Halloween 2011

Big day today. Busy day for the mommy of the group. I managed to squeeze in a couple hours of work this morning before meeting up with Regan in her lunchroom.

She was a little more than excited to see me!

From there it was party central! We are so thrilled that her school allows the children to celebrate Halloween complete with a parade around the school, snacks and party games!

Regan had 2 other bees in her class...all different bee costumes.

After Regan's school let out, we quickly stopped at home to pick up Grandma Jan and Sidney to take her to her classroom party (Mondays remain dedicated to grandparents but we were able to attend the party). As soon as we walked in, Sidney stuck like glue to her best buddy, no big surprise there.

Then it was home for dinner, setting out the creations from the weekend....

and we were off Trick or Treating! I was thankful to have Leigha join me while Ryan stayed back to hand out candy. Sidney was a hoot, racing from one house to the next, commenting on the "old lady" that answered the door, or the the "funny looking dog", which happened to be a donkey plant holder. She had us laughing quite hard most of the evening.

And after a walk around the (incredibly large) block we live on, each girl had a pile this big setting in front of them. Part of Regan's homework this week was to count her candy, she came up with 87 pieces. Wowzas!

We hope you had a great Halloween!

Pumpkin carving 2011

With Halloween on Monday, it was a great opportunity to carve pumpkins this weekend. Not to mention the QUEEN of pumpkin carving (aka: Grandma Sheri) came up to babysit for a few hours Saturday night! Ryan couldn't have been more excited!! We did the dirty work for her, prepping the pumpkins, and I had two very big helpers.

Regan simply loved digging in to the guts of the pumpkin this year. It's been a progressive trend (click HERE to see how she did last year). I laughed at her as she kept repeating over and over again, "this is just SOOO much fun!!". She helped clean out 3 of the 5 pumpkins.

Ryan isn't much for 'cleaning' the pumpkins and takes over as the carver. It was like an assembly line with Regan starting the cleaning process, Sidney placing seeds in a bowl of water to bake, me scrapping down the inside of the pumpkin (with a tool that ended up scraping my hand to a bloody mess), and finally Ryan, and later grandma Sheri, doing the carving.

Sidney proved that she did actually put her fingers inside the pumpkin. She doesn't mind it, but prefers one that's a little more dry compared to a gooey wet one.

But she took her job seriously and we had a large bowl of seeds to bake to yummy goodness!

Pictures of the carved pumpkins to follow soon!!

Halloween celebrations continued

A local store put on a Halloween celebration and the girls were eager to dress up again in their costumes and check it out. Balloons, treat bags the size of their heads, haunted houses and decorating cookies. What a great time it was!

Sidney wanted nothing to do with their little haunted house, though it didn't phase Regan a bit. We're beginning to realize that Sidney is a little scardy-cat....a lot like me.

She was much more entertained at decorating her own cookie. Carefully putting a scoop of frosting onto the cookie, and then another into her mouth before repeating the task with sprinkles, M&M's and candy corn.

But what a gorgeous creation she made! Pretty, but apparently not very tasty to her, she took one bite and tossed it in the garbage.

Not this little girl who brought her cookie home to munch on every last bite. We had sprinkles littering the table and floor, next year I'll make them eat it at the store.

Conferences, dentist, dance and more

Today's agenda included so many items that even the mom of the house who normally has it all well put together, had trouble keeping track. We started out the morning with Sidney's conferences where we learned she's doing well, on track and loved up by so many teachers (the only worry is the whole color-blind issue but there's not much to be done about that). She is social, has her own little group of girlfriends (yes, a little clique of sorts it seems...oh brother), and is academically right on track. After a shortened day at work, I picked up the beauties and headed....to the dentist!

This was Sidney's 2nd attempt at a cleaning, the first one 6 months ago didn't go so well. With a lot of prep work, she managed to muster through this one on the safety of my lap. She did great and only whimpered when the suction straw was placed in her mouth.

Unfortunately, I had to leave after Sidney's cleaning to take her to dance (you can see her wearing a tutu on the photo above). Grandma Sheri stayed to hold Regan's hand and get her through her appointment before meeting back up for a celebration dinner out of NO CAVITIES.

and then finally whisking Regan off to her dance class, complete with Halloween costume attire as they celebrated Halloween a week early. Man alive it was a busy day, I'm happy to have that one behind us. Here's to a quiet Tuesday!

Half-Haunted Halloween '11

The annual Half-Haunted Halloween trail was held yesterday near our old neighborhood. We've been going to this Halloween related event for many years and the kids have so much fun trick-or-treating, playing games, watching magic shows and just enjoying the day.

