Run-down

Where were we?

I have no clue, so I'll just start with where my new pictures start . . . because that's the best part anyway, right? :)

A week before Thanksgiving, Charley's preschool class threw a Thanksgiving party, where all the kids dressed up like Indians (not ONE of them wanted to be a pilgrim, so they pretended we were the pilgrims coming to their feast), sang us a song, and then served us all lunch, including pies that they baked in class. Here's my darling little Indian . . .


That weekend, we attended the birthday party of one of Charley's classmates. Someone volunteered to do face painting, so both my kids took advantage. After Zander saw Charley's butterfly, he insisted on having his own blue butterfly.


We spent the rest of the weekend preparing for the arrival of my dad, Ed, who flew in from Sacramento on Tuesday. First thing was first . . . we hit the beach early Wednesday morning for a little fun in the sun.

Thanksgiving arrived before we knew it, and our house quickly filled with our family, plus two other families, the Roethlers and McGinity's . . . 7 adults, 7 kids, and one 27 lb. turkey. Needless to say, it was a lot of fun and the food was awesome (especially thanks to my friends' contributions!). Here are the kids burning off some energy before dinner . . .

To avoid another lazy day at home, as well as any areas that may have crazed Christmas shoppers, we decided to check out the North Shore today where there were supposed to be some big waves, up to 20 feet they predicted.

Ironically, we ran into Heather, her dad, and her kids at the beach park, and we all went down to the water to check out some beach turtles that were lounging in the sand. There were at least ten turtles just in the area where we were looking. I've seen a turtle or two since we've lived here in Hawaii, but nothing quite like this. This was WAY COOLER than anything Walmart or the mall could have offered today!

So that's the nitty gritty of the past week or so. I'm sure a bunch of other stuff has happened too, but unless I have a picture to capture the moment, I often forget about it. Good thing I take a lot of pictures.

Tomorrow we are going to hit the pool, and on Sunday Brian is leaving for a work conference in Mobile, Alabama. My dad is sticking around until Tuesday, and then we have a short two and a half week break before our next guests arrive. Things are busy around here, but I can't help but love the holiday season.

Oh, I almost forgot . . . I had a really fun birthday this year, thanks to Brian, the kids, and my friends. The kids bought me presents and a card and took me out to lunch. That evening Brian had to work, so Heather came up for some cake to keep me company, and then my friends Marian and Andre surprised me by showing up at my house with flowers and to share in the festivities. Just one more reminder of all the things I have to be thankful for this holiday season . . .

Poor Time Management

Brian: "Charley, hurry up and brush your teeth."

Charley: "But Daaaaddddd, I can't hurry up . . . I don't have time to hurry up!!!"

Slacking

Charley and Zander like to play this game where they make me lie on my bed, they bring me pretend food and drinks from their "kitchen," and then they proceed to tuck me in for bed by going through their own nighttime rituals, like singing songs, reading me stories, and giving me a face massage. So we decided to play this game a couple days ago, and I must have been really exhausted because somewhere during this process I dozed off.

I must have only fallen asleep for about 15 minutes, but when I awoke I was a bit nervous because things were pretty quiet in the house. I quickly jumped out of bed and when I reached the hallway, I could hear the kids singing songs along with a cartoon on T.V. downstairs, so I figured all was well. I entered the office/guest bedroom and immediately realized that something was off when I saw a pad of paper sitting on the bed, completely covered in pen drawings. I glanced over at the desk and became even more nervous when I saw that the lid to the pen was sitting on the desk, but no pen.

I started heading down the stairs, checking the walls for pen marks. Nothing. I reached the bottom of the stairs and saw Zander peacefully sitting on the floor watching T.V. No problem there. Then I saw Charley sitting on the couch stripped down to only her underwear. While this may sound unusual to you, in our house this is a normal occurrence because Charley loves to play dress-up and frequently ends up nearly naked in the process. She too was quietly sitting there watching T.V., so I once again thought I was in the clear for any disasters.

Until I got closer to Charley that is. Charley was covered head-to-toe in pen. Every inch of her arms and legs was covered . . . her belly and chest were covered, with particular attention paid to her nipple area (???) . . . even her face was covered, as she had drawn a second set of eyebrows on her forehead, blush on her cheeks, and some lines down her nose for good measure. I couldn't help but start laughing and asked her who had drawn all over body. Her response? "Hmmm . . . I don't remember, Mom." Yeah, as if the whole thing had not just happened in the last 15 minutes.

Shortly after this, Brian got home from work and after getting a good laugh, he also asked Charley how she got pen all over. Again her response was that she couldn't remember. So he tried a different route. He asked her where the pen came from. "The office." He asked her where the pen was now. "On the table." He asked her who was holding the pen when the marks got all over her body. "Oh, I was Dad." Ahhh, mystery solved.

