Lincoln's First Haircut!

I have already thoroughly raved about Cookie Cutters in a previous post, but I have to quickly mention again how much I love the place (no, I don't own stock in the company). Lincoln recently went in for his first haircut! I'll admit that I was a bit nervous - and not just about cutting all those curls off the back of his head, but also about how it would go taking both boys to get haircuts (that had to turn out good for pictures) by myself. How did it go? Perfectly! Notice Noah entertaining himself in the background of this photo. And there was not one sad face from either boy the whole time! Look at this guy!

Sure, Lincoln may have decided to try greasing the airplane's steering wheel (do airplanes have steering wheels?)...

...but that was nothing that a little plug (aka pacifier) couldn't take care of!

Lincoln sat still and watched Baby Einstein without so much as one peep. Stark contrast to the screaming and thrashing of Noah's first few haircuts at a salon. Luckily Noah loves getting his haircut now too (ever since we started coming here actually), and in fact he looks forward to it. And why wouldn't a kid love this place with cool cars/planes to sit in, shows to watch, toys to play with, a play area, balloons, and suckers...I'm tellin' ya' - I have no problem paying a little bit more to take my kiddos there for haircuts when they go this smoothly!

All done!

The hairdresser even sent me home with one of his curls in a baggie...my only regret is not remembering to take a before picture of the back of his hair. Just that little trim made my little guy look so much more grown up.
How do they grow up so fast?!!

Halloween Parties

Our Church's Halloween Party
Last Saturday our church hosted a neighborhood Halloween party that was a great success. They decorated classroom doorways upstairs...and the kids could walk to each of them and trick-or-treat. It was actually a great practice run for Noah & he thought it was pretty fun...although I hope he's not disappointed tomorrow when we go to church (no more costumes, candy, etc)! Even Lincoln seemed intrigued with all of the great decorations and costumes!


After enjoying a doughnut & some cider, Noah gave pumpkin-bowling a try.

Before leaving Noah realized that these lights were eyeballs, I guess that he decided that he better try them on :)

Playgroup Halloween Party
Claire hosted the annual Partners in Medicine Halloween party at her house, and it was (of course) a great party! Lincoln wasn't thrilled about getting back into his costume (when I bought it several months ago, I wouldn't have dreamed that an 18 month sized costume could've been so much on the small side *sigh*), but I was still able to get one good picture of my little guy.

Dani the lion. How cute is he?

Aiden, the tiger, giving Michael his very best rooooaaarrr! Michael, being the brave firefighter he was, remained calm & held himself together nicely :)
Sydney & Aiden making their carameled apples.

Rolling his carameled apple in candy was serious business for Noah.

Noah giving a ringing endorsement to the tastiness of his Halloween treat!...

Yum!
This was the best picture that I got of all (well, most...) of the kids at the Halloween party.

I love this picture of Noah & Michael :)

How cute is baby Lucy the giraffe?

Our good friends Leslie & Isaac (the very adorable pirate!)

I had to include this picture of Noah & Isaac eating their pizza because of the balloon...each time that Noah sees a Frankenstein, he yells out "Freakin' Stein!"
Gotta love kids & Halloween!

"Boo at the Zoo!"

Maybe it's just because this is our first year owning a zoo pass, but I'd never heard of the annual Boo at the Zoo event that Hogle Zoo presents. From the turnout there that day, you'd think that we were the only people in Utah that hadn't heard of it though! It was packed! It was a lot of fun to take the boys to the zoo in their costumes though, especially considering that they were a zebra & an elephant!

Despite the crowds, we saw most of the animals & still had time to hang on a statue or two :)

My little zebra was quite excited to see his friends the "real zebras". Such a cutie.

The zoo did a good job having lots of cute Halloween decorations, and there were booths set up throughout the zoo where the kids could trick-or-treat.


Did I mention yet that my mom went with the boys and me? It was a lot of fun to have her with us.

My mom took Noah on the train (Lincoln was sleeping)...

Here's Noah waiting for the train with a bunch of other kids in their costumes. It was pretty cute.

And, lastly, a quick clip of Noah and grandma taking off on their train ride!

Starting a New Tradition...

