After a 5 month hiatus, I'm baaaaaack! Aaron hooked up the computer for me this weekend and I'm back in communication with the outside world.
Last weekend Aaron's parents rented a cabin in Lake Arrowhead so the whole fam damily headed to the mountains. The boys have never seen snow, so this was the golden opportunity. The cabin was super sweet. It was 3 stories and the rooms were gigantic. You could see the lake from the HUGE balcony - it was just perfect. The only drawback (if you could call it that) was the cabin owner's sense of decorating style, or lack there of. There was a major theme throughout the cabin - Ducks...hundreds of them. Every shelf, lamp, picture, you name it was plastered with ducks.
In our upstairs bathroom there were duck hooks to hang your towels on. Above the toilet there was this lovely trio of duck heads.
I'm sure they were placed there as a warning to whoever didn't wash their hands after using the bathroom that their eyes would be plucked out. In the living room there was a disco ball ornament cleaverly hung to the wooden beam with a bandaid.
Clearly this must have been from other cabin renters or it would have had a duck on it too.
There was just enough snow on the shady areas of the mountain to take 4 little boys sledding. We found a great spot at Dogwood campground and let the boys have at it. Everett wasn't sure what to think of the snow at first, but after a little while of getting used to walking in it, he loved stomping around.
Since I'm hugely pregnant, I didn't get to take Ev sledding. I was limited to standing on the sidelines taking photos.
Aaron and aunt Katie took Ev on a few sled rides.
He was a bit petrified, but by the last go down the hill managed to eek out a smile.
Later that afternoon, we headed to Lake Arrowhead village for some ice cream and chocolate- yum! The weather was perfect - sun was warm, but the air was cold so you still got to wear a jacket.
That night it was in the mid 20's, so we lit a fire, played cards and let the boys run around and play. Ev was up to his usual sleeping habits when he's in a new place which means - he doesn't sleep at all. By night 2 I was so tired I just brought Ev in bed with us.
About 3am we woke up to an alarm going off in the cabin. It was the carbon monoxide detector. Apparently the wind outside was causing the smoke in the fireplace to get pushed back into the cabin instead of out the chimney. We were told to open the windows, evacuate the cabin and that the fire department and an ambulance were on the way. I woke Aaron up and told him the news. "No way, I'm not leaving. Just open the window, we'll be fine." Aaah, yes...nothing like trying to sleep with freezing mountain air blowing through your window at 3am and a baby that wakes up every 30 minutes.
The fire department checked out the cabin with a "yep, smells like smoke in here!" (Duh)and had us keep the windows open to get fresh air in the cabin. Katie got her picture taken with them before they left - seize the moment!
(I'm
SURE this is what they looked like)
The next day, we had a lazy morning, packed up and headed home. Aaron had the awesome idea of taking the back way home a-la dirt fire roads. Looking back, I should have known better. I'm still not sure how Ev's head didn't bobble off his neck and I didn't go into early labor. None the less, we made it.
We took Ev to the park before we got home. The weather was perfect, how could we not?
I let Ev's electronic mother take over for a while so I could recover. This weekend, I was grateful for children's tv 24/7. I feel so guilty for having him watch tv all day, but I was so sick. Luckily, I'm feeling better now so we'll be playing outside today.
I'm sure they were placed there as a warning to whoever didn't wash their hands after using the bathroom that their eyes would be plucked out. In the living room there was a disco ball ornament cleaverly hung to the wooden beam with a bandaid.
Clearly this must have been from other cabin renters or it would have had a duck on it too.
Since I'm hugely pregnant, I didn't get to take Ev sledding. I was limited to standing on the sidelines taking photos.
Aaron and aunt Katie took Ev on a few sled rides.
He was a bit petrified, but by the last go down the hill managed to eek out a smile. 
Later that afternoon, we headed to Lake Arrowhead village for some ice cream and chocolate- yum! The weather was perfect - sun was warm, but the air was cold so you still got to wear a jacket. 
That night it was in the mid 20's, so we lit a fire, played cards and let the boys run around and play. Ev was up to his usual sleeping habits when he's in a new place which means - he doesn't sleep at all. By night 2 I was so tired I just brought Ev in bed with us. 
(I'm SURE this is what they looked like)
We took Ev to the park before we got home. The weather was perfect, how could we not?
The boys got to play and have a great time. Later that afternoon we took all of the boys to the church Trunk or Treat. The church is just down the street so the boys got pulled in a big red wagon - which Ev loved.
There was a huge turn out. Ev had a great time having free reign to cruise the parking lot and have mom and dad follow close behind. He scored 2 lollipops.
By the time we were finished with the Trunk or Treat festivities and were on our way home, Ev was slouched lower and lower in the wagon, almost asleep. There was pizza waiting for us at home. We ate some yummy food and headed out to the driveway where the firepit was blazing. Ev kept wanting to get into the fire, so I opted to have him playing in the house instead. By 8pm, we retired the giraffe costum and put our tuckered out baby boy to bed. Can we do this again next weekend?
Last night, we took Ev to the pumpkin patch. The one we usually go to was not open this year, so we were forced to go with Plan B. We only knew of one other patch in the area, so we headed there.
When we pulled up, we were greatly disappointed. It wasn’t lit very well, there weren’t very many pumpkins to choose from, my camera wasn’t working right and I had to use the flash on every photo, so they didn’t turn out that great.
We were hoping to get just a little Ev sized pumpkin, but they only had medium or large ones.
Ev was more interested in the cars whizzing by on the side of the road and staring at the other pumpkin patch parishioners. Everett was a little shy and nervous walking around by himself, so we had to coax him into exploring the patch. 
Ev likes nothing more than to have his dad hold him. This boy loves his dad!
We picked out a pumpkin, let Ev give it the durability test shake and headed home before he turned into a popsicle! It was cold! Despite the setbacks, we had some great family time and picture proof that we did take Ev to the pumpkin patch, however lame it may have been.
Aaron and I looked at each other and just started laughing. Aaron tried a few more times to get him to do it again. He did make the noise a time or two, but never the full imitation. I was instructed not to encourage this behavior unless he "did it right". 
Hooch
Or Moe
I dunno…jury is still out.
We fed the chickens, collected eggs, picked apples, basil and parsley.
To our surprise, there were even a few raspberries – yum!
While I was collecting basil leaves, Ev walked up and handed me a slimy, wet snail. Thanks, son. 
He had a great time drinking the water and letting out a big “Aaaah!” when he was done.
After about 10 minutes, his jaw started chattering so we knew he was ready to go in. I wrapped him in a towel and followed up with a warm bath from Grandma Carol.
a huge pot of home made applesauce,
and dehydrated a batch of basil and parsley.
The house smelled wonderful. It was a great day. All we need to do now is figure out what to do with the rest of the apples!
Time to get busy dehydrating some more! I had been craving a creative outlet, and this satisfied the need. I am really missing my kitchen.
The change will accumulate for years and when the jug looks full enough, he’ll find a worthy cause and put the money toward that (usually something fun!).
Somehow, it seems I’m the one that gets stuck with the task of rolling all of the coins. Luckily this time we had an automatic change counter. In the years before, I got to do everything by using just my brain power and sorting skills.
Ev went down for a nap and I got to work rolling. I got quite a pile going by the time Ev woke up. I decided it might be fun to have him help me put the coins in the counter. 
After the coins got boring, he went on systematically emptying out every drawer in our bedroom. By the time I got to a good stopping point, our room had been ransacked and I had to wait until he went to bed to put our room back together.
