Fall Highlights

I realized yesterday that we have lived in our home for six months already! We still love it and it has been fun to plan and execute little home projects to make the space feel like something we created for ourselves.

In September our little Pepper turned old enough to enter the nursery class at church! This means we can actually attend all of and pay attention to our second and third hour meetings on Sunday now while she plays and learns with other toddlers. Entering nursery is seen as a bit of an anxious milestone because for many kids, it comes right at the stage where they get separation anxiety. They don't appreciate being left with a bunch of unknown teachers and children for two hours. Not our kid. She took to it like a duck to water. No fit, no crying, no noticing that we were there in the first place let alone gone again. She's always been fine to leave with babysitters, known or unknown to her, so it was no surprise. She was born ready for nursery. Sometimes I wished she missed me a little bit though, just to make me feel indispensable.

Living in rural America these days means things like corn mazes and pumpkin patches are just down the road from us. In October we had fun going to well known corn maze which also included a few carnival-type activities like pig racing. We also picked out our own pumpkins from a patch at a nearby farm. I did our carving because Husband doesn't care to and Daughter didn't like the feel of the pumpkin guts. I'm particularly proud of the results.

Left to right: The Stig, a cat, the Black Pearl

We dressed in family themed Halloween costumes as characters from Peter Pan. I assembled outfits from thrift store finds and our own closets and they turned out great! Early in the week before Halloween I dressed the little one up for story time at the library and they let all the little kids trick or treat through the library offices. Later that week we attended a church Halloween party and Trunk-or-Treat. Tinkerbell wasn't quite sure about what was going on but loved her wings and eventually got the hang of holding out her bucket to ask for treats.

November was busy. My sister-in-law returned home from her LDS mission to Texas early in the month and the most of my husband's family was going to converge in Kansas City for family time and the BYU vs Missou game. They had an extra ticket so I girded my loins and made the drive to KC by myself with the little one in tow. Pepper played with little cousins and met two of her aunts for the first time. The football game itself was a disappointing performance, but overall the trip and the company were great and I'm glad we did it.

A friend was flabbergasted that I would go voluntarily hang out with my in-laws for several days by myself, but they're great and I really do enjoy hanging out with them whether or not my husband is around which is a good thing because this wasn't the end of our reunion-ing! We hosted Thanksgiving dinner at our home this year. It was so nice to have family came to us for a major holiday and have the space to accommodate them. My husband's parents, three younger siblings, and a sister-in-law all arrived just before a big snowstorm moved in and stayed a few days. Reece's aunt and uncle and their married daughter and her husband joined us for Thanksgiving dinner as well.

In December I worked on Christmas projects and helped plan the church Christmas dinner decorations. Baby Girl needed some furniture now that she has a room so her Christmas presents were all furniture which is, of course, every toddler's dream. We purchased a set of toddler-size table and chairs and I constructed/assembled a DIY learning tower (tutorial here), and a little play tent (tutorial here). I'm happy to report she uses and enjoys all of them. We were all spoiled by our families and each other but we are so grateful for what we have, a house to put it in, and wonderful family and friends to share it all with.

Locked Out

I stopped exercising around the time of our move and then procrastinated resuming because it was so. dang. hot. most of July and August. It's still hot, but as the sun rises later the mornings stay cooler longer so a couple weeks ago I started getting out of the house again with my baby toddler in the stroller to walk/jog around the neighborhood, local parks, or the Poudre River Trail (local butchered French pronunciation: "POO-der" River). I've already noticed an encouraging difference in my stamina and strength.

Yesterday I got ready as usual, strapped the kid in her stroller, and took off for a round of the neighborhood.  I didn't take snacks or water or sunscreen or a hat for the kid (I use a blanket to block the sun when I'm lazy) because we needed to return soon to head to a play group at a park. It would just be a quick jaunt.

Our neighborhood is next to cornfields and there's a nice wide, paved path along the border between the homes and open space lined with bushes and trees and other vegetation. It's a very pretty route and hardly anyone else uses it so we aren't ever interrupted by bikers or other pedestrians.

We traversed the length of the path and returned home. I opened the compartment on the tray to pull out my keys to get back inside the house to open the garage. No keys. NO KEYS? I am usually paranoid about leaving my keys and triple check they are in the stroller before locking up the house but somehow grabbing the keys completely slipped my mind that morning.

We've talked about giving spare keys to a local relative and placing a hide-a-key somewhere outside but of course hadn't executed these plans yet. I texted my husband to please come home at lunchtime to let us in then prepared to hang out on the porch or lawn till then.

Thankfully, I recently made friends with a family down the street that go to our church. I texted her my predicament to let her know we'd miss play group. She turned around and came back to rescue us. She had an extra car seat, grabbed sunscreen and some water bottles for us, and we piled into her little Mitsubishi with her daughters and headed to the park to pass the time till we could get back in the house.

It was much nicer to pass the time with friends and eating their snacks than sitting like a lame duck at home for three hours. That afternoon I wasted no time strategically planting a spare key for future episodes of Mom-Brain, but I am so grateful to have new friends nearby willing to help us out in a pinch if I ever end up in a similar situation again.

Baby Girl enjoying her current favorite pastime 

Traffic

Now that we're settled into the house, I have time to discover and appreciate benefits of the move that extend beyond the house itself.

I lived and/or worked in the Denver metro area for five years. I could get around pretty well. I knew which route to take depending on the time of day. I never tried to do errands before 10 AM or after 3 PM because traffic would make the trip twice as long.

After moving I kept up the same pattern of thinking, then one day I was on the other side of our new town and it was getting late in the afternoon. When I realized it was nearly 4:30 PM I internally groaned and resigned myself. But then as I climbed into the car I thought to check traffic on my phone first to see the damage. Green everywhere. I was shocked. Then I felt dumb. Duh! I'm not in Denver anymore! As I started driving there were more vehicles on the road than earlier, but I wasn't actually delayed by the heavier volume.

When I brought up this experience to relatives who live nearby they chuckled. They clarified they call it "rush minute" around here instead of rush hour. Traffic gets slow for about 15 minutes at 5PM then clears right up. I feel like my days are suddenly wide open and full of new possibilities now that I can go anywhere at anytime!

Though I was used to it while I lived there, I do not miss the crowds of the big city.  In addition to traffic not existing around here, I've yet to have to wait for a checker at the grocery store no matter when we go, even on evenings and weekends. Costco feels relatively abandoned. We found a parking space right in front at the farmers market. I love it!