How Arizonans do "cold"...

...with mittens and flip flops.

And Sean dressed up in his totally cute winter get up that won't fit tomorrow...

Turkeys and Parades

Well, here it is! The paper-mache turkey. Maggie still wants to put some finishing touches on it, but it looks pretty good! Big though!

The Tempe lights parade was tonight, but I missed it. I stayed home with Sean who is a little sick. Glen and Maggie went and they had tons of fun. Well, Maggie had fun anyway. ;) Thanksgiving was fine. I managed to ruin the yams, gravy, asparagus, and potatoes. Oh... and the turkey was underdone inside. I blame it on trying to multi-task with 2 kids, but really I just was having an off day. Glen and Maggie were out and about so it was just me and Sean, and he was sleeping most of the time. Oh well. Better luck next year. Hope everyone else had a good meal!

Paper Mache Turkey

I'm not sure where Maggie got the idea. But Glen thought it sounded fun so off they went on their project together. Glen shaped a turkey out of chicken wire and then they started putting the strips of newspaper over it. Its not currently done. Maggie is looking forward to painting it tomorrow morning but I don't think it will be dry by then. Fortuneately, the turkey looks more like a goose, so maybe it can become part of our Christmas decorations as well...

The peanut gallery watching the goings on.

Peter Piper Pizza

Its Tuesday and its the end of a loooooong week. Ok, it wasn't really that long. But we felt the need to celebrate the start of a 5 day weekend. Wooo hoooo! Maggie has school tomorrow, but Glen and I don't. I'm going to use the time to make pies for Thanksgiving and maybe get a jump on xmas shopping. Most of my shopping has been online this year, but there are a few things I prefer/need to get in person.

Maggie's class is having Thanksgiving Dinner for lunch tomorrow and families are invited, so Glen, Sean and I are going down for lunch at 9:45 am. (!?!) They stagger the start of lunch every 15 minutes starting with Kindergarten and ending with 6th grade. So when Maggie is in the cafeteria, she is there with 1st grade and leaving when 2nd grade starts to come in, if that makes sense. Can't wait to experience "the cafe" as Maggie calls it. Sounds more elegant then the cafeteria. I hope there will be some of Maggie's work on the walls in her classroom so I can see what she has been up to. She still is highly non-communicative about what goes on during her day.

Ok...so I have rambled a bit and haven't even addressed what the title of this post proclaims. We went to Peter Piper Pizza for dinner. The pizza was so much better than I remember. (We haven't been since Maggie was Sean's age as we had a bad experience...) Maybe I was just hungry? We had tons of fun. Even Maggie ate a piece of pizza. She usually picks everything off, but I noticed she left the mushrooms on this time. They were fresh, not canned. Very tastey. Sean hung out in the sling. He is too big to be worn the way I used to wear him when he was tiny. Now I put him on my hip and use the sling to support carrying him. It worked very well. Less stress on my back and Sean could see out and turn, but still snuggle down when he has had enough. I still prefer the Beco (SSC -- "soft structured carrier" for those new to babywearing -- looks like a little backpack worn on the front or back) for long carries as the weight is distributed on the hips. But its not comfy to sit in. The sling still wins for carrying while sitting.

I'm glad my English teacher isn;t reading these. I'm sure I'd lose points for grammer. I just reread everything and my writing leaves something to be desired. Oh well. Its just a blog, right? L8r!

Time flies

Wow. Has it really been almost a week since my last post? Time flies. Its been a good week. Maggie had her first field trip at school. They went to the zoo. I assume it went well. She really doesn't like to talk about her day. But her daily classwork sheet I have to sign came home with stars instead of frowning faces, so i guess things went well. I realized I need to start shopping for Christmas pronto. No more of this lazy online browsing. Its time to commit and buy!

