36 weeks Pregnant!

Soothing Picture

This is going to be the soothing picture I'm taking to look at during labor! =)

Slippers

Our apartment does not have any carpet at all and our floors are extremely cold! I wanted to get some slippers for Jocelyn and Jacob, but decided to make some instead. I only finished Jocelyn's so far. I made them out of an old towel of mine and used puffy paint on the bottom to make it less slippery on our floors. Oh, and since Jocelyn had a hard time keeping them on, I sewed on some elastic to help them stay on her cute little feet.

Jocelyn posed for all of these pictures all on her own.

top view

side view
back viewbottom view

Fleece Hats

Since the weather here in Urbana is getting colder and colder, I decided to make Jocelyn some fleece hats. We are trying to save money so I just took some fleece hats that I never wear anymore and used that fabric to make Jocelyn's hats.

Here are some pictures of the hats I made. Jocelyn does not like it when I put the hats on her, but I think she is starting to not mind so much since we have to put it on every time we leave the house.

Our Halloween Adventures

For Halloween this year Jocelyn was Minnie Mouse. She was so cute we had to bring her as many events as possible to show her off! =) There were so many free Halloween events here that we had to go and check them out.

The first event we went to was held at a store called Meijer. It is kind of like a supercenter Walmart. We decided to take Jocelyn dressed up in her costume since we were already going there to buy groceries. Meijer handed out candy around the store and they also had free samples of food. There was also a costume contest, but we were too late and were not able to enter. Jocelyn got her picture taken and we got two copies of it with a Halloween magnet frame.

After the trip to Meijer, we went to the Halloween party that was put on by our housing staff. The party was more geared to older kids, but Jocelyn liked going there and eating the snacks they offered.

Our family picture. I wore a shirt that said "Bun in the Oven" and Jacob wore a chef's hat and an apron that said "The Bun Maker."
Jocelyn dancing to the music.
Our friends from playgroup and cooking club.
We let the mom with the baby borrow Jocelyn's pumpkin costume from last year.



The Monday before Halloween, Jocelyn was able to decorate a pumpkin with stickers at playgroup. It was nice of the playgroup to give us a free pumpkin!

All of the fun toys Jocelyn played with at playgroup that day after she finished her pumpkin.



That same Monday night, we decided to have family night at the Champaign mall. The mall had a Halloween event planned. Everything was free. They had trick-or-treating and free games for the kids around the mall.

We took Jocelyn around in her stroller to get candy from the different stores. We forgot to bring her pumpkin pail to collect candy, but luckily I had a little brown paper bag in my diaper bag. =)


The mall also held a costume contest. We entered Jocelyn in the 0-2 years old category. We didn't make it to the top 10, but the bee next to us did... I think Jocelyn should have made it.


Me taking Jocelyn across the stage for the Judges to see. Jocelyn was too scared to walk on her own, but Jacob said that she waved to everyone when we went across the stage.

Jocelyn waiting for the Judges to announce the results.


On the actual day of Halloween we attended our church Halloween party. Jacob signed up to bring chili and it was a contest. Unfortunately we did not win, but it was only my second time ever making and eating chili. Jacob and I really liked how our chili turned out, even though we didn't win. We got the recipe off of the internet.

Here is a collage of all the pictures we took that night. We took a picture of Jocelyn's bum with her skirt up to see the panties she had on. It was so cute. There was also a guy dressed up as Willy Wonka. Jocelyn enjoyed trunk-or-treating, but wanted us to hold her the whole time. She even tried to say "trick-or-treat" and said "thank you" when she got candy. This little girl is growing up so fast.

I also liked the ballerina pumpkin that was carved by someone in our ward! I thought it was such a cute and creative idea.... I had to take a picture of it!

Fall Festival

We went to a fall festival at a local Champaign park. We only made it to the 45 minutes of it, but we still had a lot of fun. There were a lot of things to do around the park, and they had a little farm there too. We wanted to go on a hay ride, but we were took late. Oh well, maybe next time.

Jocelyn saw a rabbit and said that she wanted to touch it! She did but then got really scared of it. It was cute to see her actually touch the rabbit.
We helped Jocelyn make a necklace out of pasta.


There was a pond full of fish and ducks. Jocelyn enjoyed looking at the fish in the pond and she liked to point at the ducks and make duck sounds.

They had games for the kids and one of them was to find candy in the hay. Jocelyn was a bit nervous and scared of the hay. We ended up finding a piece of candy for her and she picked it up in the hay. Everyone there thought she was so cute!


Jocelyn holding the piece of candy we found.


One of the donkeys we saw on the farm. Jocelyn calls it a horse in Chinese. She was too scared to pet it.


Jocelyn and Baba stamped and colored a bag. They had really cool stamps and ink pens there.


Our family picture. The park even had a place set up to take family pictures.

Jocelyn's Hair

I thought it would be fun to play around with Jocelyn's hair since it is getting longer. She enjoyed having me do her hair and loved looking in the mirror after I was done. She is such a cutie!

Dairy Farm Adventure

We were able to go tour the UIUC Dairy Farm last Saturday morning. I was excited to bring Jocelyn because she loves to make the sound of the cow and whenever we drive past the farm she would always point out the cows outside. It turns out that Jocelyn is scared of the cows and did not want to get close to one. She even got scared when we tired to take a picture of her with the cows in the background. I guess it would be scary for a little girl like her to see a cow. The cows are huge and weigh about 1500-2000 pounds! They are definitely a lot bigger up close! We got to see where and how the cows are milked, where they stored all the milk, what type of things are fed to the cows, the young calves, and some people even got to stick their hands into the cows stomach! We were not able to stay for the whole tour so we missed out on sticking our hands into their stomachs. It was a fun trip and although I gagged sometimes because of the stinky smell, it was worth going.


Jocelyn before the tour pointing at the tractor.








Bruce, our tour guide, explaining how the cows are milked three times a day.







The stalls the cows stand in while being milked and after they are done, the bar goes up and the cows walk out all by themselves.







Jacob and Jocelyn standing in front of the milking machines.







This is where the milk is stored at 38 degrees F. It is emptied about every two days.







Cows outside eating. I couldn't believe how big the cows are, and their utters looked painfully huge and swollen. Good thing they are milked three times a day!





We finally got a picture of Jacob holding Jocelyn in front of the cows. Jocelyn was really scared and nervous around the cows.






Me with the cows... this picture was taken to document that I was actually there.







I liked how pretty this cow looked.







Hay. One of the things in the cows diet. It is mainly a filler.







Alfalfa hay. This adds to the fiber content of the diet.








Cotton seeds. Also part of the cows' diet, but I forgot what nutrients it provides.





Soybean pellets. It adds protein into the cows' diet.







Corn meal. The corn has to be ground up because the cows can not digest the whole corn.







This is called corn silage. It is whole corn plants chopped up to pieces and fermented in bags. The smell was awful, I almost threw up.



A caterpillar we saw while we were walking.






I'm guessing that this is manure by the way it smelled.





A calf. They don't start milking until they are two years old and are usually 10 years old when they stop milking them.




Jocelyn and me with the calf. Jocelyn was still scared.