I Love Clifford the Big Red Dog...

I had been feeling at a loss lately for what to blog about, but then this past week, a new inspiration.  Clifford.  You know, the cartoon of the big red dog from PBS Kids?  Yep, him.  Clifford got to come home with Peyton from school last week after her day of show and tell.  It is a literacy project Miss Karen & Miss Becky put together and each kid in the class gets their own week with the dog.  There are books, puzzles, activity sheets, a bowl with letters to feed Clifford with, and a journal.

When you have Clifford for the week, you get to do whatever you want with him.  We took him Christmas shopping, lunching, to a play, and a Christmas party.  Others took him to see Santa, play in the snow, down to the local fire station to hang out in a truck, and carved pumpkins with him.  We wrote in the journal and put pictures in of his week with Peyton. 

Well, that's all fine and dandy, but this mama may or may not have had a bit of fun with ol' Cliffy as well.  And my fun with Clifford, didn't quite make it into the classroom journal.  As much as the others parents would have appreciated the humor, it just wasn't pre-school appropriate! 

Clifford got to go to Victoria's Secret. You lucky dog you.  This was probably the highlight of his shopping trip on Monday.  Although Peyton tried to feed him some fries while out to lunch at Mc Donald's with Grandma.

We had a Christmas party to go to on Thursday night.  Good Ol' Clifford took it upon himself to scope out my wine rack and choose a beverage to bring to the party for all to share.  I mean, he is 47, so it's not like I was corrupting him.

We ended up not taking this bottle with us, as Grammy would have plenty of wine at the party.  Clifford you could say decided he was going to be the life of the party once we arrived, and made himself right at home behind the bar...

A nice crisp bottle of chardonnay was opened, Cliffy was all over it.

Hi found his way into Papa's humidor for a cigar, although there is no smoking in the basement at 407.



You would think that at 47 years old, Clifford would  have learned how to hold his drink, but I think mixing the wine and Corona's got to him, and he had to call it an early night.

I think Clifford had a good week with us, and is using the weekend to recover from the party.  I don't know that he will have this much fun again, but I think there are a few families on the list that might up the shenanigan's once they read this!

Halloween in December

What better way to kick off the Christmas season than with a Halloween recap:

THE cutest Superman ever!  Nathan is almost 2 and is simply delicious.

FLAVA FLAV!  You have to yell it, it's the only way.

A cupcake, Tinkerbell, and a candy corn to hand out the treats.  Peyton enjoys this more than the door to door trick-or-treating.

My Halloween wine glass.  Courtesy of my mother-in-law and Home Goods.

"I'm Rick James!!"  Not sure who was our favorite was, this guy or Flava Flav.  It's a tie as far as we all were concerned. 



Yummy snacks for after dinner.

Christmas funnies coming soon!

Peyton, Noah & the Fall Festival

Thursday was the Fall Festival Program at Peyton's school. A bunch of 3 & 4 year olds singing and dancing, is there a better way to spend your morning? I think not!

Not sure what was more entertaining this day, the songs the everyone did or watching Peyton and her friend Noah while the other classes performed.

Noah, it has been reported, likes Peyton.  Not just likes her, but likes her likes her.

And honestly, what's not to like about this face?

 As all this was unfolding, Dug looked at me and said "You're totally eating this up aren't you?"  And I was!  10 minutes after he asked me that, I hear from across the way "Michelle!  Michelle!!"  And it's Noah's mom Cheryl.  "Are you watching those 2?" she asks, "I got them on camera!" I reply.  Dug's on the other side of me just shaking his head.

 

Noah's mom also told me that he won't wear his "motorcycle hair" anymore because Peyton told him she liked his hair like that.  What is "motorcycle hair" you ask?  When he would wear it all spiked up with gel of course.  This is the same Noah who when he walked in the door a few weeks ago, all the girls in the hallway turned and as 1 said "Hi Noah!" (Draw it out for about 6 syllables like any girl says to a cute guy!)  No other boy this year has gotten a greeting like that. It's always the shy quiet type isn't it?! And besides Noah, there are only 3 other boys in the class.  There are 11 girls.  It's good to be a boy in room 3 this year.

