Happy Halloween!

This year we decided to dress Hylie up as a Cabbage Patch Kid.  I did quite a few searches on how to make a wig and found there was very little help out there, but after reading one semi-helpful post on the interwebs, I decided to just give it a try.  It turned out to be such an easy task!  I wound the yarn around a shoe box, cut it down the middle so I had a bunch of yarn laying horizontally one way, then laid the yarn along a beanie, sewed a seam down the center and then sewed some bangs across the front!  Once I had the yarn wound around the box, the wig took me literally less than five minutes to do!  I wish that was the case for getting Hylie to actually WEAR it!  Ha ha!  Luckily, I made the wig at the beginning of October because it took some time to get Hylie warmed up to the idea of having this mop on her head.  The first time I showed it to her, she cried.  I put it on my head to show her what it was for, she screamed and pulled it off of me.  Off to a great start, right?  After a few days of absolutely NO success, I thought to put the wig on one of her dolls.  After she saw me hugging the doll, she started snuggling with it too, and then after a few days, she let us put the wig on her!  The funniest part is she really gets excited to wear it if you tell her how pretty she is in it!  Ha ha!  Do we have a girl on our hands or what?

We're looking forward to taking Hylie on her first Trick-or-Treating adventure!

Chicago Boat Tour

Geoff planned a wonderful outing for us in Downtown Chicago.  We got to go on a river boat tour!  The overcast weather was perfect, we didn't have to squint when looking up at the tall buildings and the rain held out until after our boat tour was done.  We learned a little bit about Chicago's history and architecture and enjoyed our fun get-away.  Thanks, Geoff, for planning such a great date!

The Sears Tower

This tall black building was one of Geoff's favorites--the Leo Bunett Building

Along Navy Pier

Sportin' the Spoon

So Hylie has been getting better and better with using her hands to get into anything she can.  Recently, she has been figuring out how to put her spoon into her mouth and gets REALLY excited if it actually still has food on it!  Last night at dinner, whenever food would be successfully delivered to her mouth via a utensil instead of her fist, she would get super excited and clap with us.  Here's a short clip of the action:



To help hone her skills, I decided to let her try a spoon with oatmeal this morning.  Of course, a sticky mess accompanied this adventure, but I was pretty impressed with how much food actually made it to her mouth.

Don't let her fool ya, she still got a lot of grub by fistin' it in!

In other Hylie news, she still loves walking around with her toy walkers and holding on to Mom and Dad--but the minute you let go, those knees bend and she is back to crawling.  It's okay, she's easier to chase when she's on all fours.

Her movement isn't limited to the ground either, unfortunately.  Diaper changes have gotten pretty eventful with hands going where they shouldn't go and her body twisting when things shouldn't be twisted.  Every once in a while we're thankfully able to distract her with a good read while we finish the needed business down below.

Front Door & Laundry Room

I love "Before & After" pictures.  Not just because you can see what amazing progress was made, but because if there's an "After" picture, that means a project is DONE!  Geoff and I have been slow and steady in getting projects done around the house, and boy does it feel good to be checking things off our list and feeling so excited about how things are turning out!

Our front door was a piece of work.  There were stickers on the window, finger prints and smudges all over the place and some type of stain splattered all over the bottom.  I was anxious to give this puppy a nice makeover.  So Geoff and I marched down to Home Depot (with Hylie in tow) and picked out some paint colors.  We sure love having this beautiful door being one of the first sights visitors see when coming to our home!

Because the previous tenants took all (and we mean ALL) the shelving in the laundry room, we had our work cut out for us to get this room storage-ready.  It cost us a pretty penny, but it feels good to have a fresh coat of (non-yellow) paint and rows of shelving so we could actually unpack the basement boxes!  We sure are loving our home!

Where's Waldo?

Our church youth group had an activity called "Where's Waldo" and asked Geoff to participate.  The fact that I never realized how much he actually looks like Waldo blows me away.

We had one day to scrounge up a costume--what a fun little event it was!

Gone Campin'

For Geoff's birthday we decided to join some families from our ward on a quick camping adventure.  It was a beautiful weekend and we thoroughly enjoyed the family time (and being away from house projects for a little while!)

We decided to strut our "Team Woodhouse" gear for the trip.

Geoff wanted a chocolate cake to celebrate.  At first I was planning on trying to go dutch oven style...but since I've never really experimented with cooking cake over a fire, I decided to play it safe and bring an "Ooey-Gooey Chocolate Cake".  Boy was it delicious!  Geoff had quite the chorus singing the birthday song to him!

There were 17 children in our group and only 2 were boys!  That night all the girls danced and sang songs together.  Geoff was laughing at the sight and commented how NONE of his camping trips had such activities like this.  Gotta love girl power!  Ha ha!

That night Hylie didn't do too bad.  She slept for a few hours in the tent, but when she awoke crying, I didn't want to disturb the entire camp, so Geoff helped me grab blankets and get set up in the car.  Hylie slept until about 5:00 AM in my arms...I wish I could say the same.  I was in and out of consciousness, but mostly "in".  I enjoyed the beautiful sunrise though!  Around 6:00 AM Geoff joined us in the car so he could warm up from the 48 degree night.

Hylie LOVED being in the great outdoors.  She explored anywhere we would let her.

Our fearless (and filthy) explorer

It was a beautiful day to be near the water.  We played along Lake Michigan before we headed back home.  Happy Birthday, Geoff!  You are such an amazing husband and father.  We enjoy each and every day with you and are so blessed to have you in our lives.

Hylie Highlights

As we continue to work on house projects and squeeze in a few get-aways while the weather is still nice, Hylie keeps herself busy with a few things like:

Finding her belly-button

Playing in moonsand.
(Moonsand = eight cups of flour + one cup of baby oil)

And strutting her stuff with this Winnie-the-Pooh walker.

Some friends let us borrow this toy and for several weeks Hylie wouldn't even let us put her near it--she showed absolutely NO desire for walking.  Just this past week she started warming up to the idea of walking with it and now it's one of her favorite past-times!  It will be just a matter of time that we hear the pitter-patter of her little feet running around instead of her little hands slapping the floor as she crawls.