My Favorite New Place

Today Cadence and I ventured to Saline, MI and found the ultimate mommy/baby play date...Urban Toddlers! If you want a place where the under 5 set can safely play while you chat with friends and play too (of course). They have the play area monitored, each parent and child get a number on their hand that shows under ultraviolet light. You have to be scanned to leave. Shoe's go off at the door and everyone socks it.

The play area is divided into fun rooms. There's a room with comfy chairs, 100's of books and puzzles. The market has plastic food on shelves, like a grocery store. The kitchen has a giant play kitchen set for your little gourmet. The art room has a floor to ceiling chalkboard and a bunch of mini musical instruments. The center has a pit for the crawling or rolling playful ones. And there's a track to push around baby buggies and push toys. Then there is the theater with a tiny stage and puppets and oodles of play dress-up clothes.

For the grown-ups you can order coffee drinks and food from the cafe a few doors down. The Urban Toddler staff with run and pick it up for you. And there are plenty of unique items to buy in in the attached baby boutique.

I'm definitely going back. Cadence had fun for 3 and a half hours straight! We met up with Colleen, Matthew, Katie, Melissa and Gavin.

Up North with Cindy and Leon

For this first weekend of fall we expected it to be cool. But you have to love that Michigan weather, it was actually shorts and tank top weather! I love Michigan spring/summer/fall. There's nothing like being surrounded by nature, trees, the seasons. Cadence had a great time hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa. We scored some really cheap Melissa and Doug toys at the Amish store. The block set we bought at a baby boutique was $22, at the Amish store it was $12! I only with I would of discovered these great deals sooner, I've bought so many baby shower presents the past year.

Fall is in the air!

At work we have a walking club. We walk outside for a mile and a half at 12:30 on nice days. This past week has been amazing, beautiful sunny days and just warm enough. Today I'm home and it's dismal so that's alright! You can actually feel fall in the air and of course I'm really wanting hot apple cider and nice warm donuts. Cadence got into the fall spirit with this beautiful knit ensemble from Grandma Cindy.

Justine, Alexandra and Yolanda at work all knit. Justine is planning on having a knitting party so I'm going to learn to knit! I think winter is the perfect time to knit and hopefully I'll get good enough to do something cute like this!

Cadence is getting new cousins!

My cousins Robin and Jonathan are in Russia right now bonding with their two sons! The youngest Alexander was 14 months yesterday, he's 4 days older than Cadence. And Nicholas is 27 months. Jonathan set up a blog of the experience http://jondrop.com/blog

We are so excited for them and can't wait to meet our new family. The boys are just adorable, fair with blond hair and big happy smiles. They are so lucky to have Robin and Jonathan as parents. We do have a bit longer to wait, they should be done with the court hearing and waiting period by November 15th and be back in the states. It will be a really special Thanksgiving this year. A lot of prayers have been answered and we are so thankful.

I showed Cadence pictures and she got real excited and started her jabbering. She is going to have so much fun with kids her age at family events. And Michael and I will like it too because she'll have tots to play with while we talk!

A Little Person

One day you realize that you no longer have a baby but a little person is living with you. Cadence has begun to clean with anything she can find, paper towels, tissues, wash clothes. We had a period of drippy sippy cups so I was constantly wiping the wood floors so now she does too!

She also insists on watering the plants everytime we go outside to the patio. She also opens the cupboards when it's time to cook. And pretends she's cooking too. She grabs groceries out and puts them in bags when the new groceries come in the door.