Now, I've been to Gardner Village several times...but never at Halloween time. Wow, they really go all out! The Halloween decorations were really great. They also have lots and lots of witches all around the village, and you can walk around with a checklist so that you're sure to see them all (and then turn it in at the bakery for a cookie!). Noah was really excited about running around to see everything when we got there, and so this is the face that I got when I plopped him up on crate of pumpkins for a quick picture...the super-pout:

Luckily Lincoln is still at the stage where he's content to stay in the stroller...

Linc and me.

Trying to get a picture of grandma and the boys, but Noah is just much too fast.

There are lots of really cute shops at Gardner Village, and many of them had witch hats. Noah absolutely loved them and wanted to try them all on, and he was quite disappointed that he couldn't have one. Here's a quick shot of him wearing one of the hats inside a shop.

Noah was a bit reserved about all of the displayed witches at first, but I wouldn't say that he was necessarily scared of them. However, we saw a couple of boys wearing werewolf costumes that he was scared of. In fact, he ran over and grabbed a hold of my mom's hand. So, while you might have thought this was just a sweet moment of Noah holding grandma's hand (which does happen sometimes too) - nope. I just jumped on the chance to snap a quick photo while Noah was holding still. (and then we asked the boys to take off their masks and show Noah that it was pretend, and just a costume - which they did)

This was about the time that Noah started warming up to the idea that all these witches were pretty harmless. He slowly inched his way up to this one, keeping his eyes on her, and gave her a quick touch on the knee...

And, of course we wouldn't miss a chance to "ride with a witch". While we waited in line, I asked Noah to hold on to grandma's pocket so that he'd stay near to us. Too cute.

Of course he didn't go for the pocket thing the entire time we waited, but he didn't run off too far. There was a little wall that he enjoyed balancing on and walking around - over & over :)

Once it was finally our turn for the ride, we hopped up onto the tractor and sat down on the bale of hay right up by the witch. When the ride got started, the witch asked Noah if he would like to hold her toad during the ride. He got a bit shy and didn't answer, but he held out his hands to take it.

The witch was our tour guide as we took our ride around the village, pointing things out and making cute, clever little comments or singing songs. Once our ride was over I snapped a quick photo of her with Noah.

Lastly, before heading home, we stopped by the bakery for a quick bite to eat...and a cookie of course! Noah chose a snickerdoodle...

...and I even let Lincoln have a sugar cookie (frosted like a pumpkin). His first cookie!

Unlike Noah, who wasn't crazy about sweets at first, Lincoln loved the cookie and it seemed like he just couldn't eat it up fast enough.

Mmmmm. (I'm guessing that we won't have to coax him to eat birthday cake in a couple of weeks, like we did Noah...what do you think?)
Thanks, Mom - we had such a great time! And, I plan on making a visit to Gardner Village during Halloween time a new tradition in our family!

A Double Date (plus two)

A couple of weeks ago Mark & I went on a double date with my brother Josh and his adorable girlfriend. They were so kind to spend most of the day hanging out with us and our two boys (hence the "plus two") - and both Josh & Emily were both so cute with Noah & Lincoln too. We hung out at the zoo & went out to eat. I have to mention that, since there's a 12 & 1/2 year age gap between Josh & I, we've never been on a double date together. It was a lot of fun! Thanks, guys! Anyway, here are some pictures from our date/outing.

We start out with both boys in the stroller, but it's never long before Noah is out and running.

Noah was dead-set on riding the elephant when we went to ride the carousel. However, like always, that popular choice always gets taken. We had plenty of other cool animals to choose from though, but Noah insisted on riding this bench. I tried to talk him into a the zebra, or at least the praying mantis - nope. So, the bench it was.

It looks like Josh and Emily enjoyed their tiger & panda bear though :)

While we were watching the boys play at the zoo playground Josh decided to see if his over-six-foot self would fit in this egg. He did!...and so in climbed Emily too. I had to snap a photo.

Of course it looked like a lot of fun, so my boys piled in too!

We had a great time at the zoo. The weather was perfect, there was hardly anybody there, and we had a nice, relaxing time...other than convincing Noah that it was time to go. That's never easy. Here's Emily, Josh, and Noah playing with the giant, marble ball/fountain just before leaving.
Thanks again, guys! We had a blast. We'll do it again sometime.