Yet again we held the annual Pumpkin Carving Party with record breaking numbers of people attending. I think when it was all done and over at least 41 people came by to carve pumpkins! (A few people just opted to hang- out **cough** SAM!)

This year also seemed to break the record with the number of kiddos attending. Just a sign that we've hit that point in our lives when our friends are all having kids! Plus Sam, Jessica (Micah's wife), Marion and I were the 4 pregnant ladies Due Feb 24, March 1, march 2, and March 4th in that order! So I guess there will be even more kids next year!
Penelope was too cute, I wish I had gotten a picture of her and Isaac, they were best friends within minutes!
Mason seemed to think this whole pumpkin carving business was a little too messy.


As always, Emily seemed to be having a grand time and got along great with Colin (My boss' son) Look closely at his pumpkin, it reminds me of the little kid in Nightmare Before Christmas that gets the severed head from Santa Jack. :)

The unfinished basement proved to be a great "gutting" room. Elisa is showing off the automatic gutting tool!

Hahn was so excited to get started, he was the only one carving for a little while.


And a few of the finished pieces!

Nic & Carleen had their annual costume party for Halloween and this year the theme was 'Award Winning Movies'. Hahn and I decided that it was the perfect year to go as Juno and Paulie Bleeker. (I didn't even have to stuff my belly - it popped out just in time!)


There were a lot of good costumes at the party, but I think my favorite was Nic & Carleen as Sweeney Todd and Ms. Lovitt. (Of course Alexa was a wonderful Yoda too!)

Joe and Natasha as pirates!

Doug the gladiator and Kate.

Phil and Kristi - I was impressed - he stayed in costume all night. It had to be hot!

Rachel and I got to talking about how long it had been since we had gone to the Zoo, So we finally made plans and went (with Hahn and Tony too)! It ended up being such a perfect day - the weather was warm and comfortable and all the animals were out and about. Except the stupid penguins - we couldn't find them anywhere!


Is that another polar bear?? Oh wait - it's my husband :)

We were strangely intrigued with this weird looking bird hanging out in the Aviary. Hahn and Tony were trying to see how close they could get to it. The bird seemed to win the face-off, so we thought we should get a pic with it. :)

Me and Rachel with the Elephants!

Hahn and I with the flamingos - if you look close you can see my little bump!

Rocket Launch

Hahn joined Ed this year for the big rocket fest that happens every year. Ed has had the hobby for awhile of building his own rockets, it's really quite perfect for him, it combines science with pyrotechnics. ;) With some of their earlier experiments, Sam and I used to joke that if their rocket didn't leave the ground - then it was technically just a bomb. (oh dear)

Every year the group that Ed is in has an Oktoberfest - a big rocket launch in Northern Colorado. This year Hahn went along to help and I went up for a day to watch. It was actually quite fun to see all of the people that enjoy this hobby and many of the rockets are quite impressive. I can just see, in a few years from now - the boys with our little kiddos really having a great time doing this together!

Look! Sam's helping! :)

Ed and Hahn with 'Bunny Thumper' - the rocket

Making adjustments after on of the launches.

Stoli's 2nd set of stitches

So I went to the West Fest in downtown Fort Collins with my fam and Sam's. And when I got back Stoli was upstairs laying down with a HUGE quarter sized gash on his inner thigh. I still can't figure out how the heck he got it. Of course he ended up needing stitches. Here he is a week later showing off his new bandage. It was a pain keeping it covered so that he wouldn't lick it. Poor greyhounds are just not built very tough. This was the 2nd time we've had to get him stitches in the year we've had him. He seems to be healing nicely and should be up and running around shortly.

Garden of Ainsworth

This spring Hahn built two raised garden beds where we planted tomatoes, peppers, carrots, lettuce, squash and pumpkins. As well as a spot for corn behind all of that. Little did we know just how much produce we would get! We had more summer squash than I knew what to do with! And now that I've seen just how big pumpkin plants can get, (We assumed big, but not quite THAT BIG) we'll make sure to spread them out a bit more next time! We sure had fun watching it all grow and tending to it, and sharing it with everyone. Can't wait to do it again next year!
One of our giant pumpkins - we had 2 that ended up quite large. One weighed in at 35lbs, the other at 43!


