Halloween 2013

These first two photos are not actually of Halloween but they fit under the general Halloween-y theme of, ummm, posing or disguise or props or something.

A. watching Big Comfy Couch with Bob the Builder and "Pilot" (a Playmobil figure). I believe he has chocolate on his face.

D. pretending to be a detective.

Last night (the night before Halloween) we decorated some giant pumpkin cookies and went to a Halloween Carnival at the elementary school. 

And without further ado, here are their Halloween 2013 costumes!

As is immediately obvious, one of these costumes was a lot more work than the other! We are inordinately proud of this Wonder Woman look as we've never put so much effort into a costume. It is a creative mix of materials from two different thrift stores and a craft supply place. Plus, we managed to winterize (fall-ize?) the standard superhero bathing suit that Wonder Woman usually wears without compromising on style and recognizability. We googled "Wonder Woman kids costume" for inspiration and now D. really wants to put her own photo up on the internet to inspire others. Paying it forward, people, paying it forward. 

A. was a pumpkin for two reasons. First of all, he has really been enjoying pumpkins this fall. Whenever he sees one, he points it out and says, "punkin!" Second, I wasn't sure he would want to wear a more elaborate costume-y costume, so we sent with something simple and comfy. The hood has a little stem on top, which you can't see in the picture. 

We went trick-or-treating with some friends at about 10 houses. I thought we'd be out way longer but D. got cold and wanted to go home to eat some treat. A. would've kept going for sure. After every house he would say, "More punkin! More Halloween! More bonbon!" I was glad that we got home early enough to give out some treat to a few trick-or-treaters at our front door.

Here they are assessing their treat. They ate a bunch before bed. 

 Good times!

Trouble, Yah!

How 'bout an anecdote about each of them before I hit the hay on this late Sunday evening of my birthday (35!)?

• Little A. has always nodded 'yes' or shaken his head 'no' in response to questions. But just over the last few weeks, he has started saying 'yah' instead of nodding. It's not a 'yes'; it's clearly an emphatic, often drawn-out 'yaaahh!' in any kind of situation. For example: "Are you hungry for some cereal?" "Yah!" "What kind of cereal do you want to have?" "Ay-ah-Eeets!" "Mini Wheats?" "Yah!" (Okay, there's just no way that a written description can capture the cuteness of this 'yah'... but you can perhaps imagine a percentage of the cuteness.)

• Apparently in D.'s kindergarten class, kids can get sent back to their desks if they are misbehaving on the carpet. Recently, she admitted (laughingly, sheepishly) that this once happened to her! One of her friends has "fluffy" socks (tube socks, I imagine) and he pulls elastic strings out of the socks to play with, even going so far as to (if I understood correctly) put the elastic string in his teeth. Flossing, I suppose? Anyhow, D was somehow involved in the elastic extraction or she was playing with said elastic and they both got sent to their chairs. She seems jealous of the tube socks because she can't manage to extract elastics from her own socks.

The Bulk of October

Holy moly, time flies! Before I just logged on here, I never would've guessed that my last post was from as long ago as October 1.

Speaking of that Sickies post, about a week after A's throat infection, D had an ear infection! This was actually her first ear infection ever. So we were Antibiotic City for a while there. Thankfully, all four of us are now patients of a doctor + nurse-practitioner team here in town. Access to medical services is much easier than it was in the big city. Case in point: last week it seemed like A had some kind of infection on his penis (likely caused by his antibiotics). I called the practice when it opened at 9am and got an appointment for him for 1:30pm. (We kept saying, "oh, his poor little peeny!" which made D laugh hysterically.)

As I also mentioned in the previous post, we had a lovely visit with my in-laws. One memorable moment: the kids both really got immersed in playing "restaurant" with Grandmaman and Grandpapa using their pretend food. So cute.

Then my parents and my brother visited over Thanksgiving. Our big family meal was at my relative's farm so the kids got to see baby kittens and cows and tractors. AND they both got a pony ride! I was impressed that they both had the nerve to do it.

A final bit of catch-up news: A has started going to daycare 3 days a week. It was tough at first because 1. it was new and 2. he started when he was still recovering from the throat infection. Now - only a couple weeks later - he seems to really like it! They have a huge backyard with play structures and toys; he calls it "big garderie park."

Sickies

So many people seem to have horrid colds these days, including - unfortunately - little A. He's been stuffed up for over a week now. A trip to the doctor on Sunday resulted in antibiotics, so he is now on the mend. (I'm reminded of the Strep Throat Nightmare of July 2013, when D was actually hospitalized (hospitalized!) to receive IV antibiotics, steroids and fluids. I shudder at the memory. Thankfully, A didn't even come close to that extreme situation.)

Here are some happy photos, taken just yesterday. He looks so much more chipper than he did the day before. He went to an orchard with his papa and grandparents, who are visiting us! He really likes pumpkins. He points them out and likes to go over to sit or lean on them.