Happy Halloween!!

As most of you know, Max has been OBSESSED with Halloween stuff this year. So he loved that I made this card for him and sent it to our family. We love Halloween!!

Cooking Part II

So I thought I would revisit cooking with Max. This time was not as successful. He's just too distracted by other stuff AND hates to get his hands dirty. So it was kind of a disaster. I thought we could decorate Halloween cookies together. I made some sugar cookies and got out the frosting and decorations. Max started to decorate but kept getting so upset about his hands being dirty. It was driving me nuts and him nuts and eventually I just stopped the whole thing. Maybe next year... or Christmas time... we'll see...



But here are his results. Not bad for being a lot whiny about the whole thing!



And he enjoyed eating the cookies that didn't get decorated. Of course he wouldn't touch the ones that were. Oh well...

Trunk or Treat

Max and I had our first Trunk or Treating experience the week before Halloween. Trunk or Treating is a church activity that's actually a pretty great idea for kids that are too young to go trick or treating. Everyone parks their cars in the church parking lot and decorates their trunks with Halloween decorations and all the kids go around and collect candy. It was really fun! And Max just about had the time of his life.



He went around to every car and told everyone what a pirate says (Arrrrgh) and also sang the pirate song for them (yo ho yo ho a pirate's life for me). We didn't get many pictures because our camera ran out of batteries, but, I assure you, he was adorable and had a great time.

Waiting in line to play a game at the little pre-party.


Fishing for a prize.


Trunk or treating!

Swimming

We finally got a family membership for the local YMCA and one of the only things we've taken advantage of so far is the family swim time. Max LOVES going swimming with Tyler. He doesn't do much swimming though, mostly makes Tyler hold him and walk up and down. But, he does enjoy jumping off the stairs into Tyler's arms. It's pretty cute. He's a high energy kid, but he's very careful about what he does. He's very contemplative, not dare-devilish. Anyway, he loves the pool and I'm excited to get him involved in some of the classes they have for his age (once I'm done being pregnant).



The only negative thing about the pool is that it is outside, they don't have an indoor one. So Max will swim for a little while and then run over to me and say he's "soooo chilly" and I wrap him up and we take him home. It'll be great for next summer though, when it gets hot again.

Favorite Games

One of Max's favorite games is to play "night night" in our bed. This game drives me crazy because I hate it when our bed isn't made or is messy. But I relent and let him do it because he gets such a kick out of it. He throws all the pillows off, crawls under the covers and pretends to sleep. Then we have to go in and try to wake him up and he cracks up laughing, runs away and we chase him and he runs back in and it starts all over again.



Max has also been really into his teddy bear lately. One morning I went in to get him up and there was a teddy bear in his crib with him. "He slept with me!! He's my buddy!!" Max beamed. He has never had any toys in his crib with him and the only thing he sleeps with is his "wrappie" (his blue blanket). But, the teddy bear seemed harmless, so he sleeps with that now, too. But teddy bear doesn't just sleep. He also needs to eat, go potty, he gets sad and cries and needs to be wrapped up and put to bed, etc, etc, you get the picture. Last night teddy bear was eating blocks and playing and then he got sad and then he was having a grand old time.

Max also likes to be chased. Incessantly. He makes Tyler hide and then he goes to find him and then chases him and makes Tyler chase back. He loves it.

He also likes to name the presidents on all the coins. Starting with the penny and right on up to the quarter. He knows all of them. I have to get a video of this to show you, it's funny.

Anyway, this kid is so dynamic. He constantly keeps us guessing and going. We sure do love him!

Can someone please tell us...

why our baby looks like this? You know what I mean.

Lots of New Posts

Just scroll down... way down... or don't.

Don't Fall Asleep on the Couch

Alternate Title #1: Sleep With One Eye Open
Alternate Title #2: Do Not Keep Scissors In The House

Think of this blog post as a public service announcement. I type this and share this so you may all learn from my great tragedy.

My crime: I fell asleep. On the couch. While Max was awake.

