Birthday Girl

On October 16, Madeleine turned 3! Here are pictures from our various celebrations.
Pictures from our little fairy photo shoot. I used this one for the invitations, after lightening it up and cropping it in a soft oval. She's not posing - she's trying to watch Sound of Music and the wings are in the way.

Posing with the cake she and I made on her birthday. She helped stir the batter, and she decorated the top entirely on her own (I did stop her from dumping the entire jar of pink sugar crystals on top).

Getting our mother-daughter manicure at Goldilocks.

Madeleine did very well and sat very still for her turn. She picked purple nailpolish.
Drinking her Pink.
On the carousel. She walked around and around until she found her reindeer that she wanted to ride.
Talking to Aunt Becca on the carousel.
Taco birthday feast at the Villa. Granpa brought the hats.
Our family in the Great White North sent her an Alaskan animals video and coloring book.
Madeleine's first Barbie-type doll, a Snow White.
The flowers and the balloon were from Daddy. These are Madeleine's first flowers from a gentleman!
With cousin Nathan at her Tinkerbell party on the 20th.
She's smiling, I promise. I don't know why it looks weird. Gramma C's gift came in this super-cool Princess bag.
Ballerina dress and slippers.
Opening gifts.
The mostly assembled play kitchen. This thing came in 3 huge boxes and weighed a TON. It took Shannon and my Dad about 10 hours alltogether to assemble.
Madeleine really wanted a pinata, so I found a Tinkerbell pull-string one that has a trap door. Instead of hitting the crap of of it, each kid takes a turn pulling a ribbon, one of which opens the trapdoor and releases the goodies.
Some of the goodies. Most of them got stuck in the infrastructure of the pinata.


Tinkerbell ice cream cake!
Trying on the dee-luxe Tinkerbell costume from John and Kay, with the wand that the Willmann's gave her.


The end of a long and happy day!

Our little girl will officially become a preschooler tomorrow. She starts at Millersburg Preschool bright and early at 8:30 and she is so excited! Will have pictures and a complete report of her first day soon.

Trick or Treat!

Snow White and the Pirate, ready to head out!

Our Halloween started out minimally eventful. I got home from work, slept a bit. Shannon got me up and the kids and I ran to Wal Mart to get some last minute costume supplies and some candy for our trick or treaters. Madeleine was out of her mind with excitement. "Can we get ready now Mommy?" "Okay, lets get dressed in our costumes!" "Now, Mommy?" In order to keep her busy and still keep her excited about the night, I got out some paper, cut it into strips, and we made paper chains to decorate the wagon Noah would be riding in. After we were done, I got the wagon out of the garage, pulled it up to the front porch, and cleaned it off. I got the chains and the kids and we went out to tape the chains to the wagon. Noah stepped out the front door and headed straight for something on our walk that caught his eye. I looked up to see where he was going and saw him reach down to pick up a stick. Then, in the next second, as he reaches for it, I see that it is not a stick, but indeed a HUMONGOUS SNAKE!!!!!!!!

Okay, so it was not humongous, it was a 12 inch garter snake, but still. When you hate snakes with the white hot passion of a thousand suns like I do, all snakes look huge. Also, you loose your freakin' mind when your 14 month old has one writhing in his hand.

I screamed, "Oh God! Noah! Put it down! Put it DOWN!" If any neighbors were out, they would have thought a child had lost a limb from my shrieking. Poor Madeleine's all "What's wrong Mommy?" and I'm all "Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod". I need to get it out of his hand, but there's no way in Hades I'm touching that thing, I don't care how little it is or how many bugs it eats or how good it is for my yard. Instead, I grab Noah's wrist and shake his hand violently. Zing! The snake goes flying across the yard, hopefully to hell where it belongs. I drag Noah into the house, still holding him by his snake hand, and sort of herding my terribly frightened daughter. I wash Noah's hands and do my best to calm myself and Madeleine down. She's so scared, she's shaking. Noah's still unfazed, and sits down to play with a truck after I get his hands cleaned and check for bite marks (it was little, but it still could have bit him). It takes me about 20 minutes of reassurance and hugs to get Madeleine back to normal.

I have been trying not to pass on this intense fear and hatred of snakes to my kids, but I seemed to have screwed that pooch with this little incident. Once she calmed down, though, Madeleine was able to talk about it and even do her little impression of the snake. All thoughts of snakes were left behind, though, when Shannon got home from work and it was time to get ready to go out!


Noah gets himself into the wagon.
Noah did very well in the wagon, rode up and down our street without once trying to stand up or get out. He did enjoy tearing up the paper chain and dropping it over the side, though.

Our first stop was our across-the-street neighbors. This holiday is totally made for Madeleine. She had no problems at all walking up to people's doors and ringing bells, and sometimes just opening doors and walking right in.
Noah wasn't a sure as his sister. We only got him out of the wagon once, and he wasn't crazy about it. He rode happily the rest of the way.

Avast, me hearties!
Pumpkin Pi
Riding back to our house to get ready to go into town.
Trick or treat Kelly!

The Pirate fell asleep on the way to Kelly's and didn't wake up, even when we got him out. Must be too much grog.
Snow White, the benevolent princess, helps Kelly hand out candy to trick or treaters.
King Louis and his fair Queen, aka John and Kay. The King costume is a vast improvement over last year's. Just ask Madeline sometime about John and the monkey mask.

Arg! I tolds ye not ter wake a sleepin' mate!
After the Neudeckers, we ran out to see the Czeschins, and then to Holts Summit to see Gramma and Granpa Ramsay. It was all too much for little Snow White.
If you look closely, you can see Madeleine's Tooties Roll she had been working on when we left the Czeschin's, now stuck to her left puffy sleeve.
Last house on our journey. Trick or treat Gramma and Granpa!
Noah's favorite toy du jour: A singing tree that plays a song about trick or treaters to the tune of "The Addam's Family".
A little more of his costume's detail, without the coat on.
The end!

Shannon and I finished the night by going home, picking up dinner from our favorite local Mexican place, putting the kids to bed, and enjoying our dinner and some quiet time.

THE ORIGINAL Scary 'Mary Poppins' Recut Trailer

Happy Halloween!

Colds suck.

(Found at engrish.com)