Fall harvest.


Nanoo got us a Rose of Sharon bush for the front yard. We weren't even expecting it to bloom the first year, so it was a nice surprise. It can get up to 10' wide and 10' tall - so I think it will really fill in that space nicely!

Surprise!

We finally made the announcement that we have a baby on the way! We are due March 4th 2009! The super exciting part of it is that Sam and Ed are also expecting and are due just a couple weeks before us! It's so much fun to have someone else to experience all of this. (And have someone to complain with :)
My mom wanted to document our progress so far, as well as Hahn and Ed's too! :)

My Very Own High School Reunion!

This July was my 10 year High School Reunion. It is crazy to think that it has been that long. I was super excited for the reunion, but overall it didn't quite live up to my expectations. Friday there was a cocktail hour at the Rio - which was really weird. It was very clique-y - all the people that hung out in high school were in all the same groups. I mostly spent the evening hanging with Natasha and catching up with the Averys. There was definitely a couple people it was nice to see what happened too, but mostly I realized that I still keep in contact with all the people I wanted to.

The next day we had a family picnic at the new park in town and that was much more fun to see everyone's kids and hang out in a nice casual setting.
Laura, Brad, Ryan and his wife.

I'm really glad it gave me a chance to meet up with Leslie and Mark again. It was a blast getting caught up on everything they've been up to - and they have the cutest 3 kids! (Leslie with her youngest Scott and her twin sister Lisa)


Laura and Lizzy

The old gang - 10 years later!


Hahn spent most of the afternoon with Emily. She just adores him (Uncle Punk) and I think it's so cute!

Italy baby! (part 1) - June 2008

This June Hahn and myself (celebrating our 5th anniversary - June 1st) along with my parents, my brother and Ann (Hahn's mom) took a family vacation to Italy. I was fortunate to have been there once before with Kathy Cocetti's high school group. Hahn and his mom have both been to Europe a few times, but Hahn had never been to Italy and my family had never left the country before - so it was quite the adventure! We traveled with a tour group and I think it was the best choice for such a large group of us. And as much as my parent's whined about all the early mornings and the walking - we would have never seen as much on our own.
The trip started in Rome where we joined our group and headed South. The first couple days we spent traveling with stops at Pompeii, Sorennto and finally, the Isle of Capri.

March 2008

Over spring break (for Hahn and Ed) we decided it was about time to start finishing the basement. Ed, who has spent many summers building houses with Habitat for Humanity, graciously offered to help. And over the course of the week they managed to get about 90% of the framing finished.

Sam and I decided to help by mostly staying out of the way, but the boys found something for us to do and we ended up prepping a few 2 X 4s. (With only a few little problems)

We plan on making the basement into the office and family room. Hopefully we'll be able to get it done sometime this year!

Babies! - April 2008

April was the time for babies! Our good friends Nic and Carleen as well as our friends Aaron and Mandy managed to have their first children less than 30 hours apart! It was a fun day at the hospital meeting both babies!

Alexa Gail Widhalm was born to Nic & Carleen on 4/18/08 at 10:17am , 6lbs 8oz.
Hannah Jane Clarke was born to Aaron and Mandy on 4/19/08 at 6:49pm, 8lbs 4oz.

Proud papa Nic holding Alexa!


Hannah (top) and Alexa side by side. I'm pretty sure the nurses frown upon putting babies in the same bassinets, but we couldn't miss the photo opportunity! :)

Nic and Aaron with their respective newborn girls!



We dog-sat D'Argo for Nic and Carleen while they were at the hospital. He and Stoli got along so well, it was adorable. I caught the two of them waiting for everyone else to get home!