Catching Up - September & October

September highlights include a surprise party for Anna's first-ever girl cousin, Maria. Also, it was Auntie Loonie's birthday, and Anna has gotten very good at singing Happy Birthday to everyone. Anna's favorite part of the month was probably Berwyn's Oktoberfest. She called it "The Carnival," and she enjoyed all the rides a ridiculous amount, so much so that she talks about them months and months later. These rides include "Puff the Magic Dragon," (which she rode with Ellie) the "Big Strawberries," and the pony ride. At the end of the month was Maria's baptism, so for Anna being able to visit Marky, Eric, and Maria's house for any reason is good times. They have an astounding number of toys that Anna is more than happy to play with.

For October, we visited Six Flags for Fright Fest. Anna, being 36 inches, can now ride an amazing number of rides! She definitely has the thrill-seeker in her, because she likes roller coasters! Her favorite is probably The Little Dipper. She also rode The Whizzer, but I think that one was a little too scary for her. She loved The Scrambler and all the littler rides like that, and Bubby, Bobby, and I had a blast taking turns riding with her. What fun! Anna has gotten ridiculous use out of her Halloween costume (Jessie), wanting to wear it nearly every single day. I was actually worried that it wouldn't make it until Halloween, but it did. We made a visit out to the pumpkin patch again this year, and Anna got to play inside the big kid play area this time. It's a shame we didn't have more time to devote to that, because she sure did have fun. We had to cut it short though because it was waaaay past her nap time! We visited Starved Rock on a beautiful, mild day, and Anna was able to hike quite a bit! We went up to St. Louis Canyon, where the murders occurred many years ago, and it was very pretty there. Anna had a hard time making the walk back, so I had to carry her a lot of the way. Still, it was a fun time. Then we celebrated Bubby's birthday, and we always have a fun time when we go to her house! Of course, the month ended with Halloween, and Anna very much enjoyed Trick-or-Treating and getting all that candy! Yum-MA!

Catching Up - July and August

This year has flown by, thank goodness. 2011 hasn't been very kind, but Anna has been having a blast. I think that girl could be the happiest kid I know. She's always happy, smiling, full of energy, it is wonderful. Let me try to think of what has been happening thus far. I'll start with our vacation in July that I never got a chance to write about. We stayed at a cabin with Mike and Emily and other Swansons. We went swimming in Mirror Lake, saw how real Wisconsin cheese was made, went for a couple nice bike rides, and I went running for about 6 miles every morning. It was a very laid back vacation, but it seemed to appeal to Anna pretty well.

In August the highlight might have been the Wild West Town. We went there with Bobby, and I think we could have spent about 8 hours there if we could. Anna just loved it. She went on her first roller coaster, there was an adorable playground, pony rides, canoe rides, choo choo train rides, panning for gold, a carousel, a covered wagon, archery, a petting zoo... I mean, you could see why she would have a blast. We also finished (mostly) the upstairs of our house, so we all moved up there. Anna loves her new cloud room, and we're happy having more space. It turned out very nice and matches the rest of the house beautifully.