N O V E M B E R

This was the day Garrett got called a girl a couple of times and I decided it was time to cut the hair. 

 I wish we had left the mullet for a few days,

but we cut the rest.

 My little baby boy looks so grown up! 

We escaped the cold for a little bit and flew to Phoenix to visit Jeff's brother, Preston, and his family.

Garrett had a blast playing with his cousins. It was definitely a Garrett vacation.

 Preston and Amy were nice and watched G for us so we could go out on a date. 

 We went to the Phoenix zoo and fed a Giraffe! It was pretty awesome. 

 For Thanksgiving we decided to go to New York City for the weekend. 

It was fun, crazy, exhausting and every level of our patience was tested with Garrett.

 Some of our friends got up at 5am and saved us a spot to watch the Macy's day parade. I joined them at 6:30 and Jeff and Garrett came at 9. It was pretty cool, but I think I'm ok not ever going again. And Jeff unfortunately lost his phone on the way back to the hotel, on the bright side, we had a fun morning at the parade and ate an awesome Thanksgiving meal at a triple D restaurant called, the Brindle Room. We've heard their burgers are fantastic so we'll have to go back.

 We looked at the Saks 5th Avenue windows. Their theme was fairy tales this year. 

Looked at the Macy's store windows. 

 Saw the tree at the Rockefeller plaza. 

Too bad it wasn't lit up yet, maybe next year we'll go for the tree lighting. 

Jeff was nice enough to stay at our hotel with Garrett and let me go to Radio City Music Hall and see the Rockette's Christmas spectacular. I loved it. 

We went on a little stroll through Central Park.

And walked across the Brooklyn Bridge. 

 Because we took a train in from New Jersey we didn't have a car, which was so nice, because we could walk everywhere, but not so nice because Garrett despised the cold and did NOT want to sit in his stroller. Imagine a toddler walking around times square with a million people around, not wanting to hold your hand, not wanting to watch where he is going, and not wanting to stay on the sidewalk. Then, when you try to pick him up or try to hold his hand he throws himself onto the nasty sidewalk, or the floor of the subway or the ground in chelsea market and lays there, and there's nothing you can do to calm him down except let him just have his little moment and then all is good. Like I said, we had a really good time, but we had to learn to just not care about what people thought and to roll with it and laugh, it was either that or get frustrated and be grumpy. When we go back, we're going in warmer weather.

O C T O B E R

 I'm playing major catch up right now. I haven't posted anything in a LONG time, so here are some of our adventures from the month of October. I think this may have been my favorite fall. The weather was beautiful and Garrett and I did all sorts of fall activities and enjoyed the outdoors. 

 We went to Mount Vernon to meet up with Jeff's sister and her husband while they were in town.

Ok, I know this is gross, but I thought it was hilarious that they have George Washington's teeth on display, I'm weird, I know. 

We went to the Jefferson Memorial and forgot a jacket for G, so he borrowed a sweatshirt from Dave. Thanks Dave! 

I love this little face. He loves lining up all his animals in the tub.

 We picked out pumpkins and looked at farm animals. 

Garrett loves animals, well, just looking, not touching. 

 We had some frozen apple cider.

 We went hiking and threw rocks into the river.

 Soaked up our last bit of sunshine at the park. 

 Went to six flags with some friends. Garrett rode his first roller coaster. After the first time around he kept saying, "Done, done, done." haha. I may have scarred him for life. 

 We met up in Philly with Laci and her husband, Parker. 

Climbed the Rocky stairs. 

 Went on wagon rides. 

 Walked through a corn maze.

And had a fun Halloween dressed up as a shark.

C O N N E C T I C U T 

The beginning of September was a fun time for us. My dad went to a BYU football game in Connecticut and we decided to meet him up there before heading to Massachusetts. 

He took us on a tour of Madison, CT. It is beautiful there! 

My dad attended high school in Madison and below is their neighborhood beach hang out. The only people who have access are locals (we talked our way in so we could take a picture). His high school's football field is right next to the beach too. How fun would that be!  He took us to his old house and also showed me where he and my mom lived when they were first married. It was pretty cool, except when he told me their apartment is where I was conceived...not cool.

The next day we drove to Cape Cod. Jeff and I took a little road trip through Rhode Island, which is beautiful, while my dad picked up my mom and memma from the airport. 

M A S S A C H U S E T T S

Our first day on the cape was a little gloomy so we just drove around and found some fun places to go to keep us busy.

We took a cranberry bog tour in this awesome bus. To my disappointment they do not look like the ocean spray commercials, there's not any water with beautiful berries floating on top, that part of the process only lasts a few days, but it was pretty interesting to hear how they harvest them. Garrett about had it with the tour and was very restless. 

We walked along the beach to try and find horse shoe crabs.

We went to the fish market and watched the fisherman haul in the fish. Weirdly this was one of my favorite things, even with the terrible smell. 

Their seafood was delicious. This was my yummy lobster roll. 

We walked around the town, and of course Garrett went #2 and I was out of diapers and far away from where we were staying. I looked around for someone with kids and embarrassingly asked a mom if I could pay her for a diaper, haha, but who hasn't been in that situation before? Luckily she just gave me one and laughed. I would have done the same. 

We took a tour of the Cape Cod chip factory, YUM! 

We went to Sandwich's glass museum. Apparently glass blowing is a big deal up there. 

These colorful glass items are my favorite. 

We went to the beach in Chatham...we just really liked Chatham.

Garrett was unsure about the water at first. 

He quickly warmed up to the FREEZING water.

We had to make another stop at the fish pier for one more round of their clam chowder and fresh seafood. 

My days kind of blur together, but one of the days we went to Provincetown, the first place the Pilgrims landed, not Plymouth. 

One of the cities my Dad lived in when he was growing up.

Provincetown was a cute town and definitely had it's own flair. It's pretty similar to Haight-Ashbury  in San Francisco.

THIS is Nantucket and it is my favorite. 

My mom and Memma were kind enough to watch Garrett so that Jeff and I could go hang out with my dad. She also rented a jeep for us to go four wheeling on the sand dunes. It was incredible. The beaches there are beautiful and the water is so clear.

We hunted for sea shells. 

Drove by beautiful scenery.

Went swimming 

Went to a local farm.

Walked around the downtown area.

Dad and I got lobster rolls, Jeff got this...

A soft shell crab sandwich, yes, you eat the whole thing, not recommended.

We saw a ton of light houses and adorable houses. 

While we were in Nantucket, Garrett was with the grandmas. He was very intrigued by the boats unloading cars. 

 I love these pictures of Garrett with Memma. We call my grandma Memma, it's a southern thing, like Sheldon on Big Bang Theory. 

We came back to find G's hair in a pony tail. Nope, I will not cut it, not yet. 

Our last stop on the Cape was Martha's Vineyard

There was a little park with a gazebo in it and I thought the weather vane was pretty cute. The park was surrounded by adorable Victorian houses. I was in heaven. 

Our last day was spent in Boston. Again, my mom took one for the team and watched Garrett so we could go enjoy a child free baseball game. Before the game Jeff and I had a great time exploring downtown. We saw Paul Revere's grave, went to Cambridge to see Harvard and just had fun walking around the city. Fenway was awesome. My favorite part was when they play Sweet Caroline and everyone sings.

The next day we drove home and got to enjoy a nice sunset. It was a good way to end our vacation.