Pick of the Patch

Everyone at this point knows that I'm psycho for fall. If you didn't know, you will soon be convinced.

I torture pump my family up about the patch every year. Actually, usually if there's anyone being tortured it's usually me and my husband, who's a good sport to every session that I drag him along to. He seriously deserves a medal.

We've gone to a patch I think every year since Nolan was a toddler but Halls Pumpkin Patch is our absolute favorite patch. They have the best fall setup ever and the kids absolutely love it. It's like fall threw up everywhere. My fall spastic meter is off the charts. I can smell pumpkins a mile away. It's my party trick.

While I'm loving every single second of my new role where I work from home/am a full time Mommy/designated chauffeur/full time photographer, the only bummer is that October is full of soccer games, practice twice a week, photo shoots galore, and it all coincides a little with my fall freak obsession. And all this rain is really literally raining on my fall parade. Seriously, why can't it rain at night only?

So we changed things up a bit and headed to the patch during the week which is a first for us because this family knows ain't no one keeping Mama from her pumpkin patch. But now, I gotta say I won't do it any other way. It was a ghost town compared to what it normally is on the weekend, where you have about 50 people photo bombing every photo. Your kid screaming because he wants a ride on the tractor and people giving you stare down because you want a picture of your kid's 8 seconds of fame on that tractor. But wait, they're not looking. Look over here kids...oh, just forget it.

The food is delicious. Don't believe me?

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

 

Exhibit C:

There was no getting that corn out of the grip of her chubby dimpled hands. Here are the other 1,957 reasons why I'm obsessed with fall.

 

 

 

 

 

And just when we were headed home, I got my biggest fall fix with this.

And that's a wrap on Fall Obsession 2013.

Lego land birthday

This year we decided to offer Nolan to either have a party or invite one friend over to spend the night and that we would go Lego land. Thank goodness he chose Lego land. Don't get me wrong, I love to throw a birthday party but with his party only weeks after Landry, a little break in party planning was nice.

My parents came to watch Landry and we took Nolan, his friend and Campbell to Lego land. I gotta say that I don't understand the fascination with legos, but I do love how much they creativity out in my boys. They could play with them for hours.

I'm not sure who had the most fun out of all my kids...including my biggest one.

My favorite part was seeing the the little Lego towns that looked just like DFW. Way too much. Of course I would love the part that remind me of a doll house.

I gotta say, I'm really sold on this kind of party. I'm hoping we might just be able to talk him into something like this every year.

Landry's 2 year old photo shoot

I got a crazy idea to try something for a photo shoot for Landry. You know anything that involves a 2 year old, balloons and a creek might be a total torture fest. But I'm a gluten for punishment so I did it anyway.

We needed a way for the balloons to stay put in the creek so we tied them to sticks which we were proud of ourselves for coming up with that idea. Well too bad we didn't think about how they'd constantly be floating around and we would have to keep chasing them down the creek. Pair that with a little toddler who hated the water and it's a miracle that I was able to catch anything of this girl.

Either way, all the trouble, frustration and hilarity of it all was worth it. I absolutely adore these photos of her. I hope my kids don't remember all the craziness involved in these shoots but just appreciate what I did to remember their childhood.

 

And here are so UNEDITED outtakes that show what was really happening behind the scenes.

 Oh the things I put them through for a good pic.

Our berry sweet girl turned 2!

It's hard to believe that my baby girl is 2. There's something really monumental about turning 2. Up until this point, I had no problem calling her baby. Don't get me wrong, I will still continue to call her my baby and she always will be BUT don't judge me when I'm still calling her that at 8, 12, or even 20.

This baby girl, the one who I didn't think I would ever make it through with my pregnancy, is now full of life, so stinking adorable and everything I prayed for in a daughter. She's changed so much in two years. I'll never forget the HORRIBLE record-breaking summer that I was pregnant with her. I still have to whisper about it because just talking about it makes my ankles puffier and my toes turn into little Vienna sausages. Stretch marks, muffin top, cankles and all, she was 100% worth it.

I found this little outfit for Landry before she even turned one on mega clearance for $10 at Gymboree . It was a 2T and so it was decided before she even turned 1, that her 2nd birthday would be a strawberry party. That is the most I have EVER been ahead of the game and it was by accident. And then, as luck would have it, I found loads of strawberry stuff on clearance at the end of the summer last year in the Target dollar spot. The strawberry tablecloth was $2. I found strawberry notepads, coasters, sticky notes all for 30 cents! SCORE!

I made the little strawberry banner for her using my Cricut. That thing has paid for itself tenfold. And I made the birthday hat out of paper and a ton of ribbon. I've gotten pretty handy at making those after making them for several photo shoots.

Hello adorable $10 outfit.

All the fun tags for the goodie bags and the sandwich headers cards were made by Justin, of course. I tell him it's time to open up an Etsy shop with all the artwork we've done for our kids parties over the years.

 

And most importantly, another amazing creation by Amanda with the strawberry cake. 

Not only was beautiful but tasted amazing too. This is Landry's yummy face.

I found these cute strawberry glasses for the girls' goodie bags at Party City. 

After eating cake, we opened up presents and this little girl got a lot of babies and has been playing with them ever since.

She wanted to open all her gifts immediately.

My baby girl loves hard and it was so precious seeing her hug everyone because she was so excited to see all her friends and family. She was missing them over the summer.

 

I'm so grateful for the help that everyone gave to get this party ready and especially that they came out in this horrible heat to celebrate our sweet girl. 

 

  

And we've made a video of each of our kids' first year. We watch it on their birthday as a tradition for our family and just reminisce about how little they were. They absolutely love it. Poor third child...it took almost to her second birthday to get her first year done but it's done, that's all that counts, right?

Happy Birthday Landry Kate.You have completed our family and I'm so so grateful to all the joy and love you've brought to our family. We love you so much.