Fall - Loving it!

Now that fall is really here, we are loving it. It has been fun so far and the great weather has been nice. We have been trying to take in all the fun of fall and Halloween. A couple of weeks ago we went to the Lincoln Park Zoo for Harvest Days. Harvest days is a weekend at the zoo where there are activities centered around fall and farming. They have all the festivities out at the farm part of the Zoo and there were lots of things for the kids to do. They also have a pumpkin patch where the kids can each pick out their own pumpkin to bring home. We had a lot of fun and Ella really enjoyed seeing all the pumpkins and getting to pick one out herself.

Picking out her pumpkin

Here's a good one!

Decorating her pumpkin

We even made her a mask

Daddy and Ella looking at the cows

Ella and I have taken advantage of the nice weather lately and headed the park a couple of afternoons. When we don't have time for the park we'll go for a walk around the block. She probably has just as much fun and she can actually walk the whole way instead of having to ride in the stroller. The other day we were out and she was very interested in the leaves that were on the ground. Living right in the city we don't have a ton of leaves to play in, but there is a couple of big trees that line our street that have dropped some leaves. Ella really wanted to play in them, so I thought it would be a good time to grab some pictures.

Yea, leaves!

Look what I found, a "big stick"

Cheese

Last weekend we carved our pumpkins. I know it's kind of early, but it was nice out and we were all here, so we thought we would just do it. Plus, Ella isn't going to know if they last until Halloween or not :) It was fun carving the pumpkins, but Ella wasn't really in to it. She was actually a little scared of the inside of the pumpkins. So, Marc and I each carved one and Ella just played on the deck with Mona (our cat).

So, like I said we have been enjoying fall and I'm looking forward to Halloween fun too. We are going to Lincoln Park Zoo for Spooky Zoo this weekend and then Ella has a Halloween party at the gym daycare on Halloween, so lots of fun coming up. It is fun this year, because she actually knows what she is going to be. If you ask her what she is going to be for Halloween, she promptly responds, "a zeba" (zebra).

Guess Who's Two

That's right Ella turned 2 on Saturday and is now officially in her terrible two's! Actually, I think she hit those at about 18months, although she isn't very bad at all. Her birthday celebrations actually started while we were in MN where we had a birthday party for her on September 17th. We wanted to have a birthday party for her in MN so that her cousins would be able to come and celebrate with her. She is definitely starting to understand the whole birthday thing. She kept asking for a "happy itday cake". For her birthday party I made her an Elmo cake.

Pretty good, huh?!

This was actually her first birthday party she's had. For her first birthday we never had an actual party, so it was fun to have something for her. She enjoyed playing with her cousins and having balloons in the house. We let the kids play outside for awhile and then brought everyone in to eat. After everyone was done eating we opened presents to keep the kids roped in for awhile longer before cake. Ella was so cute opening the presents. She would open one and then just want to play with it, she didn't understand that she had more than one to open.

Pushing her new mega blocks wagon

She received great presents from my family and our friends. She got some new clothes, books, dress up clothes, mega blocks and weebles. I think her favorite present was the My first leapfrog book reader from my brother. He got her that and a Dora book to go with it, she plays with it at least once a day. After presents we had the Elmo cake. Since I used a lot of food coloring in decorating the cake I recommended that all the kids take off their shirts to have cake. I didn't want to risk any stains on behalf of Elmo! Here are pictures from cake eating.

Cheese! Good cake, it doesn't even need a plate

Who needs hands?!?

All the kids had a great time and I'm so glad that we were able to celebrate with family and friends. I don't know how people throw big parties for kids though. It was stressful enough with only about 10 people, I can't imagine a bigger party.

Then Saturday was her real birthday so we had a little celebration again for her. John, my brother-in-law, Katie and Johnathon came out for the day. Marc, Ella and I started out the day with a birthday breakfast of pancakes.

Birthday Pancakes for breakfast

Ella and Johnathon played all day together (except for when she had to nap). I got her a couple of balloons while at the grocery store so we had a couple of decorations. We grilled out for dinner and our neighbors, Jamie and April came up for dinner. We all had a good dinner and then had cupcakes for Ella's birthday cake this time. I made cupcakes and decorated them with chocolate frosting and M&M's. Ella even blew out her own candle this time! She got to open presents again, this time from Uncle John and Katie and from Jamie and April. She got another new Dora book and a princess book as well as more blocks (which she loves). It was a very fun day and Ella wasn't ready for it to end, she fought to the end to go to bed! Here are pictures from that day:

Birthday Princess

Opening presents

Blowing out the candle

Playing with Johnathon, making silly faces

This lucky girl actually gets one more birthday celebration, I know, crazy. We are going to Ohio next weekend for my sister-in-laws baby shower and we will celebrate Ella's birthday again with Marc's mom and stepdad.

I can't believe my little girl is two already. I love her so much and I am really loving the girl she is turning into. She is very sweet and loving, but independent at the same time. She is growing so fast and learning new things everyday.

What a big girl!