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Category: Family
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Trick or Treat!
We continued our tradition and went trick or treating with the Hogans. It’s so so fun to watch Andrew and Austin enjoy each other’s company and share in these precious childhood milestones together. After some pizza, we loaded up the wagon with Mr. Shark and Mr. Lion for some trick or treating. The boys seemed to get the hang of ringing doorbells, saying ‘trick or treat’ and grabbing candy quite quickly. They REALLY understood eating the candy even quicker. Our little men suffered from major sugar highs and then crashes by the end of the night. One of my favorite lines of the evening from Andrew, ‘Ghost is pooky (spooky) mommy.’
Pre- treating. Of course Andrew refused to wear his lion’s mane.
In case you forgot what these two looked like last year:
Our 2016 Halloween mobile:
Grabbing candy with the daddys.
What a great daddy looks like when his son refuses to wear his lion mane.
Overall a great success and one for the books. Hard to believe there will be two more little ones with us next year! ❤️?❤️
PS- Here is my lone photo from Andrew’s Palmer School Halloween parade. No mane and looking oh-so-thrilled in the back row. His general demeanor was ‘what the heck is going on here?!’
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Happy Halloween!
On Friday Andrew and I joined in the annual Halloween parade with my local Mom’s Club. We strut our stuff around Bernardsville and then ended with some cookies and treats at PEP Club (a toddler friendly gym filled with all sorts of things to climb on). This year Andrew was a lion and by all accounts he hated putting on his costume- particularly the mane. Oh well, he looked pretty stinking cute, especially when he’d tell you that a lion says ‘ROAR!’
Getting dressed. And thanks to a little distraction from Thomas the Train, I was able to snap one picture with the mane on.
We were luck that Papa and Coco could join in the fun! Andrew’s buddy/girlfriend Abby was also there.
Andrews favorite part was the cookies and climbing. Shockingly he walked right up to the balance beam and walked across- no problem. This child has NO fear!
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Cooking with Coco
Coco and Papa came to visit for a few days before their migration to Florida for the winter. Coco and Andrew did some cooking together. Today’s creation: ‘dirt with worms’! Aka chocolate pudding with gummy worms. Yum!
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How to get rid of annoying toys
Step 1. Put your child to bed
Step 2. Light a fire
Step 3. Drink wine & watch
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Vindication!
Based on our last pumpkin experience (see earlier post this week), I was determined to get Andrew (and me!) a happy pumpkin experience for 2016. This morning Andrew, along with his best buddies Austin and Abby, went to Alstede Farms in Chester, NJ. I am happy to report that everyone had a great time! Some highlights:
Playing hooky from school with his best buds
Feeding the donkeys
Picking pumpkins (until he realized he could ride a wagon instead)
Tractors
And his favorite- running through the corn stalk tunnel!
Everyone was happy! ?
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A Message for Aunt Kiki
When Aunt Kiki (Kelly) doesn’t pick up Facetime, she gets messages like this:
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Pumpkin Picking Fail
Last Saturday I planned what I had hoped would be a memorable and fun family outing to pick pumpkins. Andrew’s best buddy Austin and his parents were going, the sunny was shining, it was almost 70 degrees and Andrew seems to love farm animals, tractors and all opportunities to run around. He even took a 3+ hour nap before we went! I had all the ingredients for a ‘Pinterest-Perfect’ afternoon.
But boy was I wrong. From the moment we arrived at the farm Andrew expressed zero- perhaps even less than zero- interest in being there. He refused to stand and insisted to be held the whole time- which is increasingly hard to do when he weighs 30+ lbs and your 5.5 months pregnant. He wanted no parts of the animals and couldn’t be less excited by the pumpkin patch if he tried. Major strike out.
This about captures the experience:
The only time he wasn’t crying was the tractor ride. He wasn’t happy but at least there weren’t tears.
As we drove home- in silence because we were all so exhausted- I realized that my son actually gave me exactly what I was hoping for. Last Saturday was certainly memorable. I suppose I just need to be more specific about my expectations moving forward….. -
Maryland Memories
This month has truly been a hectic one for me- and the whole family for that matter. I needed to be in San Francisco the week of September 12th, Detroit the week of September 19th and back in San Francisco the week of October 3rd. And on the weekends we had hoped to squeeze in two weddings and a baby shower in Maryland/western Pennsylvania. So when we came time to plan how we’d juggle two busy careers and a toddler through all of this, we opted to make Middletown, Maryland our home base for a week and avoid any unnecessary Keystone state criss-crossing.
It turned out to be a great plan! Andrew, Grandma and Grandpa traveled to Ohio (pronounced ‘Hi-O’ by Andrew) the first weekend to visit Gigi. All of a sudden we were kid-free for two whole days! We enjoyed a nice dinner- after 5:45- onFriday and ventured into DC for some fun on Saturday. We celebrated my dear friend Shiwali’s baby shower on Saturday afternoon and had a White House adventure Saturday night- more on that later. And after a lovely drive and lunch in Harper’s Ferry, we celebrated Andy’s buddy Charlie’s wedding on Sunday night!
During the week we took turns watching Andrew while we both worked. Admittedly there was a decent amount of screen-time for the little guy going on, but it was also mixed in with some walks to the park, reading, long naps and swing.
On Monday we trekked out to the Fear Family Farm for a visit. Andrew LOVED playing with Caitlin and seeing all of animals. His speech has been exploding recently so it was so cool to hear him yell ‘cow’, ‘sheep’, ‘tractor’ and more during his first trip to the farm.
We capped off the week with another wedding- this time in Alum Bank, PA for my cousin Lauren. Great to see everyone and celebrate more milestone with family and friends! We left Alum Bank, picked up Andrew in Harrisburg and drove all the way back to New Jersey Saturday night.
On Sunday we did NOTHING. It was spectacular!
