Hatfieldadelphia

On Friday night Katie and I went on an adventure. Every time we drive down 20th North in Orem on our way home, we see this castle off to the right... That's right, a castle! We like to do crazy things and explore, so on Friday we decided to figure out what a castle is doing in Lindon UT. It took us awhile to find the entrance to the place because the property is huge. Upon arriving at the entrance, we were greeted by "No Trespassing" and "Beware of the Monkey" signs. Being the adventurous sort that we are, we decided to at least pull in and take a look around. I mean... "turn around". Inside, we found a courtyard full of statues of giraffes, lions, monkeys, a life sized rhino and more. It is actually really creepy in the dark, and the huge gorilla freaked Katie out. We thought maybe it belonged to some sort of cult or something. There is, after all, a witch's cabin on the property. There is also a gazebo with a top that resembles the top of a sultan's palace (think Aladdin). Which led us to believe this might belong to some sort of foreign dignitary (Think Punjab from 'Annie'). After looking around a bit we were totally weirded out and decided to take off before we got eaten for dinner. As we were leaving, we noticed a sign that said, "Welcome to Hatfieldadelphia...

Frankly, everything we had imagined about Hatfieldadelphia was far more interesting than the truth. After a little research we learned that Mr. Hatfield, our rich, semi-neighbor has built a fantasy land in his backyard for his grandchildren. There is a castle (with a MOAT), witch's cabin, playground, sand volleyball court, go-cart track, Indian teepee, paths and parks, and all sorts of statues that look creepy in the dark but aren't actually that creepy when you know what they are.

It turns out that Hatfieldadelphia is only open to the public once a year for a Little Princess Festival each August. Don't tell Chase, but next August he may have to don on a princess outfit so that Katie and I can further our investigation of our neighborhoods castle :)

It was a good adventure.

He's your grandson Mike!

For a few weeks Tim had been telling me that sometimes Chase makes a smile that looks just like his dad's "goofy smile". Jannifer and Noelle came over one day and both caught it. I still had no idea what they were talking about until I saw this picture; I knew right away that this was it.

He's your grandson Mike!

Playing Catch-up

I guess it really has been almost a month since we last blogged. I don't even know what we've been doing; life has just been so crazy and BUSY. For the sake of time I'll give a few bullets of what we've been up to the past week.

-Tim and I celebrated the 3rd anniversary of our first date last Tuesday by going back to the Corn Maze at Cornbellys. We rode the cow train and everything. Yeah... we are pretty sentimental. Tim got beat up by some orphans in the "corn pit", we journeyed through the 'belly of the beast', and we enjoyed playing on the slides, bouncer, and in princess land. Per tradition we went home and watched Betwitched, ate caramel apples, and remembered how much better life has gotten in the past 3 years. We are always glad that the night never ends with a doorstep scene anymore.

-We took Chase trunk-or-treating and out to some family for Halloween. He absolutely loved picking candy out of the bowls and knew exactly what to do. We let him have a sucker and some licorice when we got home and he was in heaven. It was so fun for us to celebrate Halloween with him even though he's so little. We are even more excited for next year.

-We put up our Christmas tree. You can say we're crazy, but we love how it makes our home feel. Also, if you remember, we bought it for 25$ on KSL, so we were pretty excited to put it up and make sure we had all the pieces and everything. It is probably a 400$ tree, and it looks awesome with our vaulted ceilings. We still can't believe what an amazing deal we got. We are also starting to shop for Chase's first Christmas, which has been a blast. I'm getting really excited to go to Colorado for Christmas since we missed last year as I was 9 months pregnant. Nothing beats 24/7 free babysitters, mom's cooking, and unlimited time with my husband. Can't wait!

-Tim is almost done with grad school! Only 6 more weeks. He has been studying for his comps and working hard to get everything ready to start his thesis. I'm so proud of him!

Update for Grandma and Grandpa

Chase is nearly 10 months old, weighs 19.2 pounds and is 28 inches long. He can say "cracker" (we are trying to get a video up- sounds like "cah-cuhh")and he signs "milk" when he wants any kind of a drink. He recognizes the signs for "juice" "cracker" "cookie" "milk" "drink" and "eat" when we do them. He seems to think "cracker" means "eat" because he says it every time he sees food. He's decided that his bed time should no longer be 8 o'clock, but 9:30. Also he is boycotting naps. I shouldn't complain because he sleeps so wonderfully during the night and he's been a good sleeper since he was born. He can crawl almost as fast as I can walk and is starting to cruise and try standing alone. I am getting nervous for him to start walking since we have hard floors. He is still a bottomless pit and eats everything in sight. His weight is still 25th percentile so I'm not sure where it all goes. Tim thinks it's all stored in his cheeks. But, he's growing like crazy and we are getting excited for our first Christmas with him!

Sometimes I let him crawl around and play in his room while I clean the living room and kitchen. He likes to get all his toys out and take them all out of their baskets, but lately everytime I peek in to check on him, he has a book on his lap and he's flipping through the pages. It is currently my favorite thing he does. It's so cute!

Dip It In Chocolate

Yes, we in fact have another blog. We decided to move all of our food-related stuff over to its own blog. If you want to see it, there is a link under 'Friends and Family', and I believe it's titled Our Food Blog.

Date Night

I have a tendency to put up a lot of pictures of Chase, and no pictures of us. So here are some pictures from our last date and an update of what we do when Chase is not around.

On our last date we began by picking pumpkins at the pumpkin patch at Thanksgiving Point. If any of you go to their Halloween stuff, check out their tree of Jack-O-Lanterns. They are truly amazing. Sleeping Beauty and Arches were my favorite. We walked around and shopped, picked out some candy at the Emporium, and took a stroll through the solarium. Here's a funny picture of us and our pumpkins on our front porch.

We then went to dinner at Little Italy in Provo. If you've never been there put it at the top of your list. The food is awesome. We had been for gelato several times and it never failed to disappoint. Hours after we left Tim was still talking about the pasta he had (Quattro Formaggio), and the lasagna is pretty good as well. Their mormon tiramisu is out of this world. Try the strawberry variety. Beware glancing at their pastry assortment- you will want to order all of them.

After a nice dinner we bought a brick of ice cream and took it home to make an ice cream sculpture. It started as a penguin and progressed to an owl, a volcano, and several other things I don't remember. We got in an ice cream fight and afterwards I spent half a bottle of conditioner getting it out of my hair.

We love date night!

Discovering Gardener Village

My cousin got married at the Gathering Place at Gardener Village last week. At the end we snuck out and took a little tour of the village since we had never been there before. It's basically a quaint little collection of shops and cute stores. They have a petting zoo and an amazing candy store. They have a little pond with bridges and ducks. Best of all, the whole thing is decorated for Halloween. If you like holidays, this is the greatest place ever. I was seriously in paradise. They place life-size witches everywhere. The Wicked Witch of the West even makes an appearance through the trees, with Toto in tow. I am already ready to go again.

This place is great for a date. Go in the evening and just enjoy walking around. It is really a lot of fun, and if you don't go crazy shopping, it's 100% free :) Here is the one picture we got before my camera died: