Halloween 2013

October means that it's donut time at Katie's school.

Dads and Donuts that is.

This time Katie was a much more gracious host.

Last time, she couldn't wait to be rid of us.

Here she is hanging with Dad, post-donut.

He ate a gigantic one.

I think they were all gigantic.

This year, Mikey and Katie were able to have treats too!

Nut-free scones were on hand.

Yay for nut-free!

Katie took us to her classroom for a peek in the window.  Her teacher was there and opened the door for us.  Katie was able to give us a tour of her classroom.

It made her really happy to share that with Dad and Mikey.

This is really the first recognizable "guy" Mikey's ever drawn.

Usually he has a huge story about what's happening in his drawings,

but no patience whatsoever to actually attempt drawing it.

It's usually a bunch of scribble punctuated by his excited description of what's happening.

Now that's trust.

We went to a Halloween party at one of our neighbors houses.

The kids weren't allowed to wear their costumes.  Instead, they had to make them when they got there.

They had a really good time getting creative with all the materials that were brought.

We had superheroes, warriors, ninjas (with duct tape on their arms), princesses, Jedi, and I can't remember what Katie and her friend were.....

Here's a close up.

Mikey was Thor.  He had some parental help with his costume which was just a hat.

The hat was such a success that he wore it again the next day.

The weekend before Halloween all of us were in varying stages of sickness.

Huzbend and I were both sick.

Mikey was being treated for pneumonia (antibiotics and albuterol puffies).

Katie was soon to follow with the albuterol puffies.

It was not a happy time.

Well, except for pumpkin carving and the fact that we did not end up at Children's Hospital.

YAY US!!!

This year the kids decided to do their own pumpkin face designs.

Here is Mikey's creation.

And here's Katie's creation.

At first she stated that this was her "cute" pumpkin.

I begged to differ, stating that it was actually the scariest pumpkin of the bunch.

It had a  definite scary clown vibe.

She then said that it was "The Joker" pumpkin.

BOO!

Halloween was finally here!

Mikey and his PreK class got to dress up in their costumes and practice safe trick or treating.

Meet Batman....

One of my friends took Mikey home after preschool so that I could run and help out at Katie's class party.

She was so excited.

It might have been because of the "Decorate Your Own Cupcake" station we had set up.

Here is her cupcake masterpiece.  She ate the WHOLE thing.

Katie's class didn't wear costumes at their party.

They had worked for about a week creating a costume based on a word that each kid selected.

Katie's word was .......

Each kid did a quick presentation of their chosen word.

They were so proud.

And then, school was over and it was time to.....

TRICK OR TREAT!!!!!!

Hey!  The Boy Wonder!

The kids collected SO much candy.  Wow.

It was impressive.

We got home and snapped a quick family picture before the candy gorging began.

The Fire Nation was not going to stop Katara from venturing out for even MORE candy.

It also helped that she had Appa to go with her.

Batman decided that he had enough of trick or treating.

He de-cowled.

The Dynamic Duo decided to chill at the mansion.

With his trusty side kick by his side, Bruce Wayne enjoyed his two tons of candy while watching Ninjago on the Surface.

End of September & Punkin Patch

Way back in September I hosted a neighborhood book club meeting at my house.

My book pick was 'The Watchmen'.

One of our guests brought these lovely cupcakes.

That is sheer awesomeness right there.

And proves that really, everyone is a geek on some level.

Katie wrote a book.

It's 50-something pages about a character she made up, Sara The Elf.

Sara is the same character that she portrayed in her summer camp play.

Here she is sharing her first novel with Mikey.

According to Katie, school is......okay.

I think if she could socialize and have recess all day, she'd be happy.

But, then they throw in all that learning.  UGH.

WHATEVER.

I think the thing she is most excited about is the science portion of her day.

Each kid in 2nd grade got their own caterpillar to study.

Katie's caterpillars name is Spikey.

She was very excited yesterday that Spikey went into the "J phase".

That means he was ready to get his chrysalis going.

Katie likes to sleep.  On weekends she frequently doesn't roll herself out of bed until 10am or later.  Sometimes it's approaching lunch time.

She even wrote on an "All About Me" project at school that in her free time she likes to sleep.

No lie.  She wrote that.

One morning I went into her room and found her like this.

Head stuffed into her pillow.

This was the result.

She is not a happy camper in the morning.

But, let her watch a show and get some food in her and

she's ready to go!

