Week 55

We had a pretty low-key week overall. I enjoyed my last week of part-time work. Yes, you heard me right. My company has a pretty amazing maternity leave and I decided that after working 6+ years for them, I deserve that benefit at the full-time pay. So I bumped my hours back up to full-time to take full advantage of it. I counted, and if the baby is full-term I have 23 more Mondays of work. I think I can do that. What is the maternity leave? Three full months fully paid with an optional 4th month using personal time off. My energy level is so much better now so it should all be fine. I thoroughly enjoyed my 10 weeks of part-time though. It was much needed.

Saturday evening we headed up to Eric's Aunt Dodie's home in Loveland. His cousin's two girls were there as well. Dodie made us an excellent dinner with tons of locally grown veggies - we love that - and a stuffing that she cooked inside a pumpkin. Yum! After dinner the two girls and I carved pumpkins. I have wanted to carve a pumpkin so bad this year so was thrilled when Dodie told us that was on the agenda. Here are the two girls (Sarah and Paige) with all three pumpkins...

And here is a close-up of my pumpkin...

I really was quite proud of myself. I usually do the triangle eyes and standard jack-o-lantern jagged smile. I changed it up and think it turned out cute. And those girls were far more clever than I ever was at that age. Their pumpkins turned out so good.

I was in charge of dessert and once I knew the girls were coming, I wanted to do something festive. I made some chocolate cupcakes (cause a dessert is only a dessert if it is chocolate) and decorated them like spiders. They turned out cute. Completely forgot to take a picture. Lame.

Thanks Aunt Dodie for having us over and carving pumpkins. It was a super evening!