BR's first post! (and maybe last)

BE recently took a trip with her sisters (and mother) to Disneyland, so I took the opportunity to take a trip to Paris (yes, the one in France).  It was great, and now that I have mastered the language and culture, I am ready to go back with BE (E will have to wait a few years--11 hours is a long time on a plane with a kid!).

BR

Pumpkins

E and I got up bright and early this morning and headed out to a free pumpkin patch. We had a really really good time.

He played in his first bounce house.

Rode the merry-go-round

We took a hay ride.

"Drove" a tractor

Met up with some of his favorite tv and movie friends

And of course saw a lot of pumpkins.

If you haven't gotten enough pumpkin pictures check out our new fall slide show.

The plants are always greener on the other side (or at least they are alive)

I think... no I know I took for granted how easily thing grew in Houston. I mean I think we watered our lawn maybe five times the whole two years we lived in our house and the grass always looked green. Whenever the greenery started looking a little sad it would rain. Unfortunately (for my yard) landscape maintenance is not so easy at our new house. In contrast to the overgrown vacant lot next door our yard looks okay, but it doesn't help that our other next door neighbor has a really nice yard. In fact they even have a cute little landscape feature that is sort of theirs even though it is in our side yard. They also made a few improvements in our yard after we bought the house but before we moved in. It was kind of nice because they did exactly what I was planning on doing.

A couple of weeks ago when our yard wasn't looking particularly fabulous we walked outside for a family walk. Our mailbox has two little planter boxes on each side of it and there is a little (nearly dead because the sprinklers don't spray them) flower bush thing in each one... well there was. As we walked down the driveway I noticed one was gone. My first thought was "I can't believe the neighbor stole our dead plant. I get it, we need to take care of our yard, but now it looks silly with one missing plant. And why didn't they pull the weeds when they pulled the plant?" Br and I went back an forth about why someone would take our sad plant. Suddenly Duchess (our dog) started walking weird. She thought there was an animal in the street up ahead that she thought she needed to get. I pulled her back and said "that's not an animal Duchess it's just a weed". We got a little closer. It wasn't just any weed it was our sad plant. Turns out it wasn't stolen (of course it wasn't, why would someone steal a plant) it just up and blew away. How sad, my landscaping became a honest to goodness tumbleweed. Time for some serious yardwork.

E showing his creative side

Most artists have a preferred medium. Earlier this week E experimented with a new one... white out. He painted his face, two rugs, the leather ottoman, the laminate floor and the brand new tile floor. Luckily he was taking a moment to select his next canvas so I was able to get to him before he decided to turn the new carpet into a masterpiece. Lessons learned from it: Even when you think your house is "baby proof" your very busy little son will find something to keep him even more busy. When your child eats white out poison control says "Just give him some water" and the key to cleaning up white out is let it dry, scrape up what you can, use magic eraser for the residue.

My Little Protégé

E and I have had a fabulous day today. The highlight was when I got fed up with the old bananas on my counter and decided to make banana bread for Br's seminary class tomorrow. Typically when I bake I try to distract E and work as fast as I can. Without fail, within minutes he'll start crying, grabbing my legs and wanting me to pick him up (although if I was doing anything else he'd be so mad at me for picking him up). Today I decided to experiment and let him help me. We washed our hands and he managed to keep them out of his mouth (and nose) the whole time we were baking. I measured everything for him and he dumped it in. He cracked the eggs for me and I put them in. He watched the mixer go and we managed to get through the whole thing without him sticking his hands in the batter. Success! Over the past few weeks he really seems to be showing me that he is growing up. Baking by 2. Full course meals by 3. I'll never have to cook dinner again!

Sippy Cup Saga

I don't know what it is at our house but sippy cups just don't last that long. Our dog doesn't chew anything up but for some reason she has taken out two sippy cups, the most recent met it's demise while E and I were at the park today. We've also lost a few cups (mostly the disposable ones) due to the lack of desire of washing after being found hiding for days or even weeks under the couch, in the car, in a closet, you name it with milk still in it. Gross. The number one culprit for taking a sippy cup out of action is loosing the little clear plugs (like the Playtex cups have) that go in the top. Despite having a little mesh basket thing in the dishwasher without fail the darn little plugs disappear just like you favorite sock in the dryer. Recently we've switched to the cup that just have the one big white plug hole (like Gerber) but they have let me down because as E shakes his cup the plug falls out and then we get milk sprayed everywhere and any where. I'd like to just do away with the whole sippy cup things but E just likes playing with liquid way too much and has this think with turning things over when he is done with them. Yes, I do realize that most of my sippy cup drama could be resolved with a little extra parental supervision, but I'm just not on top of my game enough right now to be able to commit to that kid of responsibility:) So until I get my act together does anyone out there have a good sippy cup recommendation?