• Home
  • About
  •  

    Happy Halloween!

    October 31st, 2011

    This has been G’s first year really trick-or-treating. The past few years, he’s participated in community parades and the like, but never door-to-door treating. We just don’t live in a neighborhood where anyone treats, plus with him not really being of candy-consuming age we’ve skipped the door candy soliciting and just subjected him to silly costumes. But this year? This year, was a trip out, AND with his cousins to boot.

    A few weeks ago when I asked him what he wanted to be, G said “purple”. I scratched my head for awhile, and then thought: purple crayon!!! And wouldn’t you believe it — they DO have crayon costumes out there (albeit not purple. Grr!) As soon as I showed him my idea, he said “No! I wanna be a tiger” So off on a tiger costume quest I went. Luckily I scored an awesome used one, in fabulous condition for $10. For $10, if he changed his mind again, I wasn’t going to be too upset, though I wasn’t really giving him a chance to come up with something else πŸ™‚

    S2 got to be a cow.

    Getting ready:

    I’ll give you one guess how long the tiger head-piece stayed on. If you guessed 25 seconds, you’d be right.

    Ready to go

    G is in a pretty shy phase, and he really doesn’t like to talk to people he doesn’t know. Good for general safety. Not so good for a holiday that has a basic pre-requisite for a “Trick or Treat” utterance. He insisted we do it for him, but was happy to stretch out his (adorable) paw for a piece of candy. We visited about 6 houses, and then I asked him if he wanted to continue on w/ G and J or come home. Guess what he said? … So home we went πŸ™‚

    The boys’ loot.

    I immediately claimed the peanut butter cup. G ended up having 2 pieces of Skittles and a bite of a Hersey bar. The rest were dutifully hidden.

    S2 tried to claim some candy too.

    No luck for this dude though. He went to bed. Crazy Dawg, Daisy begged for some candy too. She was a Little Terror.

    G enjoyed listening for visitors to come to the door and watching them get candy.

    It was a good year. Can’t wait for next!


    Foto Friday

    October 28th, 2011

    Guess what new toy we got at home?

    “He won’t shaaaaaaare!!!!”

    Don’t mind me — I just want to change the channel on whatever it is that you’re watching

    When baby toys make a come-back


    Are we there yet?

    October 24th, 2011

    3 years, 1 month and 25 days is how long it takes to have the following exchange:

    (1.2m away from daycare, on a 2.3m journey home…)
    G: are we there?
    Me: what?
    G: are we there yet?

    I have been formally hazed.


    S2 walks… and now there’s proof

    October 19th, 2011

    At the beginning of the month S and I were greeted at daycare by several of S2’s teachers exclaiming that they saw him walking. He was close so I bought it, but it was awhile before he would perform this walking miracle for me.
    Then these past few days he’d take several steps on his own, but never predictably, never when asked to so it was hard to get proof. Until tonight, when I half drained my iPhone battery stalking him. So forgive the camera shake, but here’s unequivocal proof that I think we are now in the possession of another toddler.

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzCithn223w]


    Stunks spray poop out of their butt

    October 18th, 2011

    I am thankful to iPhone, because it allows me to capture conversations such as this one. Pure gold I tell ya’. BTW, I think forever now I shall call skunks “stunks”. It actually makes more sense to since they be stinky.

    P.S. There was no stunk he could visibly see. That part was purely imagined.


    In with the pink

    October 17th, 2011

    This is G’s new umbrella. That’s right: it’s pink, and comes complete with a pink dangling butterfly attached at the handle.

    G’s old monkey umbrella met an untimely end due to use more as a toy than an actual rain protection device. Now that rain is behind the corner, I took him to Cheeky Monkey so that this time he can pick out his own umbrella.

    As we were pointed to the bucket of options, G immediately pulled out the pink one. I’ll be honest, the sight of pink startled me at first. And i’m not ashamed to admit that it startled me because I thought “Pink is a ‘girl’ color. Would anyone make fun of him for choosing pink?” I pulled out several other ‘more manly’ options, but he was set on the pink. And you know what I realized at that moment? The discomfort that my son is choosing to sport around a pink umbrella is my problem, not his. And that I shouldn’t be passing that down. He should make the choices in his life without stupid prejudice and just be himself. And I should support him, his choices and goals based on the merit of his overall happiness. End of story.

    So our next step was choosing between the pink hippo or the pink butterfly option. He chose the butterfly.


    Bliss is…

    October 16th, 2011

    Bliss is lying on the living room floor on a Sunday afternoon watching the boys ‘make’ me treats on the play-kitchen.


