October

I took the kids out for donuts on Ella's birthday, and then we went and brought a donut to Taylor at work. The kids were very excited about their donuts

Looking at this first picture to the next and apparently Ella had a bow change during the day haha.

We knew we wanted to do something for Ella for her birthday, but couldn't figure out exactly what to do. We ended up at iJump, and it was perfect!

She got to run and jump until her little heart was content.

It wore her out and made her happy, which is the best combination.

Hudson's favorite activity is a tie between jumping into the foam pits and running up the trampolines so he can slide down them.

On our way home we stopped and got pizza for the birthday girl which is still one of her favorite things to eat.

And another picture from a trip to the zoo because I don't share enough of them on here haha.

Hudson loved to push Ella around the zoo. At least for about 2 minutes until he got distracted and moved on to something else. 

It's a good thing we're never in a hurry when we go to the zoo.

I think this zoo trip was after Ella's one year check up and both kids got shots. 

Hudson was a HUGE baby about his flu shot (limping around and whining for forever after he got it), so this was my attempt to help him walk off the shot.

A random from the month :)

The Wild Adventure Corn Maze in Blackfoot is one of our favorite fall traditions!

It was so much fun this year with Hudson being old enough to walk and tell us where to go.

We let Hudson pick which way we went every time a decision needed to be made, and he loved being in charge. We were lost for pretty much the perfect amount of time.

The weather was absolutely gorgeous when we were in the maze, but naturally it was a super windy day. Which is nothing new for Idaho.

Ella did really well in the stroller which was an added bonus. We weren't sure how well she was going to do just sitting there for a while looking at corn stalks haha.

Hudson was big enough this year to go on the zip line.

He loved it and kept wanting to go again and again.

After the corn maze we came home, did some yard work, and then attended a birthday party for one of Hudson's little friends.

The whole day must have worn Hudson out because we came home from the party, got him in his jammies, and then not even 5 minutes into watching sports with dad he was passed out.

Elephant helped make pumpkin chocolate chip cookies with us.

Trying to take a picture of a toddler like....

I have no idea why this picture was even taken, but one day I'll miss this chaotic time in our lives when we miss more of the sacrament talks than we hear them, so I might as well post it.

We had a freak snowstorm one day that dumped like 4 or 5 inches overnight which is why there is snow in the background of this picture.

While Taylor was cleaning one or both of the cars out the next day the kids decided to take the tractor out on one of it's last drives for the year.

Thankfully, the snow melted in a couple of days because we were so not ready for it!

We don't normally attend any of the events that Chik-fil-A puts on because it's always suuuuper crazy and busy, but for whatever reason we made an exception when they did a pumpkin painting night.

I'm not sure if Hudson loved painting the pumpkin or eating french fries more.

I took the kids on a little lunch date to Sam's Club. 

I'm sure we also needed to pick something up, but we love a good excuse to treat ourselves to the food court haha.

Mr. Bones Jones joined our family this past October. He spent most of the month sitting at the dining room table, but towards the end of the month we started 

Trying to get a picture of Ella's outfit the Sunday before Halloween hahaha.

While scrolling through facebook one afternoon Taylor came across someone selling a practically brand new trampoline for a super good price. 

Taylor went to the people's house, took it apart, and then came home and set it back up.

It was a bit cold on the day we bought it, so we bundled the kids up so they could play while we put it back together. Ella might have been a little over dressed for the temperatures, but she sure was cute.

The kids had a blast playing on the trampoline for the few warm days that were left of fall.

This spring it was like a brand new toy again because they forgot we ever bought it which was kind of nice haha.

Boo at the Zoo!

I'm pretty sure this was the first sucker Ella ever had.

She was turning into a mega grump, so the sucker couldn't have come at a better time.

Hudson obviously picked out the Halloween costumes this year.

Hudson went as Lightning McQueen, and Ella went as his pit crew.

I added the black tutu to her costume to make it at least a little bit girly.

I took the kids trick or treating to a couple of houses, and we went to our ward's trunk or treat for a little while. He was pretty thrilled to be getting all of this candy. Instead of saying trick or treat he said "trick and treat" every time.

Our neighbor, Will, came over and scared the heck out of Rebekah and Emily while I was trick or treating with Hudson. They called the cops and everything, so that was fun hahahaha.

Unfortunately, Taylor missed out on Halloween this year because he was away at a 4 day long training for work in Logan, Utah.

He was still able to make it to Boo at the Zoo and a few other Halloween events so it wasn't too big of a deal to have him gone on the actual holiday.

Of course, this training was just days before we left for our big trip to Disneyland. So that was fun to prepare for the trip without any extra help..

Ella turns 1! Party and Pictures

We celebrated Ella's first birthday on the last weekend of September with a "Our Little Pumpkin" theme.

I like to think that we kept things fairly simple, but then I look at these pictures and don't necessarily feel that way haha. They only turn one once though!

Her party went well except for the baked potatoes taking FOREVER to cook and us not being able to eat until way later than I thought we would.

We used the gold "1" balloon for her first birthday pictures a couple of days before the party, and it fit perfectly with the colors of her party.

Aunt Bekah made her cake.

It only took two batches of frosting to get the orange color right..

She was a big fan of the cake, but that really wasn't a surprise.

She LOVED getting all of the pink and girly toys that were just for her.

She really didn't have any girly toys until she was given them for her birthday.

While we had family pictures done we also had some pictures of Ella taken. 

By the time we finished our family pictures it was getting close to Ella's bedtime.

She started to get grumpy, but Jenny worked her magic and still managed to capture perfect pictures of Ella.

I was afraid that she didn't get any good ones, but I'm obsessed with allllll of them.

While getting Ella all wiped off from the cake and changed, Hudson decided that it was his turn to get to dig into the cake.

It was the best.

September

We kicked September off with the Eastern Idaho State Fair.

We don't go every year, but Taylor decided it was a year for us to go.

While looking at some of the small animals, someone was kind enough to give us their partially used cup of feed. Hudson had so much fun trying to feed the goats.

He thought it was so funny to have the goats lick his hands as they were getting the food.

Ella preferred to admire them from afar.

They had the cutest little play area for little kids filled with different farm themed toys.

Hudson was a big fan of the corn and tractors.

Ella more just stood there and looked around haha.

We decided to let Hudson go on some rides so we could get an idea of what he would be like at Disneyland.

I think Ella only got to ride one or two rides because she didn't meet the height requirement for most.

She was getting pretty bored and tired of being in the stroller by the time Hudson had used up all of the tickets we had bought.

After the rides we walked around a bit more, and wandered over to the animals.

We were amazed when we looked in the stroller to find Ella asleep.

She never ever slept anywhere other than her crib.

It was a miracle even for her to fall asleep in the car.

After walking around a little more so she would get a decent nap in, we called it quits and headed home to get out of the hot sun.

Both of the kids decided to help Taylor while he was checking the van for something to do with the hitch we would be putting on it before our trip to Disneyland. 

And by we I of course mean Taylor would be putting on..

Apparently, Ella's way of helping was a quick snuggle.

We needed to run to the store one night, and when I went to unload Ella from her car seat she had spit up a little bit.

Not a ton, but it stunk so bad like throw up which was super random considering she was well passed her spit up days, and normal spit up doesn't stink like throw up.

We cleaned her up the best we could, left her shirt on top of the van while we went in the store (we didn't want it to stink up the van while we were inside), and went in to buy our shirtless baby a new shirt so we could get our errands done.

I'm convinced it was all a part of a gross plan of hers to get us to buy her a new shirt.

All summer long we had been meaning to take the kids to Rigby lake.

Just about all of summer had passed us by when we finally made it happen.

Hudson LOVED the sand and could have spent hours and hours playing in it.

Ella was unsure of the sand at first, but she did like hanging out in the sport umbrella with me on a blanket.

She eventually ventured out and played a bit too.

Hudson could have spent hours and hours there playing in the sand.

After a while though Taylor and I were hungry so we started to clean up and head home. 

Hudson was so sad to have to leave.

It made me contemplate getting a sandbox in the backyard.

I only contemplated it for 5 seconds because the answer is still no.

Rigby lake is definitely on our list of must do more often for next summer.

I have no idea why the picture of Ella was taken, but we went out for breakfast at Abracadabras one morning.

If you live anywhere near Idaho Falls you and haven't eaten there yet, you need to!

Afterwards, we went to the zoo.

Taylor didn't get to go with us too often, but the kids definitely loved it when he did.

If only this tractor kept a log of the amount of hours it's been ran..

Every day alllll summer long you could find Hudson cruising around the yard on it.

Taylor put Ella on it one day with Hudson, and she loved it just as much as Hudson did.

I took the kids to ijump one day, and shortly after we got their I checked find friends and noticed that Aunt Bekah was on her way to Idaho Falls and was only a couple of minutes away.

We talked her into jumping with us, and Hudson was obviously thrilled :) 

We squeezed in some refinishing projects before the weather started to get cold.

The pallet flag ends up needing to be redone every year because the sprinklers hit it.

We finished our kitchen table last year, but we were never in love with how the finish of the top turned out because of the gel stain.

We figured we might as well make it right, so we sanded/stripped the top of the table and the chairs off and did it again with normal wood stain.

Taylor's parents also gave us a bench that they were done using, so we refinished that to match out table. You can kind of see the before of the bench in the picture with Taylor above.

It turned out SO much better than before!

We thought we loved it before, but now we really loved it.

Summer bike rides have my heart.

They were our favorite thing to do on Sunday evenings during the summer.

We celebrated Ella's first birthday the last weekend in September.

It deserves a whole post of its own, but I wanted to include a couple so we remember when the party was.