Monday, November 8, 2010

18 months


Whew. She's a year and a half. How'd that happen?

Check-up today...not quite 19 pounds. Off the chart low, but her height is in the 25% and both are following their curve, so all good according to the dr. Glad we've finally found someone we're fairly comfortable with.

Off to K'zoo this weekend...

Sunday, October 31, 2010

Happy Halloweeeeeeen!!!





The pumpkin is fast asleep...and hoping the princess is as well!!


We had a great day, starting with French Laundry for Mike's birthday breakfast, mmmm.


Girls were super cute tonight. Penny's pumpkin costume rocked. Perfect pumpkin; we got lots of comments. Jane was super sweet Cinderella, and was oh so pretty!

Penny got the hang of trick-o-treating pretty quickly, she was starting to grab for stuff from the bowls by the end of the night. We were out for about an hour, and Jane discovered that it's hard work being a princess...wearing fancy new shoes and lugging a HEAVY pumpkin around! Mike kept unloading Penny's into his jacket so she could still carry it.

Our pumpkins greeted us at the end of the drive when we got home, kind of fun, might be a new tradition!

Candy everywhere in the living room afterward. Let Jane have a bit of a free-for-all tonight...then she lay down and stuck her belly out, uh, utoh! Hoping it's more the breadsticks from dinner and not the candy! :)


Happy Halloween!!!


55 days to Christmas!!!

Saturday, October 30, 2010

Pumpkin Goo!


Today was supposed to be warmer..I guess by the time we
were done, the sun was out and it was nicer, but...we ended
up carving in the house this year. Just seemed a bit too cold to be digging in pumpkin seeds.



Penny had a blast with pulling off the tops, and spooning seeds---back INTO the pumpkins. Heehee. Jane helped clean out Mike's pumpkin as well--had to go up to her shoulders to get in there! She said she wants a BIG one next year.

Jane drew a fantastic face on hers...complete with ears, legs, arms, earrings, boo boos, a nose, eyes, eyelashes, and who knows what else. OH--and a crown, of course! I managed to cut some eyes, nose and mouth of out it. Yeah, I need some fancy pumpkin carving tools to attempt that, not a big knife. You can kind of see all the marker lines on it to see what I had to work with!

Mine is the round happy one with teeth. Penny's is the weird bumpy grumpy one (although, I keep saying that should be Jane-who seems grumpy a LOT lately!), Jane's is the one next to it with the jagged teeth, and Mike's is the remaining one with the goofy grin. So fun. Our pumpkin family! I love pumpkins. I love this time of year. I love sharing it with the girls. It's messy, and there was a lot of 'sit down, Mommy has a BIG knife' commentary, but it was fun. And super fun to light them tonight, both girls thought that was pretty fun in the dark!

Ron came up to take us to dinner for Mike's birthday. Crazy chaos at dinner as usual, but yummy Lucky's steakhouse. Looking forward to tomorrow's fun!

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Library fun...



Today was Jane's library storytime day, and they got to wear their costumes. I need to do her hair a little better next time, but it was our first run! Princesses everywhere!

Penny is probably the worlds cutest pumpkin. Seriously.

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Goin' batty!

Been making bat cookies with our Halloween cooky (yeah, it's an OLD set) cutter set. Cute stuff, and Jane brought home a cute bat hat today as well!

Penny was super cute yesterday in her Gram Sandee outfit-fall fantastic. I finally reset some more snaps on it, so it fits a little tighter. I think she can wear it next year too, lots of room. But--I think she has grown a little-the bloomers are a little harder to see peeking out than they were a few months ago!

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Boo at the Zoo!!!!

We met up with Mindy's fam at Binder Park Zoo for their Zoo Boo. Kids had a great time...not sure how many animals we saw, but they got to trick-o-treat! Which I'm sure Jane will remember next time we go to a zoo...hey, where's the candy??? Yeah.







Jane and Bruce got along great, Jane dragging him along places. Penny rode a bunch in the backpack, and walked a little towards the end. I'd take her out more, but once she's out, she's not as excited about getting back in! She did hold her bag for the trick-o-treating which was super cute, and makes me excited to see her with her plastic pumpkin next weekend!

Nolan is a serious cutie! He was just chillin and smiling for most of the afternoon.

We went on a carousel ride, which we've done before with Jane, but she was super freaked out, clutching my hand the entire time. She later told me that the one at the mall by Gram Sandee has seatbelts, and this one did NOT. They are kind of big animals for little kids!

Next, we went on a hayride. It was longer than I expected, and it was all through the woods and super pretty fall colors. We found the reptile house after that. I'm not saying I want a boa constrictor around, but I like these better than little snakes in my HOUSE. I think. Still creepy though, they were HUGE. We tried to wait for a balloon animal for the kids...massive fail. Not a good system. Make kids and parents wait in a long line for one clown lady, then after you've been waiting for 15 minutes + announce that they will probably be taking a break soon. And that you can stay and watch a 15 minute show and then get back in line. We dragged the big ones away with the lure of popcorn. Kind of sucked, but a hour for a balloon animal that will probably be destroyed in 5 minutes or less? Nuntuh.

Hotdog factory for dinner. Dinner of champions...but it was on the way out, and I knew Penny was going to crash if we drove very far, and we wanted to save that for the trip home!

Great day with the Benzlers, and another beautiful fall afternoon.

Friday, October 22, 2010

Roofin' and walkin'



Off to K'zoo. Mike is helping Dad get a new roof on his barn. Figure with two of them, it's a simple thing to get done in a little over a day. They got most of it knocked out today, which was good because it was beautiful weather wise!

