Halloween Festivities

Halloween has come and gone and now all we're left with is tons of candy and some fun memories. If you haven't noticed, Halloween is becoming as much of a celebration as Christmas (kind of scary, but that's for another post).

We started the week of festivities with visits to the pumpkin patches and the neighborhood Halloween party (see previous posts). Here's a picture taken of our little butterfly and duck before the Halloween party:
One of my favorites of the week was my playgroup Halloween party. There's nothing better than dressing seven unwilling, but helpless toddlers and babies in all sorts of costumes. The reaction is priceless. I took at least three of these pictures and this is probably the best of the bunch. I bribed Isaac with Goldfish to get him to stay on the couch. The back row wasn't so willing, notice the mom's ducking behind their little ones. Oh what we'll do to get a picture!

One of Ella's favorite moments was carving the pumpkin. Jason asked her to draw a few designs and then choose which one she wanted to do. After a few "revisions" this is what they came up with...it actually was pretty close to what Ella drew.

Here's the proof that we were here pictures:
Because our street is loving referred to as the retirement community, we decided to walk a few blocks this year and go to a different section of the neighborhood for Trick or Treating. I'm glad we did, because Ella had a great time running from door to door to get her candy. One of the houses had a bounce house set up for the kids and another had a Monster's Inc. playing on their garage door. There were also lots of liquid beverages for the parents...I tried a pumpkin shot...very yummy...I know, I'm getting wild and crazy!!!Here's proof that Jason was not doing a very good job watching Isaac. Can you see Jason in the background? EXACTLY!!! This is not what I call looking after our 13 month old! He kept trying to tell me he was "watching" him! I guess we have different views of what that means.

It was a fun week and now I have to get back to eating more candy :)!

Funny Cartoon (at least for a Republican)

Recipe for Disaster

1 Tablespoon of way too hot for costumes weather (humid and in the 80s today...yuck)

2 tsp. toddler who does not like costume or anything on his head

3 cups of todder who missed afternoon nap

1/2 cup preschooler freaked out by scary costumes

1 nut of a mom who decides to go to the neighborhood Halloween party by herself with two kids

Mix together and you get a recipe for disaster!

Went to the neighborhood Halloween party tonight, wished I hadn't wasted the $. I'm not knocking the party, just my poor judgment based on the the circumstances. Oh well, I really didn't feel like fixing dinner...next time I think I'll order take out :). The look on Isaac's face pretty much sums up the night.

BTW, it rained this morning so no pumpkin patch! One of these days I'll get the covetted pumpkin patch picture and if I don't I'll just enjoy others!

Pumpkin Patch Visit

I've always loved the photos I've seen of children in pumpkin patches. I don't know what it is, maybe the colors. Ella's preschool class took a visit to the pumpkin patch today. I was hoping for a cute photo of both of them together, but it didn't happen.








Ella's really not a fun kid to take pictures of, because she either makes a really cheesy smile or pretty much refuses to have her picture taken. Her latest tactic seems to be closing her eyes. This combined with the cheesy smile makes it really annoying to get pictures of her. Why do I even try?! Getting a Christmas picture this year should be fun!





I did get one good candid of Isaac. Better luck at tomorrow's pumpkin patch visit (yes, we are going to another pumpkin patch tomorrow for the sole purpose of the covetted pumpkin patch photo...not really, but I'll give it another shot!)

I've Joined the Army!

In trying to do my part to stop breast cancer, I've joined The Army! The "Army of Women", a new breast cancer organization aimed at stopping the spread of breast cancer and preventing it all together. Check out the website www.armyofwomen.com.

It's revolutionary initiative has two key goals:

To recruit one million healthy women of every age and ethnicity, including breast cancer survivors and women at high-risk for the disease, to partner with breast cancer researchers and directly participate in the research that will eradicate breast cancer once and for all.

To challenge the scientific community to expand its current focus to include breast cancer prevention research conducted on healthy women.

If you are a fellow blogger, please mention this new organization on your blog and my favorite digital scrapbooking website www.howfasttheygrow.com will dontate $25 to "Army of Women." Just email them at help@howfasttheygrow.com with your link, and they will send you confirmation of their upcoming donation on your behalf.

Thanks for doing what you can to help find a cure for breast cancer!

Painting Pumpkins

Here's a little craft Ella did a few weeks ago. I bought these mini pumpkins and was planning to keep them on the table for decoration. Ella really loved them (she has a thing for anything mini). Anyway, I found her sneaking my pumpkins into her room.

So, I decided to let her paint a few...then she decided she wanted to paint all of them for her friends at school. How could I resist, so here are some pictures of her little project. They turned out to be pretty cute and we wrapped them in cellophane and tied them with a ribbon and she wrote each child's name on a label, so it was good practice for her with writing her letters. Maybe I'm more of a teacher than I thought :0!

The only bad thing was that I tried to remember all the kids from her class by memory (bad idea). We ended up forgetting one kid...how terrible is that! Ella didn't take any time letting me know we had forgotten Ryan...oops. I ended up running out that night and buying another pumpkin for him and we brought it to school the next day and of course he wasn't there...oh well!

Random Thoughts

So, I'm deviating a little bit from my regular posting of photos. Mainly because I don't want to download the recent ones I've taken and even if I did, I don't think they're blog-worthy. So, here's a little something I stole from my sister's blog http://www.troxells.blogspot.com/.

I AM…ME!
I WANT… to be better about exercising.
I HAVE…everything I need.
I KEEP... having to remind myself of the things that matter most in life...God and others!
I WISH I COULD…see my sister more often.
I HATE... the evil in our world.
I FEAR... something bad happening to my children.
I HEAR... silence (Isaac is sleeping and Ella's at school).
I DON’T THINK...nearly enough :).
I REGRET... losing touch with old friends.
I LOVE…my family.
I AM NOT... tall (even though people think I am...go figure...I guess it's the long torso)
I DANCE...with my daughter whenever I can.
I SING… to kid's music.
I NEVER... eat shellfish (I'm allergic)
I RARELY… watch movies (if I do I end up falling asleep).
I CRY WHEN I WATCH… sad movies.
I AM NOT ALWAYS... right (DUH!)
I HATE THAT... I'm indecisive.
I’M CONFUSED ABOUT… the economy.
I NEED... to clean up my house.
I SHOULD… be doing 20 other things other than writing this blog.