Our Halloweens, Past & Present ☺

And if you want a reminder of just how quickly change happens all around you, just take a look at children....

This is Halloween 3 short years ago... My little Lion and Scarecrow in our ensemble of the Wizard of OZ. 

(Yes, that's me in the background, Dorothy.  And no, that was not a wig- but my Real Hair.  I went through a red phase...  Shouldn't every gal? 

My Tin Man Husband was busy painting his face Silver in the bathroom, and this shot was taken pre the crying and screaming that his scary face caused in the children.  They had no idea who he was and in turn suffered frightened meltdowns before heading out to Trick-or-Treat.)

 



Halloween 2009:

We were each an element that makes up a S'more...

Our Marshmallow...

& Our Chocolate Bar.... 

(And you can assume that my husband and I were each Graham Crackers.  So sorry we have no family pics on our laptop files...  as they were taken my my mother with her own camera.)

This is them as a Vampire and a Pirate from the same year, for their aunt's Halloween Bash....

Finally, last year they broke away from our "Family Ensemble" and chose their costumes based off of what they found most interesting in a Walmart aisle....

The Magician and his Bunny Rabbit. 

(A little too big to be pulled out of the hat, but cute as a bunny just the same. ;-)  You should see the view from the back, his tail was the cutest part!)

And this year, Halloween 2011, the kids will dress up as their favorite super heroes.  (And Dad and Mom will join in on the fun again, as the villains!):

Our Brave Spiderman and Batman.... 

I will dress as (a very less sexy) Cat Woman-think kitty ears, a tail and drawn on whiskers with black sweats.  And my hubs will dress up as The Joker.

Even our new pooch will join in on the fun this year...

Super Dog Rocky, at your service!!!

Hard to believe these are the same kids...  they grow so fast.  And each Halloween comes around more quickly than the last!

So cherish every moment- the pumpkin pickin' and carving.  The dressing up.  The decorated spooky treats, and rooms.... Knocking on cheerful neighbors' doors. Bonfires (with S'mores, of course!).  The Halloween movies, scary music, and sugar highs!  The whole nine yards!  These are memories that both kids and their parents alike will recall and cherish for years to come. ♥

*Added:

The family photos on our buffet table.

At least you get a sense of how big and scary the Tin Man was for these little kids.  :)

Unpredictable Chaotic Bliss

You never know what the day will bring.  Even with the predictability of being a stay home mom of two toddlers, this is true.  While I must admit our “adventures” are limited.  (Say like… to the park, grocery market, or nearest Chic fil A play area.)  There are still a plethora of places and situations one can find herself in when she’s running around with little kids as sidekicks.  The randomness of being a parent of young kids is constant.   You wake up thinking you’ll scramble some eggs and bacon, and instead its pancakes and sausage they want.  Sure, this is one miniscule example.  But this is just the first five minutes of your day.  You believe you’re ahead of the game with their outfits picked out the night before, only to be met with pouty lips, and watery eyes because it’s the wrong shirt you’ve chosen.  (You pick and choose your battles, but with just fifteen minutes left to get to preschool, I’d be willing to bet you’d swap that striped shirt for the Batman one, too.   You’d probably also feed your kid whatever it is (within reason) that will get him to eat, just so that you can follow through with brushing of the teeth and the hair, doing the dressing, the putting on of the socks and shoes, the back pack, etcetera etcetera etcetera – just to get out of the freaking door!)  Then….. someone’s got to poop.  ALWAYS!  Poop never ceases to come at the most inopportune times!  Just before the movie starts at the theatre, right as you’re about to stuff that fork full of pasta fasul into your mouth, and always when you’re rushing out the door to get somewhere on time!  So, after doing his business and, attempting to wipe the tushy himself, he flushes the poo along with twenty pounds of toilet paper, causing the toilet to over flow- soaking more than just the floor.  Time to pick out a third shirt, and grab your good towels to clean up the stinky, soaking wet mess happening on the bathroom floor.  (Because the good towels are the closest to you and because the only things you care about right now is trying to NOT be locked out of the preschool building.)   All in a weekday morning!  See?  Hectic situations ensue on a daily basis with these tiny, chaotic people.  Schedule things?  Ha!  The very idea of scheduling laughs in my face.

How about you’re rolling along the highway at 60 miles per hour heading to a doctor’s appointment, when one of your kids projectile vomits.  The flowing liquid in the rear view mirror catches the corner of your eye, and the screams or horror from his sibling next to him render you so off guard that it triggers your foot to slam on the brake.  In doing so, the airborne mass of disgustingness propels forward at an even higher velocity, covering your face just as you turn backwards to see what exactly this disgusting looking levitated matter is.  Now you’re swerving off the road, where you vehicular manslaughter a baby turtle, and narrowly miss a billboard sign for some kind of erectile dysfunction medication in the middle of Interstate 95, wondering what the heck happened, and how the hell you’ll ever be able to afford the nine hundred dollar ticket for reckless driving you now have because the cop who came to your aid is single and childless and has no sympathy whatsoever for what you’ve just gone through! 

No.  This did not really happen to me.  But it’s entirely possible, give the fact that kids are so damn unpredictable and have a knack for making things happen that you couldn’t have possibly foreseen in a million years. 