Back to the show at hand...Peyton's class sang songs about the weather, decorating a pumpkin, and a song about the alphabet.

Singing and dancing, and to do both in front of an audience? Just a few of Peyton's favorite things!

Take a bow sister for a job well done!

This Sunday is Halloween and we always have a really good time with our neighbors on this day!  There is a hot firepit, coolers full of cold beverages, warm soups and pizza, and about 5 houses that all come together to celebrate in 1 driveway.  There is a chocolate cake in the shape of a pumpkin and some cupcakes on my kitchen table waiting for me to frost & decorate them, we have friends coming for dinner, and I need to email these pictures to Noah's mom, so off I go to enjoy my weekend! 

Hope you do too!!

1st Place Cupcake!

There was a Halloween party & costume contest Sunday at Peyton's pre-school.  Cost of admission was a bag of candy, so needless to say this was my kind of party!  There was a costume contest for babies on up to the big kids, and that costume right there, took 1st place among the 3&4 year olds.  I really need to thank my friend Stephanie who was adamant that Peyton be a cupcake!  Well, Stephanie and Pottery Barn Kids.  There were blow up bouncy houses, a sinking ship blow up slide that was REALLY fast, witches hat ring toss, make your own life size pixie stick, and this the simplest game ever:

Balloons and a paper plate taped to a ruler.  She would have stayed here all day if we let her.  There was other things to see and do though.  We met up with our neighbor Tinkerbell, I mean, Lily:

The last activity of the day was scratching out a face and belly button on this spider at Miss Karen's art table:

After dinner it was carve the pumpkin time.  Normally this is a neighborhood activity, but we had a family birthday party the night the other houses did pumpkins. 

Peyton had fallen asleep in the truck the night we came home from the birthday party, and I was hoping to get her in the house before she noticed that the neighbors were doing pumpkins.  It was 9:00, she was going on no nap, recovering from a cold, and just plain needed to go to bed.  Well, guess who saw the neighbors gathered in the garage next door and pumpkins on the tables?  

The mini-version of the meltdown went something like this:

P: "I want to go to Lily's and do my pumpkin."

Me: "Not tonight. We'll do yours another night."

P: "But I don't ever get to do my pumpkin!  I waited all summer to do my pumpkin!  You never let me do my pumpkin!" <said in her best drawn out whiny over dramatic voice>

Me: <making mental notes to not forget this conversation> 

So Peyton and Dug did her pumpkin after the party at her pre-school and all is right in her world again.

Well, it was right until she asked for a candle to put inside and I didn't have any tea lights on hand.  Whoopsies.  Forgive me for not remembering the tea-lights, but Halloween just isn't my holiday.  The best part of Halloween for me is that Christmas season and music start the day after.  Technically it starts at 7:00pm Halloween night if you ask my mom, because that is when Trick-or-Treating is over.

But back to the holiday at hand...Peyton also got to wear her cupcake costume to dance class Monday night and she had fun with that.  It is not a ballet movement or car-riding friendly costume, so I bet she had to work really hard that night at dance and when I put it on her Sunday before we left:

P: "Um, how am I supposed to sit in my seat in this thing? Cause it's not very bendy like this thing, so how does that work?"   

Me: "Well, you'll put it back on once we get to the school."

P: "Oh, alright, that's cool."

My oven timer is ringing and I have Halloween cupcakes to finish for my sister, frosting and sprinkles await!

1 fish, 2 fish...

3 fish, breathing fish.  This is her fish "Bubbles".  And by fish, I mean the mask to her nebulizer is a fish, not the swims in circles in a bowl fish.  Bubble has been a part of our family for about a year and a 1/2.   We are lucky enough that we have a child who doesn't necessarily mind having to do "fishes" when told.  So long as she can turn the machine on and off herself and can possibly find a Phineas & Ferb episode, we are good to go.  Before this pic was snapped she had been leaning on the tray in a "this is the most boring lecture I have ever heard" style. 