The story: I did not sleep well last night. I had some craaazy dreams that kept me tossing and turning (ah the joys of pregnancy). So when Max got up this morning I made him his waffle, got him his milk, turned on PBS and laid down on the couch to rest. Well, I dozed off. The next thing I knew, I felt a tugging on my hair. My sleep induced thought process was along the lines of Max bugging me to get up and me pretending to not notice. Then, I heard a sound that cut through the dry air like scissors through hair. Only, that's EXACTLY what it was. At first I didn't recognize the sound. And being as sleep deprived as I was, I didn't quickly put two and two together. I propped myself up on my elbow and looked toward where Max was standing. There he was, with a giant pair of scissors in his hands. Confused and concerened I sat up more and noticed a giant chunk of brown hair laying on the couch. Why was my hair no longer attached to my head? Why did Max have scissors? Where the heck was I? What time is it? WHY IS MY HAIR LAYING BY ITSELF ON THE COUCH?? WHY DOES MAX HAVE SCISSORS????

And that's when I realized the unimaginable had happened. Max had cut my hair. A lot of it. Right from the side of my head. As the horror enveloped my like a smelly blanket I ran over to the bathroom mirror and saw the aftermath. Oh yes my friends, Max did a grand old job of chopping a fistful of hair right off the side of my head a little under my chin.

My next move? Well, I wanted to cry uncontrollably and give the kid a spanking. But all he did was stand there looking kind of shocked saying, "Momma's hair" and pointing at the pile on the couch. I didn't yell. I didn't say anything. I slowly walked to my computer and frantically messaged Mariah. In full freak out mode, she came right over to fix the carnage. She is a miracle worker.

But now I have short hair, something that I know is a big NO-NO when you are pregnant. Especially when you are pregnant like me with the huge round fat face and double chins. Mariah of course did a fabulous job. And I am forever in her debt. But seriously people, I'm going to be in mourning for a while. And you best believe that we're getting rid of all the scissors in our house.

The moral: Beware mothers out there who think dozing on the couch is perfectly safe. I don't know if I'll ever be able to sleep again. I hope that nothing like this ever happens to any of you. And don't assume just because your kid has never touched a pair of scissors it means they don't know how to use them. Because they probably do. And they will probably cut something with them. Something bad. And probably try to ruin your life -- as mine has done.

Pinewood Derby

A few weeks ago Tyler signed us up to participate in the pinewood derby at church. I had never done a pinewood derby before, but I sure did have fun coming up with an idea and making the car. I wanted it to be unique so this is what we came up with:



A surfer and a wave. Unfortunately, our car didn't even make it to the end of the track. I don't think it was heavy enough. But Max loves the car and had a blast racing it. He wanted to race it over and over again but there were so many cars that he got a little upset when his only got to go down once.

I guess we'll have to build him his own, and by "we" I mean Tyler.

Very Pregnant Me

I'm feeling this pregnancy now. I'm 34 weeks now and seriously getting huge. Everything has really been going great so far. Besides the regular aches and pains we've only had one little scare. I went to my appointment and was told I was VERY anemic. (If numbers mean anything to you I apparently went from a 12 to a 7). Anyway, I had to be on bed rest for 2 days and pound as much iron rich food as possible and take a liquid supplement that tastes HORRIBLE. I did get it back up from a 7 to a 9 in two days which was REALLY good because if I hadn't done that I would have had to have a blood transfusion.

Anyway, here's the one and only picture of me that you will see of my tummy. It's huge. It's scary. Don't scream.



Something else I learned recently about my last pregnancy has led us to decide to do a scheduled c-section with this one. There's more to add to Max's birth story than I had known. My records from Kaiser were finally sent over to my new OB's office and my midwife filled me on a few details I had been missing. Apparently my heart rate had dropped so low during labor and pushing that at any point during the whole ordeal I could have gone into cardiac arrest. She told me that she is shocked they let me labor and push for as long as they did. She also said that he never even got low enough for me to start pushing leading her to believe my pelvis is slightly tilted so as not to allow a baby through. She told me my success rate for this second birth because of my histroy would be about 10% for a normal birth. Hence, the c-section. SO, our little girl will probably make her arrival on either November 20th or 21st. We haven't scheduled it yet, but those are the dates they want us to think about. I'm relieved and a little scared about the whole thing. But It has to be better than the last time.

Anyway, that's my update. Everything is normal and progressing well. She's measureing a little small, but no one is concerned, seeing as how we are all small in this family. We just can't wait until she comes! I'm finally getting excited and anxious to meet her!

Julian Apple Picking

So it's no quaint New England orchard but we had sooo much fun picking apples in Julian at Raven Hill Orchards. The weather was perfect, nice and cool, and the apples were delicious. We went with the Bakers and the kids had a blast picking and tasting all the apples. Max would pick one apple, take a bite and toss it, pick another apple, take a bite and toss it. He did that about a hundred times and loved every second of it. He ran up and down the aisles with Sienna and Chloe.



