The Best in the West

I figured that I was doing such an awesome job of posting (this makes 6 posts this week) that I should keep going. So, you lucky readers will get to hear about our trip to the fair.
On Monday, Walter, Bradon, Little Walter and I all headed to the great Kern County Fair. In case anyone is wondering what the title of this blog means, it is the theme of the fair this year. I don't necessarily agree that it is the greatest fair in the west but we had a good time none the less.
We started a tradition a few years back of going to the fair for family home evening. It is much less crowded on Monday night so the guys don't have to wait in long lines to get their massive curly chili cheese fry (a.k.a. a heart attack on a plate). We decided to split our eating up this year by visiting various kid attractions. The main reason we go to the fair is the food but we decided that we over did it last year so we enacted a new routine to help avoid this problem.
We started with a philly cheesesteak sandwich for Walter and Bradon. That firemens' booth makes a mean cheesesteak. We then moved to the animals. There are way too many animals for my liking so we stuck to the outskirts to avoid the smell and my son's need to touch EVERY SINGLE ANIMAL. After animals we hit up the funnel cake stand, then the pedal tractors/fake cow you can milk/old farm stuff that you can make music with section, then curly fries with chili and cheese thing, then the other kiddie tents with reptiles and music, then the kids karaoke stage and lastly, my amazing fair cinnamon roll. I wait all year for this thing. mmmmmm.



I think my favorite part of the fair was the karaoke stage. It was for kids 7 and under and little Walter had a blast. He was hesitant to get up at first until he heard two little boys sing the ABCs. Though I do sing the ABCs to him he doesn't really know them yet. He has a few favorite letters that he likes to repeat but on Monday night there was no telling him that he didn't know the song. Not only did he get on the stage in front of everyone to sing it but he got up multiple times and sang with conviction. It was really cute. Here are a few video of the ABCs and one if his drum solo.




This picture is just for Bradon. I convinced him to take a picture milking the cow because it would be cool to have it on the internet. I don't know if it is cool. but it is on the internet.

Beautiful Lengths

Well, I did it. It took me two years but I finally grew my hair out long enough to donate it. I decided to donate the ponytail to the Pantene Beautiful Lengths program because I only needed to donate 8 inches of hair. I ended up with a ponytail that is 9 inches that I will be mailing in. I am really happy with the hair style and I even decided to throw in some highlights. When you are going to donate your hair you can not color it so it has been at least 2.5 years since I colored or highlighted my hair. I was definitely ready for a change.
Here are some before and after pics for your viewing pleasure.
Before:


After:


I totally look thinner with short hair.

Pictures

This is our new trampoline. Actually it is just the matress to the bed that will be going in the baby's room as a guest bed. However, for now it sits behind the front door and the boy can knock it over and jump on it. It is pretty fun.

Our little family on the Train Town U.S.A. mini train.

Feeding the animals at Train Town.

Riding the carousel. He liked it after the first few turns.

Feeding the ducks at the park.

Sticker time with mama. This is what happens when you leave me home alone with the kid all day. I need to entertain myself somehow.

Walter's 28th Birthday

Saturday was Walter's 28th birthday. Wow, he's old. : )
We had a nice day together. It was Stake Temple day so we were able to go down to L.A. and attend the temple together. On the way back we ate at Claim Jumpers with Mom and the V's. We ate too much as usual but it was nice. The rest of the day we spent with little Walter since we hadn't seen him all day. We were pretty low key in the evening since we were a bit tired from all of the driving.
Sunday we went to church during the day and then had Walter's family over for dinner in the evening. Walter, being the non-conformist that he is, wanted pizza for dinner and pineapple upside-down cake for dessert. Sunday dinner is not usually a pizza kind of meal (I much prefer something like roast and mashed potatoes) but it was his birthday so he got to choose. We got tome papa murphy's take and bake on saturday night and cooked that up for everyone. For some reason we thought we would need 3 family size pizzas. Well, we were wrong and we now have and entire family size pizza worth of leftovers. Don't worry though, Walter won't let it go to waste. The cake was also quite lovely but of course he picked the one cake that you can't write "Happy Birthday" on.
Little Walter and Andi loved the birthday cake regardless of writing. Every time the two of them see a cake with candles on it they are convinced it is their brithday. Little Walter started blowing candles out while we were still trying light them and the to of them were super excited when we sang the happy birthday song. It didn't matter that we said "Happy Birthday, Dear Walter" because they were convinced we were singing to them. Walter was kind enough to let them help blow out his candles and upwrap his presents so that made their worlds a little brighter.
I am pretty sure Walter had a good birthday. I hope he did because he is a wonderful husband, father, priesthood holder, provider, friend and so many more things and he really does deserve the best.

Pregnancy Update

Not much to tell but I though I should record it just in case anyone was curious. I am a little over 18 weeks. I feel pretty good most of the time. I still don't really look pregnant which is a little annoying because I just look like I have put on a lot of weight right around the middle. It will be just a matter of time before I look back and think how nice the stage of pregnancy was, but for now I would just like some clothes that don't look silly on me. The diabetes thing is going fine. I did not end up needing insulin, at least not at this point. My doctor told me at my last appointment that if I were going to cheat that it is probably better to do it now while my sugar numbers are low. So, I have taken him up on that. I am not too bad but now and then I have a little cake or a cookie. Trust me, this is much better than the half dozen cookies I used to eat. And yes, I will be having a cinnamon roll at the fair tonight. : ) The only other news is that we are hoping to find out the gender this week. I am not holding my breath but it would be nice to know. If not this week I will find out on October 13. I think that is about it.

Napa Trip

Let me start out by telling you that there will not be any pictures in this update because I am on the laptop and I am too lazy to get the pictures off the desktop and move them to this computer. I will add pictures later.
Now, to the update...Earlier this month the Walters and I went to Napa for the annual birthday trip. I am pretty sure I mentioned this trip last year, but in case you didn't know this is a trip we take every September to celebrate the family birthdays. My Grandpa's birthday is August 31, my Grandma's is Sept. 3, my mom's is Sept. 6 and Big Walter's is Sept. 20. Every year we head up north, have raviolis and malfottis for birthday dinner, eat too much cake, have pizza from my family's pizza shop, and open presents. Big Walter especially loves this trip because pizza and malfottis are two of his very favorite foods. They say that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach and I agree. If you come to my house with good pizza and malfottis I can almost guarantee that Walter's heart would be bursting with love for you.
We did add something new to our trip this year. We took a trip to Train Town U.S.A. It was pretty fun. The have a miniature train that you ride around whole place. You cross mini bridges, ride past mini cabins with mini animals and eventually stop in a mini town with a petting zoo. Little Walter really liked the animals and even fed them some food. After a few minutes at the petting zoo we loaded back up in the train and rode back to the beginning. After our train ride we took the boy around to some of the amusement rides. He was scared of the rollercoaster but rode like a champ.
After Train Towm we made our way to the park where we were able to feed the ducks. It was so cute to watch the little guy throw the bread and get so excited when the ducks would come up to eat. The bread lasted longer than I thought and we had a really nice time.
The next day we made our way to church with my Great-Grandma and Great aunt and uncle and then drove home. It was a really nice trip. I don't love the drive and I certainly don't love sharing a bedroom with Little Walter, but all in all it was a very nice vacation.