She got this tray last week while out shopping with Dug for a little Daddy/Daughter time.  It serves many purposes for her.  She can prop herself awake during fish time, eat meals on it, color on it (pre-marker fiasco of 2010) and use it as a "blanket" for nap time as so demonstrated here:

We ate dinner this night down in the family room as the kitchen table was slightly occupied by about 7 dozen cupcakes.  Dug and I were talking about random stuff going on, how was your day, blah blah blah...when we noticed it had gotten quiet, we look up, there she was.  Passed out cold at 6:00 P.M.  She must have had a nugget or tot too many that night.  "Don't make a sound!" I whispered as I tiptoed to go get my camera.  She stayed there for about an hour.  Never moved and then turned around and went to bed for the night at 8:30. 

It amuses me greatly to see/find her passed out in random places about the house.  I once found her 1/2 in the bottom of the linen closet in the upstairs hallway, on the floor in the front room, while sitting in her chair eating dinner at the kitchen table mid-chew, or buried under a mountain of stuffed animals on her bed at 11 in the morning.  If it has gone quiet in this house for more than 15 minutes she has fallen asleep.  Guaranteed.

We have settled somewhat back into a sense of normalcy now that the wedding is over and my huge reception order went out over the weekend.  One of those normal things is dance class on Monday nights, and this night it happened to be sunny and 75.  She felt the need to wear this thick sweatshirt over her leotard "just in case it got cold out when I get out of dance class."  

I asked her if she needed to wear pants too if since she thought it was going to be so cold out when she got done with class.  "No mom.  It's not that cold out, only sweatshirt cold."  She replied in a tone of voice that suggests that I am the crazy one.   Ah to be 4 again and have all the answers!

At the pumpkin farm

All she wanted that day was a "Peyton sized pumpkin".  And this was the chosen one!

We went with our friends Eric & Amy and their daughter Addison.  And it was COLD!  I don't know that we have ever had good weather when going to the pumpkin farm with the Norberg family.  This being only the 2nd year that we have gone together, not like it has been a lifetime of pumpkin farm trips or anything.  Side note: we also went to Michigan this summer with the Norberg's and it was cold that week too.  I sense a trend here maybe??  One of these years though, we'll pick a good weekend!

In the goat pen, they were not to keen on the goat and I think the feeling was mutual.



But they liked the funny face photo stand!

Peyton leading the way in their matching hoodies we got them on vacation this summer, again because it was so cold!

Addison telling Peyton she needed to get out of her picture!  I think the look on Peyton's face says: "Yeah right chickie!"

Then she tried to *steal* a wagon!

As hard as we tried, and for as many pictures that we took, I don't think we had a picture with Peyton & Addison facing and smiling at the same time or in the same direction.  Addison also yelled "NO! NO! NO!" when Peyton climbed in the wagon with her and her pumpkins.  It was all good though once Uncle Eric took his hat off and shook his fluffy hair around! 

Peyton and Dug walking into the farm.  I love when I get pictures like this!

My mom and I took Peyton back to the same pumpkin farm 3 days later and it was sunny & 75.  Easily 20 degrees warmer than it had been on the Saturday when we went.

In deep conversation with the goat.  You can decide what the conversation was about.

Peyton and grandma.  She looks thrilled right?!

Peyton and I.

A decent picture of her in the pumpkin patch.

She thought that grandma needed a "Peyton sized" pumpkin or 2.

These 2 pumpkins and a bigger one made a new home on my mom's front porch next to her goose named Annie.  I honestly don't know that we have ever had such good weather as we did on this Tuesday.  Any weekend we have gone we have froze or been rained on.  Is there some unwritten rule that you only get good pumpkin farm weather during the week? 

We now have good fall weather that has rolled in, nothing above 65 for the next week at least, and it's almost flannel sheet time!! I can't wait!