    Disneyland (Aka “Hey look! A Duck!”)

    October 15th, 2011

    Last year, I decreed that we’d celebrate G turning 3 with a trip to Disneyland. I figured that it would be a lower-effort/lower-costΒ  venture over another birthday party. Boy was I wrong… at least on the cost part πŸ™‚

    I’m glad we did this trip! I think that in another few years when we go again, G will be much more into it… and in preparation I’ll actually have to show him some Disney movies. Yeah… that might help build more excitement. You see, I’m a big Pixar fan. G has seen every Pixar movie out thus far. However, the Disney classics? Not so much. Lion King is about it. His summation of admiration for other things Disney can be summed up in the following two mentions:
    1) He calls Mickey “Nicky Mouse”
    2) On our second day he walked right past a gaggle of little girls tripping over themselves to get autographs and hugs by Aurora (aka Sleeping Beauty) and Snow White, who were conveniently standing 30′ apart, only to exclaim “Hey look! A duck!” I’d like to tell you he was pointing and Donald, but alas, no. He was referencing your standard-issue duck, hanging out in the little moat around the Disney Castle. The same ducks he spends 10 minutes admiring every Thursday after swim class.

    G will tell you that his favorite part of the park was meeting “Nicky”. However, I think that (overall) his favorite part of the trip was the hotel pool. We stayed at the Howard Johnson across the street from the park, which had a kids’ pool w/ a 1′-deep wading pool, water slides, and other water features. We spent a few hours there each day and he was in heaven. As was S2. The water was warm. He could do all of his water shenanigans.

    One thing that both S and I found remarkable was that for the first time, since he was 18m old, G asked to get in the stroller to ride. More remarkable was when he asked to get in the stroller to nap: something he hadn’t done since he was 6m old! But I don’t blame the kid: it was a lot of walking. If I had a stroller available to me, and someone to push me around, I wouldda crawled right on in too. We unfortunately forgot to bring our second, umbrella stroller, which meant that S2 spent a lot of time being a pouch baby, while his brother rode in the wheels. We probably could’ve looked into the stroller rentals, but between 1 carrier and 1 stroller we did fine. Now if S2 had been a few pounds heavier, I might be singing a different tune.

    Having Gamma and Gappa join us was awesome! I really wanted to share this experience with them, and like many other trips, having a ratio of 2 adults to 1 kid was amazing. My dad (or mom) would hang out with S2 on the rides he’d sleep through, or was too short to go on, while S and I rode with G.

    Without further adieu, here’s a whole slew of photos. You didn’t think this post was going to be photo deprived did you? I did NOT bring my DSLR camera with me. It took a lot of going back and forth in my head, but at the end I decided to rent a newer point-and-shoot camera (vs. buying) and leave my fancy gear at home. Yes, the photos are suffering as a result, but I enjoyed participating in this trip and not trying solely to document it, AND as I predicted carrying an infant most of the time, was not super conducive to a few pounds of camera gear hanging off me too.

    Here we go!!!

    Breakfast on the go

    Stop #1, about an hour in. S2 ate and stretched out

    G ran around meanwhile, and discovered that our car magically could play movies

    And consequently spent the next few hours looking like this:

    … although he did also spend some time on his “pad”

    Promptly at arriving at our hotel, we got dressed to go to the pool. The kids deserved it after the trip.
    While we dressed, S2 attended to a critical task: trying to break into the hotel safe

    And then tried to make some friends

    The pool!!!

    Our first day started off with waiting in the admitting line (a sample of lines to come)

    S2 found this to be such an exciting experience he promptly fell asleep

    G was mapping out our route (although thanx to RideMax that task was already complete)

    Staring at the Finding Nemo seaguls

    And our first submarine ride

    Buzz Lightyear

    … and then a bunch more rides and activies

    Waiting for Mickey… er… Nickey πŸ™‚

    Like Gappa’s new look?

    After the park… we had some more pool action

    Day 2 included riding a flying elephant

    A train

    A Toady car

    Turning some tea cups

    A whole lot of waiting in line

    Some more rides

    Classic G tantrums

    And one pooped out toddler

    I wanted 1 mandatory photo of all of us together, and this was how we closed out our trip to Disneyland.


    What’s my name?

    October 14th, 2011

    Me: G, what’s my name?
    G: Mama!

    Well… he’s not really wrong.


    When I was a kid…

    October 13th, 2011

    It cracks me up to listen to G tell me a story that starts off with ‘When I was a kid…’
    … ‘cuz you know… He’s SO grown up now that he’s 3!