Especially if it's to the pumpkin patch!

Katie looks really old in this picture.

Where'd our little girl go?

Not to be out done by Big Sister, Mikey also got himself up on a tire.

What a ham.

OMG!  Is that a picture of me?

And a decent one at that?

Yeah.  Can't believe it myself.

The kids really liked the bouncy horses they had.

Everyone had to survey the land before we entered the no-corn maze.

There really wasn't any corn in the corn maze.

But, it was still fun just the same.

The kids had fun wandering as far from us as they could get.  Which wasn't an issue, 'cause we could see them no matter where they went.  Hurray for the no-corn maze.

Katie made a new friend in the maze.

Meet Fuzzy Wuzzy.

I love this one.

This is a mid-fall shot.

No Katies were hurt in the making of this photo.

See.  All good.

And then, it was TIME.

Time for PUMPKINS.

Mikey walked the ENTIRE field looking for his pumpkin.

The whole thing.

Not sure if he was being very selective or just having his own little adventure.

It took him forever to pick one.

Katie found one immediately.

Then fell in love with every other pumpkin in the field deeming them all, "Cute".

I love this picture because you can look in her eyes and see that she's thinking about something.

Maybe she's imagining that it's night.  All of the cute pumpkins have come to life and are having a dance off versus some fabulously accessorized zombies.  "Ghosts N Stuff" by deadmau5 is pumping.  The bass deep enough to vibrate your skeleton.  Strobes and stage lights are flaring.  Katie's rocking out behind the turn table; arm raised and pumping to the beat.  Her purple hair highlights are glowing in the black light and her awesomely evil hoop earrings are bouncing to the beat.

Or maybe she's thinking about what to carve into her pumpkin.

Here's the haul.

Mikey was selected to take home Wembly, the preschool bear this past weekend.

He was excited about it.

But, within 5 minutes of getting home, poor Wembly ended up like this.

Don't worry, he wasn't on the floor the whole time.

He accompanied the kids to get their flu shots.

He got lots of hugs.

"I don't wanna get a pokey."

In order to.....uh.....convince (yeah, that's the word) the kids to get their flu shots, I promised them fro-yo afterwards.

Again with the hamming.

Ham times two.

Katie might have been inspired by my attempt at creating her Halloween costume.

She decided to teach herself sewing.

Or maybe inspired isn't the right word.  

Maybe she saw what an absolute mess I'm making of it and decided someone around here should know how to sew.

Here is her first creation.

A hat!

Get to work!

Katie MADE HER OWN BREAKFAST this past weekend.

Toasted a waffle.  Put butter and syrup on it.  Poured herself some milk.

All without a disastrous mess.

Amazing.

Ha!  Fooled you.

Different caterpillar.

This one is named Mr. Cutie Pants.

Who Made Humans

We're about two minutes late leaving the house to get to preschool today and Mikey drops this on me......

Mikey: "Mommy?  Who made robots?"

Me: "Humans make robots."

Mikey: "But.  Mommy.  If humans make robots, who makes humans?"

Me, not quite paying attention in the rush to get out of the house: "Mommies and Daddies make babies."

Mikey: "I KNOW that.  How come you tell me that all the time?  I meant, who MADE humans?"

I stop what I'm doing.  I tell him about how babies are made all the time?  Hmm.  He kinda asks about that a lot.  Maybe I do.  But, what was that other thing?  Huh?  Who made humans?  

Who made HUMANS?  Now.  You ask that question NOW!?!?!?

So, I attempted to explain evolution to a 4 year old while rushing out the door to preschool.  He told me that he didn't get it.  Monkeys don't just turn into humans, he said.

I tried to elaborate in the truck on the way....but, that didn't quite work out.  The conversation worked it's way into dinosaurs and then back into robots.  Then it was completely lost when Mikey brought up WALL-E and how come he hadn't watched the whole movie yet.

It's TIME that's the problem.  He doesn't understand time.  I could say "a long, long, long, long, very long time ago" and that means, like, yesterday to him.

I promised him that when he got home from preschool I would show him some pictures that would help him understand (i.e. Lucy).  I'm just hoping that he's still interested.

On the way home, after dropping him off, I was pondering my explanation.  

Realizing the enormity of it all, I felt humbled.

We all came from somewhere.  We didn't start where we are now.  And our generations to come won't stay put.  They'll move too.

Life is amazing.

Okay.  Not my life.  The only spiciness in my life comes on taco night.