There are tons of little things that happen during a month that I wish I could capture better as they happen, but they're just things that happen as part of the every day that catch you off guard, but they're so cute you wish you could capture it forever. Unfortunately, we hardly ever are at a point where we can stop and write it down. This is something that we need to endeavor to do a better job at. One of the funniest things that happened was with Phoebe.
She started getting out of bed a lot more this month to turn on her light. She would get out of bed, and get lost trying to get back into bed in the dark and wake up screaming. It was very sad. We finally decided that it was time to get her a night light. We placed an order for one with Bapa, but in the mean time we found an old one in the cabinet. One night as we were walking to our room past Phoebe's door, Jada did her usual check to re-position blankets and bodies. She came in to have me come look at Phoebe. I burst out laughing when I saw it. I had to leave the room so I wouldn't wake her up. She was laying with her head on the bed, but she was bent at her waste with both feet squarely on the floor. I don't know how she was keeping her legs straight enough to do that, but it was hilarious. Ellen is often found in bizarre positions in her bed as well. Never anything like that, but certainly worthy of contortionists. (As of the end of the month, Phoebe had been found in this position twice.)
The other big news for Phoebe was the poopin' in the potty. (see picture here...if you dare) She did it several times this month. Each time took some coaxing, but she did it. We're getting closer. Ellen is still in pull-ups at night. She is keeping tracking of wet vs. dry pull-ups, but there aren't enough dry ones to risk it quite yet. She had got several months before the end of October when she wet her bed during nap time. But it has been very few and far between.
This month we had Ellen's field trip to the apple orchard. We had terrific weather this year. We went to Heritage Farms again this year which is great for us since it's the same one we always go to since it's not too far away from our house. We got to go on the hay ride first which was fun and bumpy. While there we saw Laurie Manghelli's nieces while we checked out the animals at the farm. Then it was off to the giant inflatable apple for some bouncing around. Phoebe actually went in there for a few seconds this time. Finally, the choosing of the pumpkins. They walked gently amongst the small pumpkins looking for one with that special something. Phoebe found hers first. It had a curved stem. Then Ellen found hers with a very straight, tall stem. Then they went and found one for grandma with the curly stem.
We finally bought the girls some work gloves. Unfortunately, they only make them in generic "kids" sizes so both of the girls are wearing the same size. To celebrate, they got to help me rake leaves. They really enjoy helping with that. They got to help a couple of times, but now it has started to rain a lot, so the soggy leaves will have to wait for now.
Jada and I got free tickets to the Blazers pre-season opener against the Sonics, so we got to have our first night out alone together. The Blazers even managed to pull off a win. We actually got to have 2 nights out this month. The second one was just dinner since there weren't any movies that we really wanted to see. We lingered over a nice dinner at the Hall Street Grill for an hour (that's about 30 minutes longer than we normally eat with the kids.) We tried to figure out what to do next, so since we're the most interesting and exciting couple in America, we decided to do an errand followed by a trip to a book store. Yeehaw. We were home before 9pm.
We made a last run to somewhere fun before the rainy season began, so we chose the Japanese Garden. There are two seasons when visits to the garden are most extraordinary. Autumn is one of those seasons. The trees are brilliant with orange and red leaves. The many colors shining like the scales of the koi in the pond. The girls enjoyed following all the paths, steps, and bridges. The grownups took turns with the camera trying to capture the splendor.
Of course, the main event for the month was Halloween. Jada actually slaved over a costume for once. Ellen had decided last year that she wanted to be a spider. Although we looked around, we never found a pre-made spider costume. So Jada took it upon herself to figure out how to make a costume. First we found black clothes-a leotard, sweatpants, sweatshirt, and socks. The next part was some black felt and florist wire to make 4 extra legs. Before Jada had put together the legs, she found a web to use as a centerpiece-it is one of those that have a large spider in the middle and uses a suction cup to attach it to a window. Using a glue gun, the felt was used to cover the florist wire. Then the legs were attached to the center of the web and then secured to the edges of the web. The next step was to figure out how to attach all of this to Ellen's clothes. Dave had the idea to make backpack-like straps. So we found some black ribbon, sewed them to the edges of the web for the backpack straps and then extras to tie around the waist. The final look was great. The legs would catch on things or droop at times, but we would just bend the wire back into position. As for our dear Phoebe, she insisted she would be a princess until she checked out the hand-me-down leopard costume from Ellen and the Casey kids. It has a sound box inside that would make a "meow-meow" sound when pushed. Phoebe was sold! From then on she told everyone "I'm a le-paaaard!!!" with a very cute, deep voice. Jada used face paint to create whiskers and a brown nose. Then we were ready to party.
