Halloween!!!!!!

The not-so-happy Garden Gnome

He was a little happier when we got to Bubba's

in one picture at least

He was super happy when we got to town

and got our Trick-or-Treat on!

This was hilarious - we'd heard rumors of a girl gnome

but when we finally found her neither seemed to believe

in the other. Like that commercial with Santa and the M&M's.

We had a pretty full day on Halloween but it was a lot of fun. We started off around 3 in the afternoon to see Bubba's family and then were supposed to make several other stops before the 5 pm TorTing in town. We completely ran out of time and hustled back to town just in time for the festivities. Since Papa was expected at 6 we hurried through all of the madness and right before we left we ran into our friends The Pink Panther and Shaun the Sheep! When we did get home, we found Papa waiting in the driveway for us - whoops! We rushed in, carved 2 pumpkins, make a big batch of Pioneer Woman Sloppy Joes (in honor of Papa) and settled into the constant ringing of the doorbell. Once we got through that relaxing meal, we headed out into the neighborhood to check out what kind of loot we could get.

All in all it was a great, albeit busy, Halloween day. Lots of candy, lots of compliments, lots of fun.

Update on Woody the Cat

Unfortunately Woody turns out to have too many allergens following him around for him to stay in the house with us. He has moved into our neighbors house and they are going to see how things go there. She is also allergic but they have no other cats so we're keeping our fingers crossed. He's on the waiting list at the shelter but they are currently full and don't know when they could take him if they had to.

Apparently he moved in a couple of days ago as we haven't seen him around. He's such a fair weathered cat.

I heart Rick Steves

Not only is he great just because he's great, he's great because he offers so many free events and classes for us arm chair travelers. Today was the big Rick Steves Travel Festival where his guides come to town and do free lectures on a variety of travel destinations. These come complete with pictures projected onto large screens that will make you want to visit any place they tell you about.

I had signed us up for Ireland and Great Britain and since my Mom was in NC, I saved a spot for my Dad too. Turns out my other (notice the lack of 'better' here) half decided to fish instead so it ended up being my Dad, the Bubs, me, and Toy Story on the portable DVD player. We all made it through the 90 minute Ireland lecture with flying colors. The only one left at the end of the Great Britain lecture was my Dad but I think he was alright with that. I called him later to see how he liked it and to apologize for having to cart my 3 year old pumpkin out and he said 'now I have to go to Ireland and Great Britain'. I smiled to myself and decided to let him tell my Mom the new plan himself. I take no responsibility, I just invited him to a free lecture.

Book Club - Little Bee - and a 20% discount

Tonight's book club was great! We met up at Third Place Books to review the book Little Bee. Only two of the four that showed up had finished it but that didn't stop us from visiting until they all but shut the lights off and put the chairs up on the tables. Miss Rose and her Rhythm Percolators played 'vintage jazz' and we found out that if we register our book club at Third Place Books that we can then get a 20% discount when we buy them there. How great is that?

Good friends, good conversation, good (free) music, good food, and a 20% discount on books.

Turns out that Third Place Books is full of free entertainment for young and old alike. Just check out their calendar and you'll find the standard book store things such as story time for kids and book readings/signings, but you'll also find they have free live music every Friday night, foreign language conversation clubs, several book clubs they host, play time for kids and cooking demonstrations. OK, so those are for seniors but you get the point. This place is full of free entertainment.

It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown

Tonight we get to watch this great classic with Baby Bubba. How fun is that? And talk about Tradition. I watch this every year and have all of my life. I can't think of one year I missed it, even before the Bubs came along. Some things just never get old.

Living (& loving) the blog life - preschool snack style!

Today was the Halloween celebration at preschool and I was scheduled as Snack Mom. Since we were also going to be decorating cupcakes and getting treats later in the day they asked me to bring something 'healthy' for snack that would 'counteract the sugar being served later'. I have to admit, I was disappointed! I had all these great ghouley snacks in mind but none of them were healthy! So I hit the blogs and came up with... big surprise here... Our Best Bites (but come on, these girls know what they're doing!) Easy Halloween Party Food. We made the cheese fingers but substituted fruit leather for the nails since we're in a nut-free class. We stuck them on with cream cheese and more than a few kids had to see the parents eat them before they would try it. To me, that means success! We also took apple chunks tossed in pineapple juice to 'counteract' some sugar - te he he!

Due to the fact that I forgot we didn't have the hat to the Bub's costume, which meant a 7 am trip to WalMart to buy felt, I didn't get a picture. I'm disappointed by that too because they got great reviews from the parents but here is the picture from OBB - they really do a better job at photos than me anyway.