It took quite a bit of soap and scrubbing to get all the pen marks off, but we finally managed to get rid of all the "pen incident" evidence. The most shocking part of the evening, however, was the fact that for the FIRST TIME in my life as a mother, I failed to take a picture. What is up with that? I take hundreds of pictures every month, but I simply forgot to take one for this significant and entertaining event. I must be getting forgetful in my old age . . .

Horsing Around

As the holidays quickly approach, my "To Do" list seems to be getting longer and longer, while my available time to accomplish the list becomes less and less. At this point, I have calculated that we have a minimum of four holiday parties to attend within a two week period in December, all which require some level of preparation, like outfit selection or gift purchasing. Is that normal? I guess I'm used to one, MAYBE two parties a year . . . but four? I guess the "kid factor" always adds to the mix. Anyway, I'm trying to prepare myself for the weeks to come, but I'm having a hard time getting motivated. Anyone else having this problem?

So, to avoid the things I would rather not be doing, we've been doing fun stuff instead. Of course we've been doing the usual meeting the friends at the park in the afternoons, going for walks, and shopping . . . but this weekend, while Brian went to Starbucks to work on homework, I went to a craft show at Hickam Air Force Base with my friend Kathy and her two girls. Now, as most of you know, crafts are not normally my thing. I am the furthest thing from "crafty" that a woman can get. But, I had heard great things about this craft show, so I decided to check it out. And besides, anything with Kathy is fun, right Kathy? ;)

When we arrived at the show, we noticed that they were doing horse and pony rides, so we decided to jump in line so the kids could go. Charley went first, and in the beginning she really wanted a "small" horse, but of course the only horse available on her turn was the biggest one, so she bravely hopped up there. I know this picture is kind of dark, but if you could see the look on her face, you would know that she was feeling very nervous and ambivalent.

However, the cowboy leading the horse was very kind, and assured Charley that the horse would go slow. So, she bravely headed off into the sunset with the horse and cowboy, and by the end she was grinning ear to ear. She told me she's all ready to ride Grammy Charlotte's horses when we go to Montana in January.

Zander was up next, and I knew there was NO WAY we were going to get him on a large horse. Fortunately, the also had a tiny pony, so I thought I would try that. I had to peel Zander off my body and force him onto the horse, all while he was whining and crying, and I just prayed he wouldn't kick or scare the horse. You can see he wasn't too happy.

But after assuring him that I would hold his hand the whole time, and after the cowgirl promised him that we would go slow, he calmed down and started to really enjoy himself. He too was pretty excited by the end of the ride.

After the horse adventure, we hit up the craft stands, which proved to be way more fun that I thought (who knew crafts could be so fun??). If you've never been around a bunch of military spouses who have the time and talent to create some of these crafty items, you are missing out. I swear, I don't know how some of these women find the energy or the creativity to create what they do, but it was pretty amazing. I ended up ordering a custom-made purse that I should be receiving in the next couple days, and I got it for a steal, so I will post a picture of it when I get it.

After the craft show, I brought the kids home, handed them off to Brian, and then hit the road to Charley's preschool for the annual fundraising auction. Several of my friends also attended, so we made a ladies' night out of it and had lots of fun. I was pretty cheap and ended up only buying a little monkey belt for Zander at the cost of $2.50 (I still owe you Marian), but I WAS one of the top two contenders in the highest priced item of the night, a two-night stay on the North Shore (a few of us were going to all go in on it). Just as I was about to throw up my auction paddle for a bid of $1400, they called it for the other bidder at a price of $1350. Bummer. But in the end, it may have worked out for the better . . . I can't divulge anything right now, but stay tuned . . . .

Today we invited over a new Coast Guard family who moved to the island a few months ago, and we really enjoyed getting to know them a bit. She and I have almost identical stories, both having gone to law school, working for a couple years, having kids along the way, and then moving here and transitioning to being stay-at-home moms. It's definitely good to talk to someone who has shared this experience, as it's challenging and rewarding at the same time.

So, that was our weekend. Nothing too exciting, but fun nonetheless. Now, how else can avoid that growing list?

Success

We had more fun camping this past weekend than we could have ever imagined.

Picture this: 8 adults, 9 kids (ages 5 and under), 5 tents, 2 nights, and a million pictures . . . all right on the beach in Hawaii. How does it get much better than that? There are so many pictures (from 4 different cameras) that I don't even know where to begin, so here's just a little sample . . .

Our campsite: Our morning view:
Our evening view:
The girls: Marian, Danielle, Kathy, and Andre

The boys: Brian, Brust, and Jamie (where the heck is Patrick??)

