It's the most wonderful time of the year...

Move over Christmas.... you're cool and all, but Fall takes the cake in my book. What could be more exciting then the crispness in the air after a hot summer, the return of swoon-worthy boots, pumpkin spice lattes and anything pumpkin for that matter?! I'm sure I have all you Christmas obsessed folks thinking of coming over to the dark side :) However my baby is a December baby so I will say, that does tip the scale in your favor for that reason alone.
We took Farrah to a pumpkin patch a couple weeks ago. She loved it! Not because of the pumpkins or anything, but because of 2 things... the animals on the farm, and the hayride to go pick pumpkins. She could have cared less about the music show they put on for the kids, which I was fine with because quite frankly listening to a creepy hillbilly sing barn songs isn't really my scene anyways. Instead this is what she did...

... stare at animals. She loved it. But I wasn't the least bit surprised considering her lifelong (almost 2 years now) obsession with all things animal. If you are one of my "real life" friends or family members, you've already been introduced to "Ra-Ra" and her purple wrist and ankle bands. If you are a "blog friend" you're probably wondering what the heck is on my kids legs and what she's carrying around. We get many stares these days. Mostly for her wrist and arm bracelets. I see people point and make comments, my recent favorite was at a party I heard a couple talking and then point to her purple bands then followed it up with "it looks like she's on house arrest." Yes moron my 2 year old is on house arrest. Being that I'm a parent of a toddler, my first thought would be, looks like that kid has taking a liking to some purple bands. That is it precisely. She's 2, she has new obsessions daily and this is her current one. Ra-Ra goes with her everywhere and her purple bands must be on her at all times. I think it makes her unique and gives her character. If she wants to wear rockstar bands all day, more power to you girl!

Best family photo we got all day

On the hayride over she put her little hand on daddy's lap and left it there the whole time. P.R.E.C.I.O.U.S.

One of her many DIVA faces

She got so mad when we had to get off the hayride to start picking pumpkins. This is her crying and pointing at the tractor as it drove away. Note to Grandma, Farrah wants a tractor for her birthday!

We quickly picked some pumpkins and got back on the hay ride as soon as possible.... Farrah wasn't diggin' the whole pumpkin part of the pumpkin patch.

Leave it to mommy to ruin Farrah's good time on the hayride. At least I was able to get this good picture with my happy girl.

We had a great time celebrating the gratest season of all. Halloween will be here soon. I'll leave you in suspense with what she's going to be for Halloween. Her Auntie Janett picked it out and is coming to visit from LA to see Farrah model her costume. Can't wait!

I've been waiting for this forever and a day

Ok well that may be a bit dramatic but I'm super excited! Me and the hubbs are going to Hawaii! I'm sure many of you are rolling your eyes behind your computer screens ... I can just picture it... "must be nice!" That's something I would probably say to someone who announces in a blog they're going on a nice trip. But hear me out.... we need this trip!
In college I did a lot traveling. I loved it. Loved exploring, learning.... yada yada. Now that I've been married for a few years and have been a parent for almost 2, I have no desire to go anywhere where I have to think. I want to go somewhere with a beach where I can lay around and do nothing besides work on my tan (or in my case attempt a slightly darker shade of pasty white) and drink girly beverages of the alcoholic variety. So Hawaii has been on my list of places I wanted to go with my wonderful husband to get away. I knew that logistically it would be difficult enough with one child, and that trying to get away for a trip like that with more than one child would be very difficult. So I've said for a long time that I didn't want to have any more kids until we could go to Hawaii. As time went on, I started to doubt we'd ever be able to go, let alone before another child comes into the picture.
Until my husband and his amazingness came to me one day with some good news. "I have some good news. We might be able to go to Hawaii." Those were his exact words. I believe my response was "Ummm... what?" You see I know Hawaii is synonymous with expensive. Because if we're going to go, we're going to do it right. None of this Motel 6in' it in Maui that's for sure. We've been working hard at paying down debt and we're making progress so any extra $ we have now needs to go to that, not to a Hawaii trip.
So do you remember my last post? In case not HERE it is. The one where I was blabbering about how much my husband has been working? Turns out the hard work and long hours he's been putting in have paid off. His boss came to him and thanked him for how much he's been working and said "I'm sure your wife probably isn't too happy with you right about now." Who me? ;) So he offered to give us his frequent flier miles to send us to LA to visit family. Very nice of him to do. So my husband jokingly says, "well the wife's been wanting to go to Hawaii.... how many miles you willing to part with?" And his boss said sure!!!! Can you believe that? So this is the day my husband came home and told me we "may" be going to Hawaii. The catch was, I knew the rest of the trip was going to be really expensive even without having to pay for the flights so we talked about working really hard until our trip to save. Fastforward a few days. The bosses wife who co-owns the company pulled Abe aside and said she was very excited for us and that she remembered I wanted to wait to have more kids until we could go to Hawaii. On a sidenote I don't remember ever telling her that... who tells the hubbs' bosses wife about their family planning? But apparently I must have. ... So they were excited for us to go and she said they would like to take care of our hotel while we're there as well! Oh my stars I was so excited!!!! Now we just have to come up with spending money. As if all that wasn't enough... a few days later they offered to pay for a rental car and a helicopter ride for the 2 of us while we're there. SHUT.YOUR.MOUTH! I literally had tears in my eyes each time Abe came home to tell me more good news.
We leave in 3 weeks! We'll be staying for a week in Maui. I feel like a school girl that just won Justin Beiber tickets or something. I'm excited to relax, not think about work or Dora the explorer, pets, or any of our other responsibilities (it's impossible for me to not think about my sweet girl :) and just spend time with my husband. I need this... we need this. So I hope that makes you feel better to know that we're not the types of people that just take trips all the time. Proof that hard work pays off. Maybe not when and how you want it to, but it always, ALWAYS pays off.
Be ready for picture overload when we get back. And don't get all anxious for a pregnancy announcement or anything since we're taking this trip. With time. We'll see. Right now all I can think about is Maui or bust!