La, la, la, la.....

Maya has figured out how to make the real proper "L" sounds, instead of the more toddler sounding "w". It's so funny because she realizes it and it must feel nice to make that sound in her mouth because she has been going out of her way to use it. All of a sudden her dolls have names like "poLLy" and "moLLy" and she is often heard repeating "la, la, la, la....." quietly to herself. When talking about aLex she emphasizes the "L" but when she is excited, in a hurry or trying to get his attention it quickly goes back to "Awex". I am cherishing those "w"'s because kids just sound so darn grown up once they disappear for good.

Economics

Last week just about all our leaves fell in the course of a few days. Alex looked out the window and said "Mom, I'll rake that whole yard for you if you pay me." I told him I would definitely pay him to rake the whole yard. He said "I think you'd have to give me one whole dollar though."

He drives a tough bargain.

(In case you are wondering, no he did not rake the whole yard. He raked enough to make a big pile of leaves and then started playing in said pile of leaves and kind of forgot about making money by raking. Also, yes had he raked the whole yard I would have paid him more than just one dollar.)

On a sad note

Last week we realized it was time to make some tough decisions about Chewy. We took him on that final trip to the vet on sunday. From the time we made the appt on Saturday until it was over with was a really hard time. The kids handled it very well. And after it was all over we were absolutely certain we had made the right choice, it was time.
We miss you Chewy.

Leeland

Hiking.............

And of course ....Grandma's kitties

They are much bigger than this summer when we delivered them. And when we delivered them we were under the impression that there were two females. One trip to the vet later and there was a name change for one of them since "she" was actually a "he".

Three Lakes adventure

We stayed in WI into the next week (it's just too far of a drive for a weekend). Monday morning mom had to go over to Three Lakes to take down an exhibit she had in the art center there. The kids and I walked down the street a few blocks to a really nice town park.

On the way back to Minocqua we looked for an interesting new place to have lunch. We have always seen signs for the Black Bear Lodge in St. Germain so we decided to find it and try it out. The nice thing about this time of the year is that most places are very quiet on a weekday, in this case we were the only people there for lunch!

Mom and Alex had been wanting to go mini golfing since summer. On the way out of town that morning they had noticed that once of the places that has mini golf in addition to a garden/landscaping center had their "open" sign turned on in the mini golf building so on the way home we stopped to see if they were actually open. The garden center was but they said there was no reason why we couldn't golf, in face they hadn't drained the ponds and pipes yet so they even turned on the waterfalls and fountains for us! And I talked them into an off season rate :)

It was a perfect day and the mini golf course was actually kind of neat. Since it was at a garden center, each hole had a horticultural type theme - certain types of trees and/or flowers. I would love to go there in the spring and see everything in bloom.

First weekend of October

Thursday Sept 30th Ben and I went over to Interlochen to see Jason Mraz in concert. It was a great show and a beautiful night to be in that outdoor auditorium. We didn't get home until almost midnight and the kids did great with a babysitter - Maya even went to sleep in about 10 min. which is a big deal for her.

We got up early in the morning on friday. I took Alex out of school for the day and we started our journey to the cabin. I was so excited to go, I hadn't been to the cabin in the fall in so long and the kids had never been there in the fall at all. I thought it would be kind of an adventure for them having to use the fireplace for heat and spending so much time outside regardless of the weather.

It was perfect most of the weekend. A little rain here and there but mostly sunny and cool, cold nights but not freezing.

We had a really fun going away/baby shower party for Jared and Zoe saturday night and the kids managed to hold it together very well despite lots of fresh air, lots of excitement and lots of people.