A wordy update

I just haven't made time for updating the blog lately.  We've just been busy with...well, life!  And honestly, while Julia is the best baby and so easy, the transition to 3 has gradually made my "personal time" disappear...so blogging is often at the bottom of the never-ending to-do list.

We have been busy!  In August we had our house trim repainted...which ended up being a multi-week project.  After the paint was freshened, we decided it was time to tackle the deck...so early in September (I think?) we set aside a whole weekend to scrape, clean, and re-coat our deck with a special deck paint--basically to coat over and fill in cracks rather than replacing all the wood.  We're pretty pleased with the results,and I hope it lasts for years!  We would love to have a stained deck, but since the previous owner put paint on it (which we have tried several different times to remove), we have to deal with what we've got!

Before pictures (Scott starting the paint)

 Our favorite helper...

 After

The spindles took more time than we had planned, and it seriously took 8 hours Saturday and another 8 on Sunday.  Fortunately the weather was beautiful and the kids enjoyed playing outside (by themselves for the most part!)

Another weekend in September, we decided to go camping with some friends to Hardin Ridge (a new place for us).  Our friends the Rudes have twin boys who are Charlie's age, and we also went with friends of theirs, the Uppoles, who have twin 5 year old boys!  Quite a crazy bunch...alas we didn't capture many pictures but managed to get a picture of myself and Scott (a rare thing!)

I totally skipped Julia's 8 month post, and since she's 9 months now, I'm not going to bother :) but these were the pictures I was planning on using...Julia has been busy pulling up on things, eating dog food, crawling into the bathroom, pulling clean clothes out of the laundry bin, eating everything off the ground, and climbing stairs...she can master the step out of the playroom with ease, and has made it up 2 stairs before I stop her :)

Florida/Disney pictures to come...hopefully posted sometime before Christmas :)

Fair Oaks Farm

Labor day weekend, we decided to drive up to Fair Oaks Farm to use a Groupon we bought and also to see my friend Devin and girls (who moved to Chicago a few years ago).  Sadly, I'm THAT far behind on the blog...I know.  To quote Charlie, "I'm doing my best!"

The day was beautiful, very sunny and not too hot.  We took the "official tour" in the bus (not quite as informative as I would have liked as I wrangled my 3 littles) and saw the farm.  Then we had lunch at their cafe before checking out the play area.  The kids all loved the train, and a giant "bounce house" type thing that I didn't take a picture of.  After a few minutes, we saw a green light in the cow building, so we went in to see a cow being born!  It was pretty awesome, really. 

 By the "end" of the day (I'm guessing it was 2pm) my kids were exhausted and hardly wanted to smile for pictures...so this is the best we could do as a group shot of the kids.

All in all, I found the dairy a pretty interesting place--especially the place where the cows get milked!  It's a turn-dial type wheel where the cows get in line, step on...and then the workers down lower clean and get the cows hooked up to the milkers (all while it's moving).  The cow rides the circle around, where she is detached at the other side and then walks out just before another cow loads.  Pretty amazing.