Happy Halloween!

We had a fun filled day yesterday, so I had to split it into 2 posts (3 if you count the one from Gymboree that I posted yesterday afternoon!)


When Chip got home we got to carve our pumpkins!! I always look forward to this and I am usually the only one. It was not a tradition at Chip's house when he was growing up, so he humors me, but still thinks I am crazy. :) I figured I would end up carving my pumpkin by myself while Chip entertained Lily. But Lily actually had fun and Chip had fun watching Lily having fun and it ended up being the perfect pumpkin carving evening! I was so happy! It was a great way to end a exhausting, yet fun, day!


Since I wasn't about to give Lily a knife (or even one of those kid friendly pumpkin carvers), I grabbed some Halloween stickers from the craft table at the MOMS Club Halloween party earlier yesterday. As soon as I saw them I knew they would be perfect for Lily to decorate her little pumpkin that she got at the pumpkin patch. I had the idea to give her stickers for some time now, but never got around to buying any. I figured they would be better than markers or paint -- she would make too big of a mess.

Here she is putting her stickers on. Since she knows (and is obsessed) with body parts, particularly eyes, nose and mouth, she had no problem putting the stickers in the right place. Although she did get a little help from us.

Yeah! She is giving herself a round of applause for a job well done!

They were puffy foam stickers which worked great! The ghost made a perfect nose, the cats were great eyes, and we used a bat for a mouth!! Fun and festive!

Then we got to do the big pumpkin! I was surprised at how anxious she was to touch the pumpkin guts. But she did kinda squirm when she got it on her hand.

Touching the seeds.

Brave girl reaching in

Helping Mommy clean out the pumpkin!

She really like using the little scraper.

I told her to smile and this is the crazy adorable face I got!

Posing with our jack-o-lanterns!

I've never used the timer on my camera before (can you believe that??) but it worked so well! Lily loved the flashing light and the beeping! She kept wanting to do it again and again and she looked at the camera every time!! I think we'll definitely be taking more pictures with the timer soon! :)

My favorite part -- the pumpkin seeds, all ready for roasting!

Lily had so much fun that she has been asking me all morning if she can sit down with the pumpkins again! I'm not sure if it was the carving of the pumpkins she enjoyed, or being able to sit up on the counter --- either way, I can't wait to do it again next year!

Halloween Party #4!

Yesterday afternoon we had the MOMS Club Halloween party at a near by park/nature reserve. It was a really cool park with hiking trails and fun playground equipment that Lily loved. The best part is that it is only a mile away. Not only is this club good for meeting people, but it is helping me to discover places in our community I might never have found on my own! I had to wake Lily from her nap and I hate doing that - she is so cute though and all confused when I come in to wake her. It hardly ever happens (if I can help it) -- I believe in never waking a sleeping baby/toddler!! :) I was hoping in her groggy state that she would let me put pig tails in her hair, but nope, she still was not having it! I had to bribe her by letting her sit on the counter in order to get her hair done. Hey, it worked!!

All ready to go!

It was a perfect afternoon. Mid 70s, with a nice breeze.

When we first arrived, all the kids were playing at the playground and waiting for everyone to arrive to start the festivities!

Lily watched the other kids on the swings for a long time and then finally decided she wanted to swing also!

But she just sat there and watched everyone from the swing -- if I actually tried to swing her, she screamed. But, hey, at least she got up in the swing!

She climbed right up the stairs by herself -- normally she requires that I am within 12 inches of her at all times, but she went up without me! I was a little nervous because she is still kinda wobbly in the boots, but she had no problem!

We tried to line all the kids up to take a picture, but it didn't work too well. Melissa took this one and it is the best I've seen, but there are still a few kids missing (Lily and I are on the far left)

They had set up a little scavenger hunt along the trails. Michelle (from Downey!) would read clues like 'skip 6 times to find the next treat', and then there would be a bowl of candy or a little toy for all the kids sitting off to the side of the trail. It was cute! Lily followed close behind and got all the treats! I was afraid I'd have to carry her the whole way, but she did not ask me to pick her up once!

See how pretty the trails are?

Coming back with all her loot!

Lily had fun with the little ball toss game

Although, she played the easy way! :)

Lily getting ready to go down the big slide all by herself!! It was a really slippery slide, so I had to hold her hand as she went down or else she would fall back and hit her head. But I was so proud of her! Normally we slide together -- but she took this big one on all on her own!

Going back for another ride on the slide!

Slide, here I come!

She would sit like 2 feet away and scoot up to the slide.

On her way up again! We were nearly the last to leave the park. She did not want to stop playing -- she climbed up and rode down the slide at least a dozen times!

Party's over. Time to go home!

We had a lot of fun at this Halloween party! And after 4 shin-digs, her costume is in desperate need of a trip to the dry cleaners!! I don't think we're going to trick-or-treat tonight -- she is still a little young and this is the first time ever that I have a home where I'll get trick-or-treaters, so I am all excited to pass out candy!! I did get one trick-or-treater when we lived in Fullerton, a little Asian Jedi! I'll never forget him! :)

Gymboree Halloween

Today at Gymboree they had a little Halloween Party -- which was basically a normal day at Gymboree, except the kids wore costumes and they incorporated pumpkins into the activities. Surprisingly there were not a lot of people there today; but all the kids that were there looked so cute in their costumes. We took a class picture and Miss Julia said she would e-mail me a copy, so I will post that as soon as I get it!! Lily was super excited as usual to go to class, but she refused to let me put her hair in pig tails this morning. I was so bummed. I even brought the rubber bands and ribbons in the car, hoping she would let me do it when we got there or maybe I could get it done while she was strapped into her car seat. No such luck! We have the MOMS Club party this afternoon, so I am hoping she'll let me put them in for that! She looks so cute with her pigtails!!

