October Update - Trip to Canada, Grandma Trudy's Visit, and Halloween!

Lydia turned 16 months old in October! She runs and talks and is busier than ever. Her favorite words are hi, da-ey (doggy), ball, all done, 'ba' (balloon), shoe, uh-oh and daddy. She does baby sign language for 'all done' and 'more.' She has a banana-oatmeal smoothie for breakfast every morning but is pretty picky about food other than that. She likes going to nursery on Sundays (with me until December) and reading books before bed. She's a happy, friendly little girl!

In the midst of all her growing, I went to Canada for a quick work trip. Back in July I started working for a corporate wellness company, doing content creation for their health education programs. I work for them a few hours every afternoon while babysitters come over to play with Lydia. Working from home has pros and cons, and one drawback is not seeing your coworkers face-to-face. So I was happy to fly down and meet them at their office outside of Vancouver at the beginning of the month!

I spent three days in Kelowna, BC to visit CoreHealth's office, meet my coworkers and dig into projects. It was a really nice getaway despite needing 3 flight connections in each direction, and the longest I'd ever been away from Lydia (who was happy at home with Grandma). It turns out that the stereotypes are true, and Canadians really do say "eh" and are extraordinarily polite and BCers wear (and look good in!) lots of Lululemon. I was able to make it to a yoga two out of the three nights of the trip, and out to dinner with coworkers on the other night. I realized that putting in a full, 8-hour day - in an office! - is exhausting and I remembered why I love working from home. And we went curling as a group - I've never felt more Northern!

Flying back into Fairbanks after the trip. Snow!

If only I'd remembered to get a picture with my coworkers it would've been a perfect trip.

My mom is an angel and came up to Alaska just to spend the week with Lydia. I wondered if L would miss me, but it's safe to say they were having way too much fun to notice!

At the airport Lydia was sure to point out each and every "da-ey" (doggy... her word for every animal.) And we even got to try out Fairbanks' new Indian place before I left. We will be back! 

"Da-ey!!"

It started snowing while I was away and Mom was a champ for driving and walking in it, even though she's not used to it and it was cold - just 1° the day she left! It gave us an excuse to get Lydia in her snow suit and let her walk around. SOO cute!!

She said, "hi." :) 

Making important Halloween candy decisions. 

After the first dusting, with our pumpkins Goldie and Gourdie. 

So glad Mom and L could have some serious bonding time. :)

The weekend before Halloween, Matt and I too L to an indoor pumpkin patch where she found a pumpkin that was just her size.

Halloween came and went in a flash. As you'll recall, we spent a whopping $1 on our family costumes last year. This year, we went all-out and spent $19.99 (with free shipping!) It was worth it to see Lydia dressed in her own German traditional Dirndl (or Target's version of it) so Matt and I could wear our German costumes again. We were inspired by Matt passing - with a perfect score! - the army German test and earning the title of 'German speaker' on his military record for the rest of time. Hopefully this doesn't mean we'll be sent to Germany. But if we do, we know what we'll be wearing!

We went to our ward Halloween party and decorated a door for indoor trick-or-treating. Our theme started out as a Hansel and Gretel but ended up looking more like Santa's house. That's ok when you're in the North Pole Ward, right? I think it 'worked,' and Matt had fun watching the kids parade by and tossing candy into their bags.

"Ya hallo!"

I'm always amazed be people's creativity with costumes. Lydia got to play with Charlee and we were all cracking up when she started fake crying... you can see the confusion on Lydia's face!

Earlier when I pulled Matt's costume out Lydia had a little fun with his hat...

Here are snippets from the rest of the month. Lydia had her 15-month check up and is all healthy! She's in the 33rd percentile for height and weight (so petite!) She also got a flu shot and a lollypop. It was enough to knock a little girl out!

We got a family Sunday selfie as we rushed out the door to church one week:

We signed Lydia up for swim lessons and she LOVES them. She squeals and giggles and splashes, and even jumped off the edge into our arms a couple times. They've been fun for all of us!

t-shirt and sandal weather

Cozy nights...

Library and story time / play group...

Hanging out...

Playing in the snow with Ariana, one of the babysitters

Trip to the dog park...

And a series called "while I turned my back for 2 minutes."

It's been cold and snowy and pretty. This first picture is from someone's Instagram, and the second is from a family walk. 

Snowy park visit

I guess you could say we're ready for Christmas!

I want to finish by adding a short note that things have been really hard recently. I had a relapse of all of the emotional stuff I was going through over summer, and it's worse than ever. Fortunately we've had a diagnosis and can move forward with a solution. Thanks to Matt for being with me as much as possible outside work during these exhausting months. I haven’t been myself. I haven’t been wonderful. We're thankful for good doctors and medicine.