The beauty of letting the girls pick out their own Halloween costumes, is that they both enjoy putting them on and attending some fun festivities. It's a (sometimes painful) rule we had as soon as Regan could help decide on her own costume: they get to go to the store, scour through magazines, websites and finally decide on something all on their own. We started the season in a much different spot than where we landed, Regan was supergirl and Sidney was Ariel. Those costumes didn't last long before being sent back to the store for lack of comfort and pure dislike of their choices. And what girl doesn't have the right to change their mind!?

Each year I've wanted to somewhat coordinate their costumes (you know, theme of a movie, etc) but neither girl could agree. Amazingly, this year, they coordinate as insects. Lovely.

Kari was in town for the weekend and joined us through the trail. Typically at the end, there is an incredibly large petting zoo that the girls thoroughly enjoyed in years past; Sidney asked the entire trail when we'd get to the "amimals". Change of plans this year, it was a "hoedown dance" and Kari took Regan out to polka....because she is THE expert in that field as far as I'm concerned!

Just look at the fun they were having!

And after sending Ryan and the girls home to bed, she and I went out to have a girls' night out and celebrate anything that needed celebrating!

Pool closing 2011

Today marked the official end of the pool season. Last night we prepared by cleaning, dropping the water level, adding chemicals and removing the light. We're going to miss this view!

The girls were our "helpers" and had a little fun while daddy was pretending to toss them into the 51F water. Brrrr!

Down, down down it went. All night we heard the sounds of a waterfall from the returns pouring into the pool.

And this morning, Tony came to blow out the lines, remove the pool fixtures and close it up. Until next year....hope it's going to be a short winter!

MEA break

We're fortunate to have MEA break for 3 days this week. And in doing so, opted to forego any daycare setting and just split the days among each other. Today was my turn to find some fun and entertain these two energetic, wishing-it-was-still-summer, beautiful girls. So to a local park we went in hopes of burning off pent up energy.

Regan still has her paw print tattoo on her cheek from last night. She'd put one on her face daily if I would allow it. Stinker.

And fun we did have. It was free and it was entertaining. Made up games, impromptu rounds of tag and experimenting with shadows.

I wonder what tomorrow holds....

Wanna-be

Regan showed off tonight what she learned from cheer clinic last weekend. We ventured over to the football stadium where she looked around in awe at all the big kids, football players, cheerleaders, band members and a slew of middle school/high school students. She enjoyed cheering, although it was pretty overwhelming for a 5 year old and she felt a little lost at the end searching for us in the sea of parents coming to corral their daughters. To see a short video, click HERE.

(Pardon the winter gear....it was cold tonight!)

Growing up....

My big girl is growing up, and I'm reminded of this daily.

I hear THIS SONG occasionally and it brings tears to my eyes.

Tonight we ventured to her first parent-teacher conference of her elementary school experience. Before we left, she did a number of things to remind me just how much she has learned in the first 6 weeks of school. First, she created a "book" by gluing paper as a binding and not only writing her own story, but also illustrating it. She continues to 'brave spell', and today all on her own, wrote her story with the exception of 2 large words which she asked for prompting.

After she read her story to me, along with a similar one from school today, I picked out one of the Dick and Jane books. By golly this girl is starting to read books!

Yes, I completely agree that those stories are cheesy and annoying but the repetition of it makes her successful in reading and her face beams with pride at the end of each page. As her teacher mentioned tonight, one of the greatest joys is teaching a child to read. I couldn't agree more!

As for what else her teacher had to say, it was all positive. Regan is on track, and at times beyond what is expected, academically. (Un)fortunately, she's a little social too so we need to continue to remind this little beauty that "listening ears" are put on for a reason.Thankfully her teacher is accustomed to chatty 5 year olds and reminded us she too, had to be prompted to mute herself during her school years. It could be worse right?, she could be crying in a corner refusing to make new friends!

We love you to pieces Regan and are so very proud of you, our big kindergartner!

Apple Orchard

We spent the day with these cuties at a local apple orchard, taking in everything they had to offer: hay rides, petting zoo, train rides, silo turned playground, apple orchard, pumpkin patch and face painting. It was a glorious fall day!

At the end of the day, Sidney was quick to remind us her favorite part of the day was the train ride. She loved it.

The girls each ate 3 (partial) apples today, and only one had some fresh carmel included. In fact, when the kids all asked for home made donuts, Sidney stood crying as she wanted an apple instead. Not a problem sweetie, enjoy your apple. Regan danced around to live music munching her apple.

