Halloween 2012

 The library was a happenin' place in Denver.  There was always something fun going on there. I miss it.  The weekend before Halloween, we took advantage of an awesome free Halloween party at the library. Lucy went as an orange crayon.  

The next day, Lucy came home from church wearing her festive Halloween dress and chose to relax in a bucket. I don't know why that was enticing to her but it sure was cute. :)

 

The candy eating started a little too soon this Halloween. Among the moving activities, Lucy found a huge sucker to eat.  Boy was she going to like Halloween!!

Halloween finally came and Lucy was ready for candy. 

  

She got so excited about the candy that she kept trying it when the wrappers were still on.

This Halloween was one of my favorites.  I don't know if it was because Lucy was getting a bucket full of candy for Mark and I to eat or because my mom was in town since we were moving the next day. It was so fun to go trick or treating with her and go to dinner with her afterwards. I am so glad she was able to come!

Pumpkin Patch

The time finally came when we knew what the future held for our family. Mark accepted an associate position in Cedar City, Utah!  We were so excited to be closer to family and back in Utah--especially Cedar City! We couldn't have been more blessed with this opportunity.

The next step before we moved was to find a place to live in Cedar City.  This meant we got to stay with my sister in Richfield again. When my sister heard we were coming, she invited the rest of the family down to visit too so our house shopping trip turned into a party. I love that my family is always up for fun and this trip got me even more excited to move back.  Bring on the fun!

We were lucky to find a great place to rent in Cedar City. We were blown away at the low housing costs!  For the first time in our marriage, we were going to be able to live in a house! Lucy could go outside to play anytime she wanted!

We were able to celebrate Hannah's birthday the weekend we were there. Lucy really got lucky because she got to spend a long time playing on Hannah's brand new birthday swing set.  We also had lunch at the park where the leaves were abundant.

The real highlight was going to the pumpkin patch! It was so fun, festive, and best of all--free!

 

The first thing thing we did was take a ride behind a tractor.  Pretty sure this was meant for kids but I had so much that I went twice. :)

Next we took a hayride with the rest of the cousins out to the pumpkin patch.

My plan was to get a solo picture of Lucy with the pumpkins until she tripped and fell on the prickly vines. Instead it turned out to be me holding Lucy screaming. Good times.

It all turned out okay though because she fell asleep holding her tiny pumpkin that she wouldn't put down. I thought it was so cute. ;) 

Colorado Springs fun

One thing I wanted to do before we moved was see a little more of Colorado Springs. We spent a day going to the Cave of the Winds and the Manitou Cliff Dwellings.  Our tour guide for the cave was nice but made painfully cheesy jokes.  Almost every time he made a joke our group was silent.  I guess we were a tough crowd because he said, "Come on folks, it isn't easy being cheesy."  That was when I knew the jokes couldn't get any worse.  :)

 

These were the Manitou Cliff Dwellings that we saw right after.  I thought it was really interesting to think about people actually living in the side of a mountain.  We saw three floor rooms that were so tiny.  Apparently, each family lived it one.  It definitely made me grateful for living in modern times.

Denver Dinosaur Park

Once we knew that we were most likely moving from Colorado, we realized we needed to live up the fun things to see before it was too late. We discovered that there was a dinosaur park only about a half hour from our house.

 

It turned out to be so cool--and I mean that in two ways--the park was neat and it was cold! This was the day I realized that for the first time in 5 years, I needed to start wearing winter shoes in October.  I was pretty disappointed that my flip flop days were over for the next 6 months.

 

Besides the cold, I loved the park.  We got to see foot marks from underneath the mountain where dinosaurs stepped in mud.  There was also a whole mountain side covered in different kinds of dinosaur and alligator tracks.

At the very end, Lucy got to dig for dinosaur fossils.  She loved flinging the sand anywhere she wanted. 

Denver Zoo

  Mark and I were feeling highly stressed as we tried to figure out the next step in our future so we decided we needed a vacation day from worrying. On Mark's next day off we went to the Denver zoo.

Some of the highlight animals we saw were a hippo that gave us a huge grunt as he came out of the water,

 

some Bighorn Sheep that are native to Colorado,

 

Gorillas,

 

and tigers.

By this point, I think Lucy was enjoying finding out what was in her nose more than caring about what she was seeing however.

 

It changed fast when we got to the kids play area though.  There was a huge chalkboard

and African drums that we had to pry fingers from before we could leave.

On the way home, we stopped at the Russell Stover Candy shop and loaded up on discounted Valentines chocolates.  Beat that completion to our vacation day! :) 

September Hike with the Thalmans

I am so behind on my blog posts it is sad.  I am committing to doing some major catch up blogging starting today.  Wish me lots of luck...

Back in September, Mark and I decided for sure that this Comfort business was making our lives miserable and we needed to get out.  Mark had a couple of interviews with some jobs in Utah (hurray!) so we drove to Richfield, Utah and stayed with my sister Katie since one of the interviews was in Cedar City.  We weren't sure about the job offers but we did have a great time going on a hike and having lunch in the canyon with her family.  The leaves had just started to change too so we had extra fun added to our hike.

 

 

We had a great time hiking up to a rock slide,

 

looking at fish displays provided by Judd,

 

watching Hannah's entertaining sleep position,

 

and Lucy had fun playing with her cousins. 

I am glad we got to celebrate the start of fall with the Thalmans. I was already hoping one of those Utah jobs would work out so we could do things like this more often with family.