Star Quality

Pumpkin Patch 2012

We made another trip to the Pumpkin Festival in Elgin.

 Fletcher navigated the first maze.

High five for a job well done!

 There was a lot of jumping around on hay bales.

And sliding down hay bales.

Watching big brother.

And more jumping on hay bales!

A whole maze of hay!

Our friend Pumpkin, Louisa, and Fletcher enjoying the view on the first of our several tractor rides.

 

Me last year on the broken motor boat and...

...this year on the broken down boat!

Pumpkin was so excited to see her pumpkin cousins that she had a hard time containing herself.

 

A more composed portrait.

Happy Pre-Pre-Halloween, everyone!

Halloween Prep

Fletcher and I - and by default, Dallas and Louisa - take Halloween very seriously.

We carbo load with pumpkin pancakes.

We take our pal, Pumpkin, and her pet pumpkin out for a walk...

...while wearing coordinating llama jackets (thanks, Tante Ruth!).

Brisk weather? You can still play in the spinkler as long as you're wearing most of your Halloween costume, right?

 

This event was followed immediately by a bath to warm up. Fletcher was so chilly that he willingly - for the first time ever - agreed to a bath with warm water, instead of his usually preferred tepid.

 

 

We ate potato ghosts (and toast ghosts, and black cat sandwiches, and bat sandwiches, and many other combinations of Halloween shaped cheese and starch).

 

Okay, to be clear, Fletcher is not wearing a Mr. Rogers costume...it's an outfit. He was very adamant that this was not for Halloween. When he's being Mr. Rogers, he won't answer to "Fletcher" and he addresses me as "Valerie".

More Halloween themed carbs...breadstick bones!

Pretending to be a dog.

 Two bumblebees.

"A witch who takes care of bees".

Eyeball soup! Fletcher politely suggested that he would have just the tomato soup (skipping the cheese and olive balls) and "just pretend that there are eyeballs hiding under the soup".

Louisa gnaws on an eyeball.

Renegade Babe

I confess, I'd pretty much forgotten what it's like to have a toddler in the house. It's all coming back to me now: the emptied recycle bin, the poured-out dog water bowl, the clink of Brunello bottles as they are yanked from the wine rack, and most of all...the siren call of the open dishwasher.  Dallas found her the other day, comfortably perched on the dishwasher door, licking the cream cheese frosting off the eggbeater blades and spatula that someone (okay: me) had foolishly placed there.

 

Boo!

Life is so much calmer...

...now that Fletcher and Louisa have developed some common interests.

Like creating Car World.

 

The beauty of Car World is that you can do it again and again and it's different each time.

Fletcher explained that he was helping by getting out a few things for Loulou to play with.

Sometimes they just like to sit and read quietly together.

And sometimes they like to dump dirt out of flowerpots, the way you do.

I put her directly in the tub...

 

...and turned the hose on him. Simple, no?

 

This is what he told me today: "When a big kid has a baby come into their family, they might say 'Oh no! I want all the love for myself!' and they might be sad. But now I'm four and now I love Louisa. I think we might be married when we grow up."