On the Tuesday morning before Halloween the Beaverton Library Preschool Story Time theme was Halloween. Miss Ginny, a children's librarian, and Grandma Janet had prepared 3 stories, a fun craft, and a snack of cookies and juice. The best part was that it was the first time for Ellen and Phoebe to wear their costumes.
Jada had worked for 12 hours doing conferences on Thursday, so she was able to take Friday off and attend Ellen's school party. The "party" consisted of a parade and songs by the afternoon three and four year olds. All three groups marched in to music and then settled on the floor to sing songs for their parents. They sang "Five Little Pumpkins," "I'm a Little Acorn," and "Grey Squirrel." Each song was accompanied by hand and body motions. Our favorite was when Ellen shook her "bushy tail" for the squirrel song. Ellen then pick up her candy haul and headed home with mom. Another successful experience in the costume.
That same night was Pumpkinfest at Conestoga Rec Center. After dinner both girls were dressed up in their costumes and whisked off to the recreation center for more fun. The night was supposed to start at 6:30 pm, we arrived at 6:20 and were able to pay and get in immediately. Each girl was handed a card with 5 spaces to earn stamps at the various activity rooms. We began by playing in the open gym, riding trikes, playing with balls, and climbing indoor play structures (Ellen kept getting her extra arms caught on things). Then it was off to vote for our favorite pumpkins-Ellen's had a spider carved into it, Phoebe's was a smaller pumpkin than all the others ("tiny one like me" as she likes to say). Next the girls guessed the number of candies in jars, neither won the prize. After that we all went to the arts and crafts room. Phoebe's regular art teacher, Michelle, was there although she had almost completely lost her voice. The girls completed a couple of projects and then headed over to the game room. Unfortunately by then the game room was packed and the lines too long for our squirmy girls to wait. Our final stop was to music time with Mr. Bob, who was assisted by his daughter. What fun! The whole family enjoyed the performance which was a condensed version of the entire series of munchkin music classes we used to attend. There were some extra songs added in to celebrate the holiday-"The Monster Mash" and "Ghostbusters." The parachute came out, there were bubbles, balls, frogs, the Hokey Pokey, and a variety of dance tunes. We spent the majority of our evening in that little alcove at the bottom of the stairs enjoying Mr. Bob's music with many other former music students. On our way out, we stopped at the front desk to turn in the cards filled with stamps. Ellen and Phoebe each earned a goodie bag for their efforts.
Pete threw a couple of shin-digs for his visiting family. He had an evening party which Jada attended, and I stayed home with the girls so they could get some sleep. The time changed that night, and we had to get up early the next morning to go back over to Pete's for breakfast before our cyclocross race (www.crosscrusades.com). We were the only ones to come, of course. That's ok though, more pancakes for us. The girls wore their costumes again so that Pete and his family could see them. Then we all headed to the race while Jada and the girls went home. We had a fun time at the race. I made a Batman costume with ears glued to my helmet, a black on yellow felt bat symbol, and a yellow felt utility belt. No cape, though since I didn't want it to get caught on anything. Of course, by the time we were done, it was all muddy. The pictures from the race were too blurry. I'll post the post-ride pics though.
Finally, on Halloween our friend Laurie Manghelli came over to help with the trick-or-treating since Dave went to guitar lessons right after work. Jada, Laurie, and the girls ate dinner and then after getting the kids in costume headed out. Considering there were only about 10 houses on the route, stopping only for folks our family knows, it took longer than expected. It seems that Phoebe had put her shoes on the wrong feet which slowed her down a lot. One of our neighbors had built a set in their garage which scared the girls. Luckily one of the kids brought candy out to Phoebe and Ellen and let them know that it was only "Dad" and not to be worried. Upon returning to our house Jada asked the girls to dump out their candy. Ellen turned her bag over and let everything fall to the floor. Phoebe sat down, pulled candy bars out one by one, and then lined them up on the floor. Then Jada asked Ellen to figure out the names of the candy. Ellen read the sounds "k-i-t-k-a-t" and then said "Kit Kat." Next she sounded out "Snickers." We were all very impressed. When Dave finally arrived home, he took the kids over to Mike and Carrie's house for a last stop. Then it was back home to change into pajamas, brush teeth, and then off to bed. (The girls were allowed to have two small candy bars.)
To round out our month, we also got to visit with several of our good friends. Now perhaps you understand why these are always late!
Journal entry: November 2, 2005
