short, it was so great to have just a few days with no schedule to follow, very little cell phone reception, no alarm clocks and 24 hour a day Willa access.  It made the trip even more enjoyable that we stayed in a cabin that was completely stocked with everything we needed so that we could cook a few meals ourselves and not pack a bunch of extras.  And having plenty of cash saved up, just for the purpose of vacation, so that we didn't feel guilty about spending a little money on ourselves.  What a great way to celebrate our 5th anniversary and our little family. 

For the love of all that is funny...

Ok, so The Bloggess is laugh-out-loud funny.  It made my day.  Oh all right.  It made my year.  BUT I have been introduced to a whole new brand of funny and it goes by the name of Hyperbole and A Half.  I think the writer of this blog and I may be non-identical twins in some sort of alternate universe.  I just finished reading the post about how simple dog behaves when they are moving and his high pitched noises.  Totally Luther, back in the day.  And helper dog has a self esteem problem?  Hello, Bailey?!?  And the writer does not want to be a grown up or do grown up things?  Its like this girl is watching my life and talking about it in a way funnier way than I ever could.  I suggest you take a gander at it.  And make sure you don't skim over the pictures.  And to give props to the lovely lady who made me aware of simple dog and his adventures...Fit Mama Training.

We have hopes for the circus one day

So, Willa fits in our nightstand!  Totally her idea to climb in there, shut the door and then come out like some sort of monster.  I'm sure this is exactly what the designers at Kartell had in mind for this piece of furniture...baby storage.

In other news, I just discovered that Blogger has an iphone app.  How long have I been missing out on that one?!?  Whose job is it to keep me informed of these things?  They should be fired.  I just downloaded it, hopefully I can give it a try on vacation so you can know about every rock and wildflower we find on our hikes. 

Labor Day is an ok holiday

We played at the park!  Willa had zero fear.  Not of slides or of big, crazy duck-birds.  There was some serious static action going on on the twisty slide. 

You too, Rubber Duckie

I don't know why I always do this, but I get really fixated on silly things before I go on trips.  This time, I was just sure that we needed to have the carpet in our room and Willa's room shampooed before we could leave.  So needless to say we aren't quite ready to go yet but we have fresh smelling carpets!  I laid out some suitcases to start throwing clothes into and then left the room to get ready for work.  When I came back, I found Willa frantically running back and forth from her room to ours, arms full of stuffed animals.  And she was telling them "Go on trip, Puppy Van Boening!  Go on trip, Rubber Duckie!"  It was the cutest thing I ever saw, so I let it go on.  It got a little less cute when I realized she was attempting to fit every darn thing from her room into the two suitcases.  I'm hoping that while I am here at work, Brad is at home neatly putting all of Willa's stuff away and packing matching outfits for our whole family.  Ha ha ha ha ha.

The anniversary of a birth. In other words, a birthday.

Its true!  Our dear friend Tosha turned 31!  As per usual, the 2 of us spent the entire day together.  If you are somehow unaware, Tosha is my partner in clean. Not crime, clean.  Get it?  So most days we are cleaning together all day.  It just so happened that the day of her birthday, we were done cleaning just a little early and the weather was just perfect to do what Tosha and I do second best (after cleaning) which is to drink margaritas!  Don't worry, we learned our lesson about drinking margaritas between cleaning jobs.  We now wait until after.  We also learned that no good can ever come of making up our own drinking games that involve bottles of vodka and counting. 

After the birthday drinks, we took the fams to Champions for arcade games, pizza and bowling.  This was Willa's first ever experience with bowling and I think she did pretty well.  I swear her score was in the 70s. 

Thanks, Tosha for including us in your big day! 

Sad Update on Ms. Miller

After all the nervous waiting to hear back from fabric designer Melody Miller (that's me being dramatic, it was only a matter of a few hours) she emailed me to say that Decor8 made a teeny tiny mistake in that the picture of the beautiful chevron fabric was actually just a picture from her portfolio of an idea that never became a fabric.  And that, folks, was the longest sentence ever.  Crap!!!  I am sinking into a deep despair.  Although it was very kind of her to respond at all, especially in such a timely manner!  Maybe I could urge her to get it into production, just for the 6 or so yards I need?!? 

Also, if you happened to read the previous post and then click the link and read the bloggess blog post, I hope that you loved it.  I have now spent a good portion of my night shift reading her other posts and believe it or not, some of them are EVEN FUNNIER!  I highly recommend that you stick her in your regular blog roll.  And maybe follow her on twitter so you can learn how to make a water bed for a cat in just an hour using Ziploc bags, duct tape, and condoms. 

Doesn't Willa look smarty-pants in this picture wearing my glasses?  Can I please tell you a story that might make her seem less smart?  She has started going off somewhere so that we can't see her when she poops.  As soon as she is out of sight, we always say "Willa, are you pooping?"  And she says "No.  Just hidin'."  To which we say "Are you pooping WHILE you are hiding?"  Reluctantly, "Yeah."

This chicken will cut you

If you have started reading Young House Love like I told you too, then you have probably already seen this and are already laughing.  If you are slow and have not started reading Young House Love, then here is something to make you laugh.

Waiting on Melody Miller

Beware, rambling blog post to follow.
First and foremost on my mind right now is Willa's bedroom.  Without saying too much, and therefore committing myself to anything that I will end up destroying, the most important item I need is some fabric.  I want to violently rip down and jackhammer the closet doors in her room and install some sort of track that fabric curtains can slide on.  I have a few very specific criteria for said fabric, in that it cannot be too girly, or too youngish, or too plain or too crazy.  I had all but given up on my quest until this morning when I got my daily Decor8 blog email and in it were some new fabrics from a designer named Melody Miller.  In amongst them was the Holy Grail of "just a smidge girly, kind of grown up, great color scheme, I'm in love" fabric.

TA-DA!!!  (Willa's own words.  She has been saying ta-da a lot lately.  She holds things up and says "ta-da" like they are the coolest things on earth, even if they are dried up grapes that she dropped on the floor 6 days ago.) 
So, I found it.  But now I have been scouring the Internets for where to buy it.  It seems the answer is...nowhere.  Its just a giant, rude, fabric-tease.  So I took a chance and sent a whiny, begging email to Melody Miller herself.  Now comes that anxiety filled game of checking my email every 9 minutes to see if maybe, just maybe she wrote me back.  Please Melody Miller.  Just this once.  I cannot proceed with the reinvention of my 2 year old's room until I have this fabric.  Fabric is one of those words that when you say it (or type it) too many times, it becomes a non-word.  Fabric, fabric, fabric.

In other news...today is the 5 year anniversary of our wedding!  We probably won't do anything magical or romantic today, as I have to work and then work some more and also because we are Brad and Allison and we don't do magical and romantic very well, BUT we did go to Kansas City together last weekend and are headed to Estes Park on Monday.  That is my kind of celebrating!  It has been a wild 5 years, and I can't imagine having had such a good time with any other person.

Look at those youthful people!  What a nice day our wedding day was.  Remember how it poured rain and it was an outdoor ceremony and reception???  But for some reason, that made it great.  I think the thing I like the most about weddings is how they bring together all of your favorite people from all the areas of your life into the same place, and everyone is in such a good mood all together and all in your honor.

And yes, I have checked my email twice while finishing this post.  No response from my good friend Melody.  Maybe I should have invited her to my wedding.  There was some lovely fabric there.