Extended Vacation, I am in love with you.

So, as you now know, we are moving! Steve has accepted a new job and we are packing up and heading "home" to Fergus Falls, MN where we grew up. Steve ended up turning in his notice to his previous employer earlier than planned to help me get the house ready to sell.. And when you leave one financial institution to go to another one, they do not let you continue to work for your two-week notice period, but rather they give you a severance and send you on your way. SO! Steve has been home with me since October 5th! Of course, initially our fourth honeymoon was spent furiously cleaning our house to get it ready for a photographer to come from our realtor's office. However, since then, we've been able to do several mini-adventures, taking in many of the activities and sites of the area before we move away (since we never took the time to be adventurous before?!).
We went to a great pumpkin patch. We'd been there before, but it is probably my favorite pumpkin patch so I had to get in a last visit (though we'll probably time a doctor visit to get here again!). Our niece Daphnie was with us for her birthday weekend, and the little girls were at their aunt's house - which worked out well considering all the running the bigger kids did.

We took a day trip up to Como Zoo. We haven't been there since Josiah was one. Eden was just barely interested in the animals (only the ones that moved a lot). Delia slept through the whole thing, as expected. We got a ton of stares for having two babies in our stroller. Welcome to the freak show, ladies and gentlemen!

Josiah checking out an ape skull.

Delia sleeping through lunch.

Eden eagerly awaiting her turn to lick the ice cream.

Josiah snapping a picture of me.

We took another day trip to Whitewater State Park, about 30 minutes from here. We'd never visited but had heard it was a great park to check out and a good place to camp. Well, we aren't quite ready to take our babies cool-weather camping, so we just went for the day. We had our first geocaching experience, and once we got our GPS figured out, it was a lot of fun. Josiah enjoyed it because he had his "own" camera to take pictures of the trip. I haven't developed those yet, but typically half of them are thumbprints ;) Eden slept about half of the time but enjoyed the walk while she was awake, and Delia slept the whole time. This was quite the feat as Steve was new to the Moby wrap and kept getting it halfway off while walking. I'm still not sure how he managed that. The best part was that we got to enjoy this awesome day out with the family AND when we logged our exercise into our daily tracker, it turns out that hiking with a 20lb pack burns a TON of calories! .....and then we went to DQ.

We took another trek out to Carley State Park - about 30 minutes in the other direction (I think?). Steve and I took the girls while Josiah was in school - which ended up being a good decision as this park was way less "park" than the previous one. We did the geocaching thing again, though it was much easier this time. It was such a beautiful day - so nice to be getting out and enjoying this before the dread of winter hits.

This hike was a tiny bit creepy - it was very much 'wilderness', with no one around but the squirrels and a random guy that drove through very slowly in a beat up green taurus. All of the old campfire horror stories came drifting back to mind. Steve said not to worry because he has a great ninja kick. I'm sure that would do the trick, honey!








Eden seems to enjoy riding along in the Beco carrier - and it is super comfy for mom or dad to wear too, which is nice. The Moby wrap has seen its days I think - it was great when Eden was so tiny, but already its harder to use with Delia. Though there are hundreds of people who have figured out how to use it for bigger kids, I think we are going to spring for a second carrier instead - we found ourselves racing to "call" the carrier - to not have to be the one stuck wearing the wrap ;) Steve did much better at keeping it on this time though, and of course, Delia slept through the whole hike.


And now the second babe is awake so I'll have to wait to post the rest of our vacation adventures. I am so loving having this free time before we make this big transition! And now Josiah is done at daycare so he will be home with us for more adventures too. Love this season of our life - too bad it is going to be so short ;)