Sean is wearing 12-18 months size clothes! He is only 5 months old! Yikes! Its getting hard to find babyish clothes that size. Everything is jeans and football shirts and polos. I really don't want to dress my baby up like a little bruiser! Let him be little for a bit longer. So I am on the hunt for soft knit baby pants and onesies in bright colors. None of this navy/gray/brown stuff. I want bright red, kelly green, and deep purple! My kids are children. THey deserve to dress in bright, fun colors. I don't like the adult male color scheme they are pushing in the 12-18 month clothing section. :( Rant done.

Jumperoo! Hopperoo!

Ok. We broke down and bought a big plastic baby item that will be outgrown in about 6 months. (I guess the baby bucket car seat fits into that category too, but ya have to buy those!) We bought Sean a jumparoo! It looks like an Exersaucer but with springs. There is one at daycare and he is always smiling when he is in it, so we bought one. He absolutely loves it! We don't have much baby paraphenalia beyond a stroller that we don't use, and a bouncy chair from when Maggie was a baby. So I guess this brings us up to par with mainstream america. Can you tell I am feeling guilty? We've been trying to stay away from MIC items (made in China) and also excessive plastic. Oh well.

Maggie loves the jumparoo too. She is very MAD that she is not allowed to climb in and give it a whirl. She asked Glen to build her a Maggie size jumparoo in the backyard. Maggie is somewhat appeased by the fact she can use her hopparoo while Sean is in the jumparoo. (Jumparoo time is when I am cooking dinner) She hops all around Sean and plays "Froggie". Sean is "baby froggy", Maggie is "sister froggy", and I am "mommy froggy". My job in the game is to ask "sister froggy" to catch some flies for dinner.

Here are some pictures...

The snuffles...

Sean has the snuffles. Actually, he is rather congested and sometimes does a little wheezing when breathing. :( We spent a lot of time in the hot, steamy bathroom with him this weekend to try to break up some of the congestion. He seems his chipper self otherwise. But as I write this, I can hear him sort of snoring because his nose is plugged up. Poor little guy. The good thing is no work tomorrow. Its Veteran's day and both Maggie and Sean's schools are closed so I "had" to take the day off too, and happy to do so. If Sean is up to it, we plan on going to the Veteran's day parade in downtown Tempe. Poor Glen has to work. It's somewhat silly that school is in session. They are closing down the street its on between 9am and 1pm because of the parade. (Not the same parade we are going to.)

Coloring Book from Photos

I thought this was a neat idea. My Kodak Easyshare Software has a "coloring book" effect. It will turn a photo into something you can color. Here is an example.

I thought it would be fun to make a coloring book out of family photos for Maggie for Christmas. Its becoming harder then I thought. Only a few photos look good with the coloring book effect turned on. If there is a busy background, forget it! Close-ups are good, but not too close. One of Sean I tried to make looks like he has no nose. Not enough color variation for the algorithm to detect I guess. The picture above looks like I have some black teeth and Glen looks like he has a double chin. Oh well. I need to focus on getting some good pictures for this project. I also need to figure out a way to put them together in a book. I guess I could just print them out and put them in a folder or something, but I was hoping for something more professional looking. Any ideas?

Halloween Pictures

First Parent Teacher Conference

Well, we survived our first parent-teacher conference. I feel it went well. The teacher seems less frustrated with Maggie's stubborness than the last time we talked. I know she is becoming more cooperative. I feel she has adjusted to life with a baby brother, and life at home seems much smoother the last few weeks. I suspect its the same at school. Boy they do a lot of worksheets! Bleh! The teacher does not seem into the hands on activities I envisioned there being in Kindergarten. Maggie has never brought home any artwork either. She has really been into painting at her easel lately. I guess to make up for it. They do have a weekly music class though, and Maggie has really been enjoying that. She likes to hit the rummy sticks.

In other news, Halloween was great. Maggie, Sean, and I went TOT-ing. Maggie was a mermaid and Sean was a dragon. Sean slept the whole time. Glen stayed home to hand out the candy. We got a lot of TOT-ers this year. Ran out of candy! That has never happened! Fortuneately, Maggie had scored a ton, so we passed out a bit of her candy while she was occupied in the bath-tub. Shhhhh! Don't tell! I'll try to post pics this weekend.