Here are some pictures I took this morning. She did really well again today in class and enjoys the group participation more than the free play now -- totally opposite of when we first started!!

One more party to go! It seems like Halloween was weeks ago already since we've been dressing up so much!

Daisy Duck

Lily's new favorite show is Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. She wants to watch it so often that I actually find myself missing and longing to watch Elmo! "Me Mouse" is what she calls Mickey. So she got all excited when she dug out these toys that we had bought at Disneyland a year ago. She started naming off all the characters to me and then she realized there was no Daisy Duck. So she asked me, "Where duck go?" and started to look through all her other toys. I told her that I we didn't have a Daisy Duck -- for some reason she did not come with the set (poor Donald). As Lily took this in, I could almost literally see the cartoon light bulb go on over her head. She got up and went to the bins of toys and dug out a little orange rubber ducky and added it to the group and said "there duck." She was so proud of herself and I was pretty proud of her too! So now the whole gang is complete . . .

Hello Old Friends . . .

Lily has been fussy and off lately and I am pretty sure it is because of teething -- 2 year molars maybe? She has been chewing on her hand and her sippy cup constantly. So the other night I figured I should probably go and find her old teethers. I had wrapped them up and put them with some baby stuff. Luckily I was smart enough not to pack them with the baby stuff for storage that is in boxes out in the garage! She was all excited to see them and could hardly wait for me to wash them. I gave her one to try and she knew exactly what to do with it. She chewed on it for about 8 seconds and handed it back to me and said "another". So I gave her another one and she did the exact same thing, over and over until we had gone through all the teethers that I had. Apparently after testing them all out, none were as good as her hand and sippy cup. But it was fun to see them all again. It seems like SO long ago that she was a baby and we brought Buzz (the Bee teether) with us everywhere!

Playgroup at the Park

This morning we had our neighborhood playgroup at the park. It was another chilly morning -- 48 degrees, same as yesterday but without the wind which made a huge difference!! Chip was supposed to take the day off work yesterday, but ended up going in "real quick" and was there all day and went back to close up again at night. Since he had a Dr appt this afternoon, he decided to take today off instead (although he has already ran into work once today!). So I made him come with us to playgroup at the park since he has never seen Lily actually play on the playground equipment. I also thought it would be nice for Lily and Daddy to play and I could actually chat with the other moms instead of having to follow Lily around. Of course she would only play with Daddy if I was nearby -- so I stayed close and took pictures!

I think the hands in the air help her balance

Giving Daddy kisses through the bars

I had to post this picture because I am not sure what they are looking at, but they have the exact same expression on their faces!

Pumpkin Patch

Chip took the morning off work so we could go up to the Big Orange Pumpkin Patch up in Celina. My MOMS club went at the beginning of the month, but Lily and I wanted to wait for Daddy to come with us. It is a nice pumpkin farm, you could tell that the pumpkins were grown right there on the vine and if we would have visited earlier in the month we probably would have been able to pick our pumpkin of the vine -- but now they were all picked over and there were not too many pumpkins left. But it was still great -- they had cows and goats to feed and pet and my favorite, a hay ride!! I don't think I have ever been on a hay ride before!! So I was loving that. Chip was pretty miserable the whole time because it was too cold for him. :) Yesterday it was 80 degrees here and today it is only supposed to be 60! But we knew there was a cold front coming and tried to dress accordingly, but it was still pretty dang cold -- I think it was 45 degrees when we left the house and probably only in the low 50's at the farm; plus it was windy which really made it feel colder! It was a good thing that I got picture of Lily in her Halloween t-shirt last week at Gymboree, because today she had to have her coat all buttoned up for warmth!

Trying to get her to pose with me . . . she has not been into the pictures lately! :)

Feeding the cows! I felt so brave and was trying really hard not to appear scared in front of Lily, because in all honesty I was a little freaked out when I fed him the first piece, but after that it was all good. Adult longhorns have 32 teeth! (I learned that today)

Lily wasn't afraid of them at all. It was a lot less crowded than last week at the fair and I think that made a huge difference. She even Moo'ed at the cows!

The hay ride!

Lily was kinda fussy getting on to the hay ride, but at the end she actually smiled and said "fun!"

Checking out the farm -- there were barns and a pond. Lily was pointing everything out to me.

Feeding more cows!

Feeding the goats. They stuck their heads all the way out and got super close to Lily. I thought she'd scream, but she didn't seem to mind at all!

Lily feeding the goats!

I'm sure he would not appreciate me posting this picture -- but I HAD to!! He was so cold and miserable!

Lily and me

You can tell in this photo that it was kinda windy

Lily picked out a heavy pumpkin!

That looks like a good one!

Walking through the pumpkin patch -- you can tell from the background that we are out in the middle of nowhere. Totally country

Checking out the pumpkins

It was nice because all the pumpkins were small and Lily sized. Which is fine by me because I already got my big pumpkin to carve at the market weeks ago! :)

One last attempt at getting a cute picture of Lily with the pumpkins and hay bales, but she did not want to get out of her stroller (which is kinda unusual)

I had to take this picture of her on the ride home. Dolly was hungry! :)

.....................

I should also note that this morning when we were getting ready to go I asked Lily if she wanted a barrette or pony tails in her hair and she happily exclaimed "tails!" Yeah!!