Visit from Grandma Wanda

Last weekend was our Halloween party, but we were also blessed to have Grandma Wanda visiting us. She was a huge help preparing for the Halloween party, and she had a blast playing with Raleigh, as he did with her.

Grandma Wanda dressed as a clown. See evidence below.

Raleigh got to read with Grandma Wanda.

Grandma Wanda also was present for Raleigh's first ever trick-or-treating adventure. You can see the pictures that she posted here:

http://northstar26.blogspot.com/2008/11/happy-halloween.html

Grandma Wanda also took pictures of all the raking we did that weekend. Raleigh sure had fun in those leaves:

http://northstar26.blogspot.com/2008/11/raking-leaves.html

Raleigh got to lick the blender attachments. Yummy!

Ooh, and the bread that we made. Delicious. It is a no-knead bread, and it was simple as can be. We made two loaves and we cut it into small pieces to be used with the spinach and artichoke dip that we made for the Halloween party.

Belly Watch: 28 weeks along

I hesitate to post this photo because it is definitely not the most fla

ttering. I mean, what is that white thing on my tummy :)

Trick or Treat

Another successful Halloween party. We had three robots, a clown, a milk monster, a cow, a cowboy and his cowgirl wife, a hippie, a kitty, a turtle, a guy from Indiana Jones, Dave from Concordia, and Tom Cruise from Risky Business.

We also had fun carving pumpkins. Raleigh helped gut out his first pumpkin.

Above: All the pumpkins lined up on our deck rail.

Below: Pictures of Raleigh going Trick or Treating for the very first time.

My mother got a lot more pictures than I did, so hopefully she'll put some up on her blog or send some to me. She took pictures of all the food, and she has many more pictures of Raleigh.

He's no longer a baby

Josh and I made a hasty decision tonight. We were going to wait until spring, but we decided that tonight was the night we should give Raleigh his first hair cut.

I strapped him in his highchair and put on a DVD for him and then I proceeded to wet down his hair with a spray bottle - not unlike what my mother did for us kids when we were young - and I gave him his first hair cut.

He no longer looks like a baby.

Also, notice his press-on tattoo on his right arm.

Pumpkin patch

We're down at Josh's parents and luckily they live only 3 minutes from an apple orchard. This orchard has tons of activities for kids and familiies. Unfortunately, the petting zoo was closed when we went, and the place was kind of a mud hole. So it was hard for us to let Raleigh run around.

We did get some good pictures though.

Above: Josh squirting some caramel on a piece of apple for Raleigh.

Below: Everyone taste testing apples in the tasting room.

Above: What a great picture of my boys!

Below: Attempting to get Raleigh to pose with a pumpkin. He kept pushing the pumpkin off of the hay bale. Josh is picking the pumpkin back up in this photo.

Above: Finally, Raleigh posing on pumpkins.
Below: Raleigh and Jenna running back to us.

Above: Raleigh picking out a pumpkin.
Below: Raleigh, Grandma Deb, and Grandpa Steve looking at the horses.

Above: 3 Generations of Thompson men.

My first vehicle purchase

UPDATED: Pictures below.

Yup, today marks the day that I purchased my first vehicle. Don't get me wrong...I've owned vehicles before. However, I have never actually purchased a vehicle.

My first vehicle was given to me by my parents. It was a 1981 Oldsmobile Cutlass Sierra . My second vehicle was also purchased by my parents for me. It was an 1980 Oldsmobile Omega with bright red interior and only an AM radio. I heard a lot of "I'm Henry the eighth I am, Henry the eighth I am I am....I've been married to the widow next door.." Ok, you get the picture.

My third car was a 1995 Dodge Neon. The Neon was my favorite. I learned to drive a stick shift because of that car which was another gift from my parents. Yes, I know... they treated me very well growing up.

The car that we currently drive is a Ford Escort ZX2 Sport. It is only a two-door vehicle...so you can see the troubles with having to get a toddler in and out of a car seat. Imagine where we'd be with another baby added into the mix. The Ford Escort was purchased by Josh while I was in New York City with my mom. Josh and I had only been dating for about 3-4 months at the time.

Now, we're the proud owners of a 2005 Ford Escape. It only had 37,000 miles on it...can you believe it? The previous owner only drove it back and forth between Perham and Detroit Lakes. So it's mostly highway miles.

Anyway, it's dark out now, so I don't have pictures up yet, but I'll post some tomorrow. I am super excited though!

UPDATED: Pictures added below.

Poked and Prodded

This afternoon, I received the flu shot, a rhogam (sp?) shot, had my blood drawn, and drank the most syrup-y orange pop that you can imagine.



Oh yah, I also had another ultrasound. And the technician wanted to practice taking the 4-D images with the ultrasound machine. So, we have a new picture of our baby.

Our baby # 2, what a cutey pie.

I almost forgot to tell the technician that we didn't want to know the gender, but luckily, I remembered just as she was squeezing that warm gooey jelly onto my huge belly.

And, we have our first official "It's fall" picture of Raleigh. He thinks that leaves are fun now...just wait till he has to rake them some day :)

Raleigh peed on his potty!

So, it may just be a fluke...but last night Raleigh walked up to me without his diaper on. He must have taken it off.

I said to him, "Oh wow, does this mean that you need to pee on your potty because you're not wearing your diaper?"

He walked over to his potty, opened it up, sat down and actually peed a little into his potty. I was completely amazed and I made a big deal out of it to Raleigh. I even pointed out his pee in the potty to him. I didn't let him touch it like he wanted to though :)

Josh was at the store at the time, so we saved the evidence to show him. When he finally got home, meanwhile I was gaurding the potty making sure Raleigh didn't touch it, we showed Josh what Raleigh did. So of course, we both made a big deal out of it again.

I just have to say, we're not actually attempting to potty train Raleigh right now but I see this as a good omen for when we decide to actively potty train him.

And no, I don't have pictures of this wonderful occasion.

Belly Watch: 25 weeks along

Only 15 weeks left. I can't believe how fast this pregnancy is going. Just last week, I felt like my belly finally popped out.

Pics from Seattle

Here are some pictures from my recent work trip to Washington state.

Coworkers of mine riding the Monorail from downtown Seattle to the Seattle Center. The Monorail is only 1 mile long and was created for the 1962 World Fair that Seattle hosted.





A picture of the Space Needle.

A really really skinny building in Seattle.

The week in Washington was very successfull, we all learned quite a bit about our teams in Bellevue, and Denmark. With that said, I am still very very happy to be home with my two guys; I missed them dearly.

Here's a pic of Raleigh in a super cute outfit that his Grandma Deb bought him.

Here's Raleigh lying on the ground asking to hold the camer.

And even as I write this post, my son is showing me some of the things that he's learned while at his Grandparents' house.

Josh is playing the Wii and when he messes up, Raleigh says, "Oh no, Sh*t". Hmmm, it seems he's watched his dad and grandpa play a little too much Mario Cart. I'm hoping that he forgets that phrase pretty quickly. We're trying not to call attention to him when he says it.