Some (but not all) of the kids:


My kids and their sheer unadulterated joy:

Even though the wind beat us up pretty bad throughout the weekend (resulting in two broken tents, but not ours), even though we didn't get all that much sleep, and even though there WAS one trip to the emergency room (one of the kids accidentally got cut with a knife, again not ours), we all agreed that it was one of the most fun camping trips ever. Definitely some good memories, a few of which are not necessarily appropriate for discussion on a G-rated (well, at least PG-rated) blog such as this one. :) Suffice it to say, we want to do it again, SOON. The trip was definitely a success.

We were also successful in taking Zander to his first theatre movie EVER, which was a very exciting event for all of us. We strategically planned on going to a matinee (maximize his good mood and fewer people), and we have been waiting for a movie where he was already familiar with all the characters so that he was more likely to stay interested . . . so we went to see Madagascar 2 (he's only seen the first one about a hundred times). Charley is an old pro at going to the theatre, but Zander is a bit trickier since he doesn't seen to have the same TV/movie attention span that Charley does. However, with a box of popcorn, a drink, and a handful of candy, Zander was perfect for the first 90% of the time, sitting in his own chair watching the movie. The last ten minutes or so he became a little squirmy, but I just put him on my lap and he was fine. He didn't try and get up and run around and he was pretty quiet, so all in all, I would say that was a success too.

So this week has been successful in those ways . . . however, I have been very unsuccessful at tackling the other 101 things on my list. Better get started . . .

Roughin' It

This weekend should be a fun one . . . we are heading over to the other side of the island, to Bellows Air Force Base, with three other Coast Guard families to do a little beach-side tent camping. Of course the occasion gave us an excuse to get a new, much BIGGER tent, so after scouring the Internet for many hours looking for the "perfect" tent, we finally found it. It is a Columbia tent that can easily house up to eight people. It has two rooms, and it has huge windows on all sides that make it feel completely open if you want it to. Last weekend we did a trial run with setting it up, and here is what it looks like. It only took 12 minutes from beginning to end to set it up, thanks to an genius invention called "color coding."

A year ago we did a similar camping trip with the same families, but just for one night, so this year we decided to tough it out for two nights at a new location. Now that the kids are older and much easier to deal with, I think this trip will be even more fun and relaxing. So, we are looking at eight adults, nine kids, and four carloads of gear. I'll think we'll survive somehow. :)

Much of this past week was spent getting ready for the camping trip (shopping, organizing, washing, packing, etc.), so we've been busy. And as you can see, our efforts clearly wore Zander out on a couple of different occasions. This first time, he fell asleep right on the living room floor.

The second time he fell asleep right on the kitchen floor while I was unloading the dishwasher.

Kind of a funny pose if you ask me . . .

We also had a 24-hour stomach bug circulate around the house this past week, and Brian is the only one that has been spared so far. While I never enjoy the joys of stomach flues, I'm glad that the kids got it out of their system before this camping trip.

So I guess that's about it in this neck of the woods . . . what's going on with you?

Hallow-weenie

Long ago, Charley decided that she wanted to be a bumble bee for Halloween . . . and hence Zander decided that he wanted to be a bee too (since he wants to do everything she does). However, the only bee costume I could find involved a spaghetti strapped dress with a tutu, and I just couldn't bring myself to put him in a tutu dress, so I tried to talk him into a dinosaur costume instead. However, the first time I pulled the costume out of the bag, he screamed like a girl when he saw the dinosaur head . . . he said it was too scary. So another trip to the costume store produced the only "non-scary" costume I could find . . . Thomas the Train. For the past two months we've been talking up the train outfit, even though Zander continued to insist that he wanted to be bumble bee. FINALLY, a few days ago, he seemed to buy the whole train thing, so I was cautiously optimistic about him wearing the costume.

When it came time to put on the costume yesterday, he put up a little bit of a fight until I told him that he had to put on the costume if he wanted to go trick-or-treating, and of course he gave in. So here you will find one of the few pictures I got of him in his costume and Charley in her costume.

Here's a group shot of our kids and all our friends' kids getting ready to pound the pavement in search of candy. If you look closely, Zander is making a pretty silly face.

And here's the first house we came to . . . so we've been in costume a whole ten minutes now . . .

However, two minutes later Zander was in complete meltdown mode and refused to take another step unless the costume came off. He kept crying, "I don't like it, I don't like it, I don't like it!!!! So the rest of the evening, he looked like this . . . Zander = no costume.

After hitting up a few streets, the smaller kids started to fall apart, so we headed back to our friends' house to check out the candy stashes. After a few suckers and candy bars, Zander literally passed out, and Brian looks like he's heading the same direction . . . .

Despite some moments of tears and meltdowns, the kids had an awesome time and we enjoyed watching them have a good time. The first thing Zander said when he got up this morning was, "I want to go trick-or-treating." Only 364 more days to go buddy . . . .