Marco!..... Polo!

This is what playing Marco Polo looks like in our world.

He loves to run with his face hidden but he cheats.

A lot. And he thinks it's the funniest thing in the world.

The sky is falling!

Oh... it's just this crazy wind blowing all of the leaves off the trees.

Today's activity was raking the leaves but we were only somewhat successful. See that bottom shot where I was being chased with the rake? That and the one where he had the big handful of leaves about to toss out of the pile? And remember me saying just a second ago that we were having crazy wind? Well every time we got a good pile, one of those 3 would destroy it. So it ended up just being time to play, time for us and both of the kitties to play. Who knew being unsuccessful at finishing a chore could be so much fun?

Today's great deal - Soundbridge Seattle Symphony Music Discovery Center

Today I scored a year long family membership to the Soundbridge Seattle Symphony Music Discovery Center through Mamapedia. Get this, for $25. That's right. $25 for an annual family membership. This will be such a great way to introduce Allen to the symphony.

Wax paper leaves

One of my friends posted she had done wax paper leaves over the weekend and it struck a memory cord but I couldn't really remember what they were. I did know I wanted to try it though and there's no time like the present. Besides, we've been having some serious wind the last couple of days and it was time to get out and start collecting a few to get into Fall fashion. The Bubs picked most of them out until he got sidetracked by the cats chasing the falling leaves, and what could be more fun than watching silly cats? Oh, chasing silly cats and kicking and throwing leaves. That's what's more fun and that's what won as an activity over collecting the rest of the leaves. We got enough though and this was the end product.

I wish I had taken the picture when it was more light outside though because they really did turn out pretty.

Living (& loving) the blog life ~ Halloween style!

We had to do an early Halloween celebration with the family this year because Nana was flying out East and would miss all of the babies this year. So in honor of this celebration, I made Our Best Bites candy corn cupcakes. They turned out super cute and the inside was bright yellow but I forgot to take a picture of that part. Trust me though, they are worth the little bit of effort!

Game night!!!

Tonight is game night. I love game night. I love games. I love having people over to play games or going somewhere else to play games. I just love games. AAAAHHHH!

The best games in my opinion are those that don't put you in the spotlight for too long, don't make you think too hard, and don't take forever to play.

Here are a few of my all time favorites...

Pit - Described as the loudest card game you can play. I would have to agree.

Spoons - so much fun!

Sequence - takes longer to play but the best slow game I've ever played.

Now if you'll excuse me, I must go prepare mentally to win win win! As I've always said, I'm not competitive until I start to lose.

Our 1st Scholastic Order is here!

Who knew it would be the little things like book orders that would get me all excited like a kid again? At the first parents meeting at school tonight I got to pick up our first Scholastic book order and I was so excited about it that when I got home at 9 pm I actually read 2 of them to Baby Bubba. I could have just sat and read them to myself but then I would have felt silly, at least reading to a 3 year old would justify singing The Ants Go Marching.

We didn't need much but it felt appropriate to go old school and introduce him to the following 3 books:

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

My review:

Excellent book!

Couldn't put it down.

And now I'm behind in my book club reading.

Doin' the pumpkin patch preschool style

Today we headed to the pumpkin patch with the Bub's class. It was a lot of fun to see him with his friends in a different environment. It was all fun and games until it came time to pick out a pumpkin though. We had 3 different Mom's, several of the kids, and our teacher trying to help the Bub's find just the right one. Not too orange, not too green, not too dirty, not too big. We ended up with the tiniest yellow pumpkin in the patch. I swear, I would bet money on it.

A day without a cell phone

Today Baby Bubba had to skip school because of a fever. That meant all of the errands I had to run would come with a little helper. Luckily it was a beautiful Fall day and we were able to drive through the Snohomish Valley some. We started off in Snohomish to drop a pallet off and saw the sign to the Pumpkin Farm we were going to with his school in a few days. We detoured and ended up winding our way through the Snohomish Valley blissfully lost. I had forgotten how nice it can be to aimlessly drive with no set place to arrive and no set time to be.... anywhere. We took turns that looked like we should turn there, we had lunch together in a little cafe, and finally ended up back where we should have arrived two hours earlier. This just happened to be the 'dirt store' where they had all of the fun equipment that little boys love. The Bubs was a good little helper until one of the front loaders would come by and fill a landscaping truck, while he stood in awe.