And oh the questions I’m faced with explaining to these inquisitive boys and the things we get into because of those incessant inquiries.  It’s a domino effect, and there’s no end in sight!  This morning, for instance, I found myself answering the question from my four year old as to why some people call the beach the desert.  Undoubtedly a question brought on by some cartoon episode I had entertaining the kids while I attempted to cook breakfast.  (Who says tv doesn’t teach?)  Out came the laptop, up came the Google screen, and in a nano second there was a map of the US, which aided me tremendously in my explanation of how sand without the ocean is not a beach.  ….Whiiiich brought us to finger painting pictures of the sand and surf per the kids’ requests.  A filthy kitchen, two color-covered little dudes, and a whopping mess of paint, papers, brushes, toilet paper rolls and plates later…. I’m exhausted, and I’ve spent my whole morning and afternoon doing something that I didn’t anticipate I’d be doing when I awoke this morning.  This, of course, means that I got nothing else of any importance done today. Like, organizing the bills (Me?  Organized? Ha!), calling to have some erroneous charge removed from my checking account (PI work, aka those dang websites claiming free trials to look up legal documents on people but who really jip you by charging ANYWAY, costs money), making one single bed in this house (Oh well, we’ll just mess ‘em up in a few hours again anyway), or finishing any one of the hundred unfinished house projects that have remained unfinished for months (What’s one more day?)…. But to be fair, making a mess painting with two lil cuties in the kitchen is way more fun than doing adult chores.   Any day.

Point is: 

If you’re an anal retentive, scheduling crazed, orderly, clean, hectic-life-hatin’, methodical, precise person- do not have kids!  Or.  Have them anyway and embrace your newfound chaos.  You’ll be kissing goodbye this idea of an actual clean and structured lifestyle for a good long while.  But if anything is worth it, kids are!

End note:  Literally, just as I was about to post this, my four year old came running out from his bed screaming "Bloody nose!  I got a bloody nose!"

I couldn't make this stuff up.....  Unpredictable, indeed.



Oh the Joys of Boys

If ever there was a Girly Girl, I was her.  I didn’t start out that way.  It evolved over time.  A fabulously diva-ish older sis whom I always looked up to, and an always put together beautiful mother, my Tom Boy ways slowly but surely vanished away.  Over time, I went from accompanying my father on trips to the hardware store, and playing with the rocks and dirt, to donning hot rollers in my hair, and blowing on my freshly painted finger nails.  I evolved from the “son my father never had” to the prissy captain of the cheerleading squad with flowing blonde hair and the trail of boys who followed.  Labels on my clothing, heels on my shoes, Brad Pitt posters on my walls…  Transformation complete.  Never looked back.

Not in a million, billion, gazillion years did I ever envision myself being the mother of a boy.  Having had no prior experience with boys- no brothers to speak of & the aunt of a perfectly gorgeous niece- when I saw the identity of my own little bambino’s gender show on that small black and white screen, you could have knocked me off of the table with a feather.  What the hell was I going to do with a BOY!?

Once I held him in my arms, I of course embraced it.  “Mommy’s little Boy… ahhh.”   I vowed to work my hardest to grow him into a sensitive, compassionate, SAFE, little man.  He’d be astute, and cautious, proper, courteous, demure even.  Did I mention, safe and cautious?  Oh was my number one priority to keep my new little prince safe!   To the point that I’d sometimes drive myself to the point of hysteria just thinking about all the possible ways he could feel hurt.  The thought pained me to the core.  I denounced the talks of four wheelers, dirt bikes, trampolines, and the like that I’d heard from my husband and his family.  Eleven short months later, along came another little boy.  Me, with two boys!  If there is a god, he or she certainly has got a sense of humor. 

I enjoyed the purchasing of preppy clothing, books, blocks and the like, and remained steadfast in my view of keeping them away from anything potentially dangerous or vulgar as they played in a completely baby proof environment.  There was no budging on this rule.  Even talks of all the mischief my little angel babies would get into, by jokesters in the family, pissed me off. 

Well, just as all things cycle around- so too have I.  That prissy person I’d evolved into has been steadily chipped away at.  Fast forward six years.  I’ve got two little boys that will be turning four and five years old before this Christmas, and sometimes I amaze myself with the gifts I look at for them.  I can’t even help myself.  I want them to embrace life!  Their smiles and laughter because of the joy they get out of living is priceless to me.  Last year, I purchased mini skate boards for them- MYSELF.  The husband couldn’t believe it when I’d brought them home.  The prima donna, sheltered gal who wasn’t ever allowed to jump on a trampoline growing up and never once wore a pair of roller skates actually purchased dangerous skate boards for her little angels?!  Yep, and I also allow them to bounce on my in-laws’ trampoline to their little hearts’ content.  I get excited looking at dirt bikes in Toys R Us, and count the years until they can enjoy the thrills and joys of cruising on one of them themselves.  (In full protective gear, of course.)  I go fishing with them, although I’ll confess I never will place a worm on a hook.  I play the “Nilock” in our pretend games of Power Rangers, running around making monster sounds and hiding in closets and behind nooks and crannies all over the house, waiting to jump out and scare the bejesus out of these boys.  Outdoor games of baseball, football, digging in the sand to find sand crabs.  You name it, I’m probably doing it.  I’ve become a Tom Boy, yet again!  And I love every minute of it.

These are things I’d never be experiencing, if not for these sons of mine.  It’s true what they say- that when you become a parent, you get to relive your childhood all over again.  Only this time, it’s even better!  Oh how I love them, and all of the joy that they continue to bring to me.  And this is why I sigh as my heart leaps with joy, and I say, “Oh, the joys of Boys”!