The girls (me, mom, Jane, & Penny) headed over to G&G Carlson's new condo. We ended up getting some middle eastern food (fatosh and hummus) and taking it to them, mmmm!

They live right off the kal-haven trail, which is super awesome. We came prepared to take a little walk, and G&G came along, which was great. Grandpa has long legs and was giving us all a run for our money. He told me it's much easier to walk fast than slow. Hmmm. It was super pretty with the fall colors along the trail.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Good clean fun!


We're making soap for Jane's library pre-school storytime group. They get to give little treats to each other next week, so we're opting for a sugar free one! Yes. I am that Mom.

Put some little bugs into them, creeeepy. Jane, of course, LOVES her blue snake. I'm sure it has nothing to do with how creeped out her Mommy is about real snakes. She keeps walking around the house saying, " Eeeeek, Mommy! A SNAKE!!!" Yeah. Really funny honey. You're hilarious. Really really funny.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Snakes alive!


Rough couple of days around here. Yesterday...a little gardner snake on top of the dirty sheets on the floor in front of the washing machine. Eww, ick, and ugh. I managed to get it into a clear tote and outside...since it was like 10 am. It's either buck up and deal with it, or leave it...to wander away somewhere into the basement...which would pretty much mean I could never go back down there.

Then, today we get back from library to see this guy outside the front door. Are you kidding me??? 2 snakes in 2 days? I'll pass. It's not necessary or acceptable. I end up poking it with a big stick...and it doesn't move. It's dead. Which is good...but seriously, why by my front door and not out in the woods?

No more snakes, I've had my share for the next 2 years.

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Projects, Pumpkins, and Preparing for winter.

Got some projects going...time is flying!



Took some Halloween pics with our pumpkins, another beautiful day today. I could really get used to this kind of awesome fall weather! Looks like another fairly nice week ahead as well. Yah.

Mike's going strong on the woodpile; he's hoping to not have to run outside in the snow and split wood this winter. Our trees have dropped a TON of leaves over the last couple of days, too. Looks pretty til you think about how much work it is to get them off the lawn. Whew.

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Pumpkin time!

Penny is getting older, and we're having our share of sibling disagreements. BUT--we're also getting lots and lots of love. These two really make me get a little sappy sometimes. They love each other so much, and they are both so young; I love that they already have this bond. I read somewhere that one of the best things for girls (now and when they're adults) is to grow up with a sister. Penny just started hugging Jane this morning, so sweet!!


Next to Christmas, I think Halloween is probably my fav. Just such fun colors and fun things to do, and really, it lasts for way more than just one day! Jane has been missing her cousin Averie, so we convinced Aunt Jenny to bring the girls and Grandpa Ron for a visit today. Such a perfect day for picking pumpkins, hee hee. Girls were running all over the place. There was a creepy clown that sang a song and it's head came 'off'; girls thought that was pretty fun, even though us adults were a little weirded out with our 4 and under crowd watching it. They probably would have kept hitting the button for it to go again for another hour if we would have let them. Sheer morbid fascination. We went to Dietrichs as it is our little family tradition, and there were a ton more pumpkins this year. (I think we waited too long last year!) Got a bumpy one for Penny, Jane picked out a cute little one for herself, and Mike and I got some with cool stems.

Jenny got some good ones for her fam, and we had to get two wagons to tote them all around in. The big ones are HEAVY. Penny took care of dragging one wagon for us, thank goodness.

Two babies without naps, and I saw a bus admist the crazyness at Spicers, so we headed home. Big girls played outside, and had a relaxing (hahaha-4 kids) and nice dinner. Good to have some cousin time, we wish we all lived much closer.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Acorns...


Thought we'd get a little air this afternoon, so walked out to get the mail. Girls wanted to carry a basket, and we filled it with some acorns. I love acorns, so cute with their little hats! I think we need two baskets next time. Would probably have made my life a little easier.

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Nerd Love!!


Okay, this child will probably never be a nerd...she's too cute and too social already.

However, I could NOT resist this shirt ('I Love Nerds') at Target...and it's a Paul Frank, so now we can get published in Dwell magazine, too. Haha.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Grist mill


Thought we'd go a bit further than Spicers today and get over to Parshallville's grist mill. I wanted some pretty fall pictures, and I love it over there. Lake is right across the street, and the trees are full of color now. They reflect on the water, and it is oh so beautiful!

Little bit of a chill in the air now, but pretty clear morning. Got some cider and donuts and walked around a little bit. Nice to have some family time, Mike is doing double-time around here in all his free moments. Working his way through wood prep for winter, and keeping up with everything else as well.

Friday, October 8, 2010

17 months!

Almost a year and half???
My baby is much less of a baby everyday... Wonderful Indian Summer day, we headed out late afternoon to give Daddy some space when he got home. Ended up at the outlet mall since the kids store I was aiming for was closed. :( After a rather frantic (on Jane's part) search for one more quarter in the car, the girls got a carousel ride for being such good shoppers. And Mommy got her 17 month shot! I can't believe how nice and warm it was, even by 6 pm.

Jane is coming out of her cold, but it finally hit Mike. Hopefully he's feeling better by tomorrow, lots to get done around here. No rest for the parents.

Girls and I will try to find something to do; probably outdoors. It's going to be chilly and snowing before we know it.

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Preschool!


First day of pre-school for this year. Jane has my cold, but she was a trooper and made it through. Just a short day to get introduced to the routines and new kids and new teachers. She was pretty excited to see a couple of girlfriends from last year. Small group this year so far, but hoping to get a few late registrations.

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Weekend...






Weekend morning post breakfast cuddles. Too cute.






Wildlife galore around here...this guy was hanging around all day!