When we got home I realized I hadn't had my phone with me the entire time. More recently I would have been annoyed at not having my phone but today it gave me a sense of a time before my schedule was so hectic and it was easy and normal to take time to do nothing planned. It was nice, it was really really nice.

Five Guys Burgers & Fries

Yum. We were turned on to these guys by some friends a few months back. They have good burgers and great fries. So lunch menu is Five Guys with some friends here (post fishing trip lunch date), then we have supper plans with different friends and we plan on having them again. What can we say, it's a fry thing.

Image found here

What happens in the house when no humans are watching (or so he thinks)

That would be him stuffed completely in the leg, not laying under it.

What happens on the porch when no humans are watching (or so he thinks)

This is the other stray that's been living around our house. We call him 'the poofy cat' because he is a poofy cat. That's all we know about him, other than he doesn't like people. He may even be a she. He hangs out in the back yard, sleeps again the slider on cold nights, and takes sun baths on the driveway. He always scatters when he catches sight of any of us though so this was quite a sight. He found the leftover catnip that we put out in an effort to have Woody and Weezy share a good time :)~ Notice Weezy is inside though and Woody is still outside, but they both watched as he got silly with the nip.

Date night! Entertainment book style

Tonight should be fun! We're headed in to the city to meet some friends for some Mama's Mexican Kitchen grub and then headed to the Unexpected Production improv show. Should be interesting - and cheap! Coupons in hand and ready to go.
Image found here

Move over dog, Woody's in the house!

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

Today Nana, my friend P, and I joined Oma's book club for a tour of the Panama Hotel in Seattle's International District. It's just a few blocks from where I worked for the county and I'd gone by it several times but had never noticed it. It didn't stand out and even when we got there we still had to look for it in the middle of the block to find where we were headed.

This hotel is the center of the book written by Jamie Ford called Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. I know that most of Seattle has read it recently but I am not currently in that majority. I think everyone else on the tour besides P had read it though and they all highly recommend reading it.

The tea was really good, the tour ended up being a 2 hour history lesson on Seattle's International District as well as a bit of a brag for the owner and all of her life's conquests. It was quite interesting though, seeing the old hotel and tea house, the Japanese public bath house attached to it, and learning more about what happened right in our own back yard during WWII.

I plan to read the book, and now that we've done this tour I'm hoping to read it soon!

Oh what I wouldn't do for my Saturday morning back

We got started nice and early on the painting only to find out the color only matched under the fluorescent lights in Home Depot, not in the natural light in our room. I headed back to see what they could do - this was trip #1 today. They adjusted the semi-gloss gallon I had and it took almost an hour because to my delight (read the sarcasm here) I had driven off without my wallet. Dada and the Bubs had to pack up in the truck and drive up to meet me so I could get what I needed and get back home - this was trip #2 today. We all got home but I only had the bathroom paint so there would no doubt be another trip later. We got the Bubs situated and off with Oma to see his play and checked the bathroom paint. Still not right. That $30 was really starting to make sense now. So I headed back to Home Depot and started over - this was trip #3. I came home with a Glidden color matched to Behr paint and it's perfect! We got the bedroom and bathroom painted tonight and can't wait to see it in the light in the morning with everything put back in place.

We can match any color... Really?

This afternoon Baby Bubba and I headed to Home Depot to have them color-match a Benjamin Moore paint color we picked out. Two hours later and we had it the closest we could get it. If it wasn't going to cost $30 more a gallon we would have just headed back to Benjamin Moore, but really, how good can paint be? No matter, the Bubs proved to be an angel by putting up with this process and our paint person gave him his very own apron as a reward for being so good. We even got to write his name on it with a Sharpie :)

Off to the beach with Daddy

Time to get the silly's out apparently.  Dada called on his way home from work and asked if I wanted to go to the beach since it was such a nice evening (although I suspected there was another fishing related reason he didn't admit to). I turned him down but offered up the Bubs in order to have a couple of hours of quiet time. He was very excited and went in and dressed himself but as I tried to get a couple shots of him in his very coordinated outfit he decided it was time to dance a little jig instead......




Looks like he got a little more serious at the beach though. It was a perfect night to snap a few photos and a good time for the boys to hang.

Stop and smell the.... forklift?

Know what I like best about the granparenty types? They'll hold up the line to have a little chat, they'll walk really slow to let kids explore at their own pace, they'll even teach a kid how to drive a forklift if they show enough interest.

