Chicago Tourists

I had a grand idea that we should be tourists in Chicago while Papa was in town. We headed out to Navy Pier on a picture perfect fall evening. Amelia had been asking about riding the ferris wheel so we set out with that as our only goal for the evening. I also had a grand idea that Papa with his awesome camera and photography talents would get a picture of us on the ferris wheel. And naturally it didn't turn out that way...

Juliet had no intentions of sitting down or cooperating in any fashion. Amelia, I think, was very overwhelmed by the size, being up high, etc. She just wanted to be held tight by her dad and certainly didn't want her picture taken.

Amelia was fairly distraught when we got off the ferris wheel but a ride on the carousel got her back to herself.

Al Fresco dining on the Pier

Amelia got (I think) her first ice cream cone. Typically we get her a cup and maybe a cone but it still is always in the cup.

Juliet helped herself to all of her dad's ice cream. We should learn by now that Juliet demands her own ice cream...

Happy Birthday Daddy

Papa was in town over Mark's birthday weekend so I decided to take advantage of the extra set of hands... While Mark was at work Friday we pulled together a mini-surprise party. We spent the day making a cake from scratch, wrapping presents, making homemade pizzas and decorating. I have yet to make an angle food cake for Mark which didn't end up ruined. I don't know what is wrong but I just can't seem to pull of angle food cakes... This year was no exception although I blame Papa for the ruined cake this year. Luckily we saw pre-made angle food cake at Whole Foods earlier that day so I made a quick trip to buy one. We of course thought we could pull it off. The first thing Amelia said when Mark walked in was, "daddy the cake came already baked." Oops, I defer to Ginnie from now on for making Mark his birthday cake :)

(and Happy Birthday to Poppy who we didn't get to celebrate with on their actual birthday as he was celebrating his birthday in England!)

Circus and Dinner

We spent a lovely fall Saturday evening attending a Chicago Park District fundraiser circus at our one of our neighborhood parks. The circus had two 45 minute halves but we only made it through the first one. There was not a chance that Juliet would sit remotely still for 90 minutes... So we decided to cut out early and go enjoy dinner and cocktails.

I think Amelia's favorite part of the circus were the clown noses and popcorn Poppy bought before the show started.

Cheers to al fresco dining.

Nope, Juliet has still not learned how to eat without making an enormous mess. When she is really hungry and/or likes her food she fills both fists up with food and shoves both handfuls in her mouth at the same time. She misses her mouth, a lot. When watching her eat it is amazing that she is only in the 1% for weight...

Week in Kansas

We spent a great Labor Day week in Kansas. I  didn't manage to get a lot of pictures but nonetheless we had a great time with friends and family. It started with a great bbq at the Fogt's house in KC. My KS girls and I have always known how to throw parties. Oh, how times have changed as this bbq's wild stories came from a yard full of kiddos and one awesome bouncy house! And I took no pictures. (p.s. Kels, I know you have a fulltime job and two young kids but whenever you find a free moment, which I get may be in 5 years please pass along pictures!). Oh and I also managed no pictures of our fun park outing with our Lawrence friends.

Someone wasn't real happy about nine hours in her car seat...

Amelia maybe slept for five minutes total if you add up her sleep time there and back...

The girls LOVED the pool at GranAnn's new place. We quickly learned that take-out dinner at the pool was the perfect end of summer dinner and was such a brilliant idea that we did it with pizza, Italian and Mexican.

Juliet behind the wheel. 

We took the girls to their first KU football game. Oh KU football sometimes you win which is special and the rest of the season we just sit around waiting for basketball to start. Evan, Norah, Amelia and Elise proudly showing off their KU tattoos.

So that whole thing about how we used to throw good parties... Yes this is our kids looking into the house next to where we were tailgating and mesmerized by their game of flip cup.....

Norah, Elise and Evan - Stop corrupting our girls with your tailgating ways! I blame Carson if my 3 1/2 and 18-month old now know what flip cup is.

cute girls

Amelia loved her Jayhawk face tattoo so much that she demanded to keep it on the whole car ride back to Chicago Sunday AND wear it to preschool on Monday. She was so proud of herself when we walked in and her teacher said, "Amelia did you go to a football game this weekend?" 

Juliet got all dressed-up in her Kansas blue to go to the game too. Thanks to Juliet we didn't even make it to half time before we had to leave...

Ravinia

We took the girls to Ravinia for a kiddo concert with their cousins and to meet Stella and Mara. I heart Ravinia and going with a crew of kiddos was almost as much fun as going with friends for an evening concert and cocktails. Okay, maybe not as much fun but still a good time! He he, in the last picture Amelia looks so stylish in her frilly dress and Cubs hat AND it is a nice shot of Georgia picking up Juliet in the background.

Their Kind of Town

Yes, Chicago is their kind of town! A few weeks ago Rainforest had a talent show. The morning of the show Amelia started telling me that she wanted to get up on the stage and dance and sing. Hm, what could she possibly pull off at the last minute? Amelia still loves to crank "Dog Days Are Over" and dance as EE taught her to. Luckily I had a CD in the car with that song on it. So Amelia spent the morning teaching her friends how her and EE dance to "Dog Days Are Over." I so wish we had gotten a video or seen her and her buddies on stage. It did sound like they got a bit of stage fright so I'm not sure the video would have been that much of a keeper.

The talent show was still going on when Mark arrived to pick the girls up. Amelia kept telling him she wanted to go on stage again. So Mark put on his quick thinking cap and came up with a Chicago classic. It didn't take much convincing to get Lily to join Amelia on stage. They put their differences aside (Lily is a Sox fan) to pull off a cute little number:

Scenes of Summer

We really aren't that busy or at least I don't feel like it when I hear about other families' schedules. The work week is pretty packed with the morning daycare drop-off for me, Mark and I both working all day, daycare pick-up for Mark, the evening rush of dinner/baths/bedtime and then getting ready for the next day or doing some work. So when the weekend comes I like to call us "the laziest family in Chicago." We lounge mornings away at home, consider a trip to the park to be a "big" outing and all seem genuinely happy with our slow paced weekends.

I am still working on getting our old blog postings put into books. Yep, so far I've only made it through 2008 and that was only one month of postings :). In our defense we had 2009 all ready to go and all we needed to do was hit the order button and then our computer got stollen. So we almost have 2009 redone and then will move on to 2010. I did work on the 2009 book a lot this weekend and it made me realize how happy I am that I have kept up this blog. I know I will love having the collection of books when the girls are grown and I am thinking they will like having them too.

So here are some scenes from the last month or so.

Juliet enjoying a Sunday evening playmate at the beach. She was the hit of the night dressed in my old swimsuit.

The problem with taking Juliet to the beach is keeping her from eating her weight in sand.

Amelia had to play so patiently while waiting for Sophia and Lyla to show up.

We decided to finally act like adults with two professional jobs and bought a new car. While we were car shopping Amelia was treating Louise to brunch.

Amelia sends a special thank you to GranAnn for taking her and Louise to American Girl for pancakes, too much sugar for a Saturday morning and some new clothes for Louise.

The park. Oh how we love our park. Juliet needed a Cheerio break but wasn't about to take her eyes off her big sister. Juliet does not have much fear. She involves a pair of eyes and an adult very close to her  while at the park. Luckily the  very frequent face plants, tumbles, falls off playground equipment, face plant into the TV stand, etc have not been serious. She rarely cries after a good spill and even if she does it is for a quick moment and then she hops right out of our arms and goes back for another bruise....