The entire gang, enjoying a hay ride. Thanks for a super fun day!

I busted Regan out of the hay pile to pose for a picture, I knew she'd do it without hesitation. She's a sucker for these cutout boards.

Something tells me this impromptu picture might make the final cut for a Christmas card.

Cheer Clinic '11

Regan brings home a lot of permission slips, activity opportunities and local happenings. Recently she brought home a flyer for a local "Cheer Clinic". Brought me back to days in high school when we put on dance clinics for the elementary students. It's a fun opportunity for both ages. As we do with every slip, we offered Regan the opportunity and she immediately lit up with a giant smile and yelled "YES!".

This morning, we headed to the high school, greeted by this guy:

and she put on her t-shirt, hair ribbon and grabbed a set of poms. Off she went, that brave soul. She spotted a few friends from kindergarten and was in her glory as she looked up to the high school students.

This face says it all; she loved watching all the girls show off their cheers and wave their poms.

I think there had to be 100 girls all screaming out cheers and finally posing for a picture. Regan's pretty excited to perform in front of a crowd at the local varsity football game next week.

Fire Department Open House

This morning it was just me and Sidney. Unusual for a Saturday morning. We took in the local fire department open house and picked a station just down the street from where Regan was spending her morning (more on that later). Sidney is a very shy girl, especially without her big sissy. She didn't want to climb into the trucks, despite my willingness to go with, she didn't want a cookie and she certainly wasn't about to crawl through the little house set up for all the kids. So instead, we watched from a distance as kids took turns spraying the fire hose.

And after much convincing, I got her to at least stand next to the truck (her argument was "they're going to drive away!") for a picture. And then we headed back to the car. Once in her car seat, she asked for a balloon. A balloon that I had offered to her at least on 15 different occasions. So back to the station we went for a balloon. Oh little girl, it's a good thing I love you!

Little Georgia O'Keefe

Regan amazes me with her love for art, drawing and now, spelling!

She's been working on "brave spelling" lately, writing out words that she doesn't entirely know how to spell. Not just sight words (which by the way she recites daily and today we were in the middle of the store as she yelled "L-I-K-E like! "W-E-N-T went!"), but spelling words she just has to sound out.

It's great to watch her, and although I'm not entirely sure she spelled 'Candycorn' all on her own, she claims she did and was very proud of her work.

She says the girl on the bottom is her dancing, and then she proceeds to show me the dance move she's drawing. Adorable little artist :)

This and that...

Given the amazingly warm temps we have been experiencing, I took the opportunity to have a picnic poolside tonight. The girls were a bit nuts about the idea and had a hard time sitting still....it's going to be a L-O-N-G winter if we're experiencing this already.

And after dinner, we got down to business with making fall colored M&M Halloween cookies!

Regan loves to crack the eggs. But she sure does make a mess! And then Sidney turned on the mixer while the beater was in the air...batter flying all over the kitchen! We tried to keep our composure, but Ryan and I just ended up laughing.

mmmmm....

Sidney was mid-chew when I asked for a picture, needless to saw she was not happy to pause!

New dance studio

Tonight Regan's dance class started back up, a little later into the fall than usual. The studio has moved into a much bigger space and it couldn't be more perfect! Regs is in her glory. She was literally all smiles each time I poked my head up to the window to watch. She loves both tap and ballet equally at this point and really thrives on the variety it offers to her.

Just a short video as the girls learn a little tap...

Planet Spooky 2011

Planet Spooky was today's destination at this local attraction:

So the girls got dressed into costumes, Sidney in a ladybug:

and prepared to trick or treat, ride on some rides and eat icee's.

We normally say that Regan is our photogenic child. Today it was Sidney. She hit us up with her charm, flashing a great smile and posing for some great pics.

And Regan remains a natural in front of the camera. There's no need to bribe this girl, she knows to pause, smile and then proceed when I pull out the camera and yell "look here!".

Sidney and Hudson were inseparable today. Poor Paxton was stuck riding solo until we could get Regan off the bigger kid rides.

Face painting (incredibly over-priced) when Grandma Sheri is around means you get whatever you want. And Regan wanted a kitty cat. She doesn't even look like herself?!

Sidney choose Hello Kitty and thoroughly enjoyed the part.

Regan (5.5 years old) and Paxton (he's 1.5 yrs old) with his arm around her. A picture from the front would show you that her arm was resting on his leg, in a protective manner :)

See what I mean?, inseparable!

Thanks Grandma Sheri! It was a great day.