Raven Hill was a great orchard. I totally recommend it. It's all organic and this really cool Irish guy runs the place.







After picking we went to the center of Julian to get some Mom's apple pie and soup. It was sooooo good. We really did have a great time and are totally adding this to our annual fall family outings.





Isn't this the cutest little couple you've ever seen?

Silly Max Boy Update

Our Max is seriously adorable. I know we're biased, because we're his parents. But my goodness this kid says the funniest things now. He's the biggest parrot ever. He will repeat anything he hears. And he talks so clearly. Here are some funny things he's said in the past few weeks. And I know I have to be better about writing this stuff down because it's hilarious.



{Funny #1}
My cell phone rings.
Max: Who is that? Who IS that? (in a very demanding tone)

{Funny #2}
In line at the grocery store, Max says to me...
Max: Come here. I need to give you a hug.
And gives me a big hug. I think I say this to him a lot.

{Funny #3}
He caught me eating a hard candy and saw the wrapper.
Max: What's that?
Me: (Trying to think quickly to distract him) That's my medicine.
Max: (Looking me straight in the eye) No mama. That's candy. I want to try some.

Also, He'll pretend to yell at his stuffed animals like I yell at him. He'll say "NO, TIME OUT" and put them in time out. Kind of sad, but still funny.

He's just become so vocal and we are loving it.

One thing we've been struggling with though is bath time. For some reason he's been hating his bath for about the last month or two. It has been a part of his night time routine since he was able to take a bath. We introduced the potty. He goes on the potty every night before his bath. He LOVES the potty. But he won't get off. He refuses to get off and get in the bath. So we have to pick him up and put him and and he starts to freak out. He's very afraid to pee in the bath now. He used to love to do it. Now he cries and cries about it. It's actually pretty sad to watch. But we aren't sure what to do. I made him a little Fimo clay surfer boy and it's actually helped. He gets distracted by the boy enough to calm down in the bath. But we're still struggling and not sure what to do. We're hoping it's a phase and he'll just eventually get over it, so we're sticking with it.

We also cleared up Max's allergy question. He's not allergic to anything. We went to a very very long appointment at an allergist where he was poked in the back with little prongy things and given 9 different needles in his arms. He also had some oral doses of stuff, too. Conclusion -- the freaky rash was just a freaky rash. No allergies.

Max is growing and thriving wonderfully. Well, he's thriving. Growing is a little slow over here. I'm having a hard time finding pants that will stay up on him. He has no bottom or hips to hold them up and they just slide right off. I'm starting to think I should stuff his diaper or something. Anyway, we're all good over here. We are all waiting patiently for the arrival of our little girl (well Max and Tyler are -- me, not so much) and having a grand old time while we're doing it.

Annual Bates Nut Farm Trip

We picked the perfect weekend to go back to Bates Nut Farm and play in their huge pumpkin patch. The weather was nice and cool and overcast (something quite rare in October in San Diego). We had such a fun time. Max just about lost his little mind. He's soooo obsessed with Halloween right now. Each and every store we go to has to involve finding, checking out and poking all possible Halloween stuff, including the candy. He loves all the scary spooky stuff that make make noises and talk and he's not scared by any of it. He's watched "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown" about 127,000 times. He wants to be a pirate for Halloween (and will be a very cute one thanks to Tira's wonderful sewing skills). He just seriously loves Halloween, which is fine with me because I do too!







Anyway, Bates Nut Farm was great. We spent the morning picking out our pumpkins and letting Max run around. We checked out the chickens and turkeys and sheep. And we even indulged Max in a little bag of popcorn that he devoured.





It's nice to know I can find a little piece of New England even all the way over here. We are definitely making this an annual trip!







And don't we all look cute as fat farmers?

Little Ladies

I finally made some of these and sent them off to Mattie. Aren't they adorable?? I had a fun time making them, too. And apparently Mattie loves them. I even made another set for her little friend Alyssa. So fun!

Cookin'

I finally let Max help me cook something. It's not that I never wanted him to. I was kind of waiting for a rainy day to break out the baking supplies with him. But waiting for rain in San Diego is like waiting for nothing to spontaneously sprout nothing. So, we made some baked apples together and he loved it!!



Next on the list are some Halloween cookies that he can decorate. That's kicking it up a notch.