That was our morning. We headed up to the Co-op to pick up a load of pellets and hopefully find some cheap local apples. As (our new friend) Rodney was loading up the truck with the pallet of pellets, Baby Bubba stood on the sidelines squealing with excitement and pretending he was driving. Turns out Rodney was one of those grandparenty types and he let the Bubs climb up on the forklift and run all of the controls. He honked the horn, ran the lift as high as it would go, side to side, and back down again. It was one of those moments that reinforces the concept of stop and smell the roses, or in our world, stop and learn to drive a fork lift with your new friend Rodney.

Meet Woody

This is Woody. He's one of the many stray cats that has tried to move in with us and although he's not the first I've fallen for, he's the first that Dada has agreed to do a test run with. See, Dada is allergic to cats but we both grew up with that one special cat that was ours and ours alone. I had Adam (the gray part Siamese she-devil hell cat) and Dada had Pele (the orange sweet and mild mannered cat). What we both agree on is that Baby Bubba should have that one special cat and that is absolutely, positively, 100% not Weezy. We'll save Weezy's story for another day though, today it's Woody's time to shine.

Woody started showing up in July of this year and he's a talker. Loud, non-stop talking, where you couldn't help but pay attention to him. He loves people, desperately wants someone to pet him, and tries to dash in the house if you leave the door open too long. On 2 occasions he's been spotted in the house where Weezy quickly rectified the situation.

Over the last couple of months we have learned several things about Woody. The most important is that his family moved away in the summer and left him behind. The second most important is that he prefers wet food, he's probably gained 3 pounds now and we can't feel his spine like we could before. He sits on the porch rail and lets Weezy slap him around a bit but he doesn't leave which I consider a good sign that he's willing to stay put for a while.

This weekend will be the big test run to see if Dada reacts to him and if not, Woody will become an indoor cat and an official member of the family.

Living (& loving) the blog life ~ taquitos style!

I've fallen in love with the blog world over the last year. It used to be this mythical thing that people would talk about that I kind of believed existed but I just couldn't access it or navigate it. However, more recently I've jumped in feet first and discovered a few gems that I adore. One of those is Our Best Bites, and these ladies know what they're talking about! So last night I made their Baked Creamy Chicken Taquitos and they were great! A little spicy for the Bubs but with a few adjustments the next round will be perfect for sure. These little guys are worth trying if you like to cook.

PUMPKIN FARM!!!

Fall is officially here in our world when we get to take the annual trip to the pumpkin farm. This year we got to make the trek with my sister and her family which is always a good time. There were so many fun things for the kids to do ~ slides, tractor rides, cow train, hay maze, corn maze, petting farm, pumpkin patch. Surprisingly none of the little ones turned into pumpkins themselves even with playing from 10:30-3:30, although I think us Mom's and Dad's were more than ready to hit the road and maybe some of us even took a nap when we got home. I'll never tell which ones though...

Last of the Edmonds Farmers Market

Today was the last day of the Edmonds Farmers Market so Baby Bubba and I took a trip across town to check out what was there while Dada was off shopping for fishing gear. We were looking for baking apples and maybe some honey. What we ended up with was olive oil from New Zealand, yellow carrots, plumots, butter toffee, Honey Crisp apples as big as my head (OK, as big as a cats head), Sixlets, Squirrel Nut Zippers, Bit o Honeys, and an USMC sticker from our new friend General Brady.

We must have spent a good 15 minutes talking to General Brady and his wife, or should I say the Bubs and General Brady spent 15 minutes talking. It was funny watching the two of them, a 3 year old and a 70+ year old holding a conversation in the middle of the market. They got a lot of attention and Allen sealed the deal when he shook General Brady's hand as we were leaving and said 'nice to meet you'. Such a little charmer he is.

From the Salmon Hatchery to XXX Root Beer

Today Baby Bubba and I took off to have lunch with Dada and due to all of the hubbub about the Issaquah Salmon Days we decided to check out the hatchery before we got our grub on. We showed up thinking we were going to be seeing little tiny fish but instead it was the 3 foot long Sockeye that were trying to get up the ladder. It was crazy how big these fish were! There were at least 2 very excited people in our party of 3.


Then we headed to XXX Root Beer where the sign on the door says 'Nothing here is good for you so don't even bother with a Diet Coke, have one of our Root Beer Floats' so we did. And it was a monster. As we were finishing up we met Jose who runs the joint. He was a fast new friend and took us inside to pose the Bubs for a 'great photo op' and then performed magic tricks while giving us little toys. Good times were had by all, then we all needed a nap.