Halloween Fun

As you can tell, she is very excited to be in her costume. It also came with a wand with a flower on the end.

We had a fun filled Halloween weekend. It started on Friday night with our friends' Halloween party. It was the first time I let Anna put on her costume (it was staying in my closet for protection) and she was so excited. That first night, I put make-up on her and did her hair like Rosetta in the Tinkerbell movies (the other nights she didn't want to do all that).

It's a bit blurry but you can see the make up.

She looked great but it was strange seeing her with make up. Then on Saturday we had our church party with games and candy. Anna is getting old enough that she can actually participate it all of the throwing games. Side note: have you noticed how when they have parties where each group has to come up with a game, they are all throwing games? It kind of bugs.

For these two parties I dressed up as the sun. I figured I was already big, round and hot so all I had to do was become yellow. Sadly, I didn't get a picture of myself (sorry) but I wore a blue shirt with a yellow dress over it. Then I glued silver strips all around my belly to look like the sun's rays. It was pretty cute.

Monday, we had some friends over in the morning to play and decorate sugar cookies. We had a lot of fun although the younger kids are still figuring out how to do it. One little girl thought the frosting was finger paint and just put her whole hand in the bowl. It was a good way to use up the day until it was time to trick-or-treat.

Again this one is blurry but that is a face of pure joy to eat that cookie.

That night we went to a neighborhood where they have houses instead of apartments. It was a nice night and we saw lots of other kids going around. Anna is still figuring out how trick-or-treating works. After a few houses she started saying "Happy Halloween" when they opened the door. Also, if they asked what she was or tried to guess, she would specify a garden fairy, not just a fairy or Tinkerbell, and would correct people if they guessed something else. Anna was a trooper and we were out about an hour before we had circled back to our car and it started to rain. A good time to stop.

We got a good amount of candy and have all been enjoying it. Fortunately Anna realizes that her bucket is not just for her but for all of us.

Pumpkins

Last Sunday we carved our pumpkins. After getting the one at the pumpkin patch, I got a bigger one for Jason and myself at WalMart. First Anna and I planned out what she wanted her pumpkin to look like. Just like with choosing the pumpkin, she knew just what she wanted it to look like. Once we had it all planned out on paper, it was time to start cutting. I cut the top out and Anna helped me pull out the guts.

I wasn't sure what she would think of it but she seemed to enjoy it and had no problem helping. Then Jason did the carving for her.

For our pumpkin, we first had to decide what we wanted it to look like. Jason went online to get ideas. We found one that looked cool and like something we could do: a pirate pumpkin, complete with eye patch. I hollowed this one out while Jason was carving Anna's. Side note: he is not a big fan of things that are messy. While he has gotten better, he still has a way to go. Back to pumpkin carving. I actually carved out our pirate pumpkin except for the mouth, which Jason did. It was fun to plan it and carve it. I discovered crayons work well for writing on the pumpkin for planning purposes and a magic eraser takes off any mistakes without difficulty.

Here are how our pumpkins turned out. Sadly, I forgot to get candles so we never actually lit them but they still looked good outside out door.

Anna especially loved them.

Halloween Decor

One great thing about having our own place is complete control over holiday decorating. Here are the things Anna and I did for Halloween this year.

This is on the wall and can been seen when you first walk into our place. I cut out the pumpkins using a cookie cutter for the stencil and Anna put on the letters. For the pumpkin I just colored the face on with a sharpie.

I'm really pleased with how this tree turned out. Jason made it out of black streamer. The smaller branches are where he cut it in half length wise. We were going to make some tissue ghosts to go on the branches but we didn't quite get around to that.

Sorry about the bad picture quality but I had to take this one at night and the lighting wasn't the best. I figure no holiday is complete without an appropriately colored chain. Rather then use it to count down, we used it for the window.

And finally, our spider wall. I have pictures of us making these ones so I'll post those tomorrow. That way you can see the closer up pictures and how to do it yourself. I love the way this one turned out.

As you can see, we've had a lot of fun decorating. It's been fun to bring Halloween into our place (especially since the weather doesn't feel at all like fall) and boy will our place be bare once we take it all down. I'll have to start looking for Thanksgiving decorations. Either that or just put some pictures up on our walls.

Pumpkin Patch

Me and our pumpkin, about the same size.

A little while ago, we took Anna to a pumpkin patch. Of course since this is Hawaii, they don't actually grow the pumpkins at the patch. It was more like a patch of dirt with pumpkins spread around. We were ok with that. Anna went walking into it with meaning, purpose and direction. I don't know exactly what she was looking for but she knew it when she found it.

We did tell her that she had to be able to carry it herself. We are so unreasonable. Sadly, that meant this one was out.

Here she is with her pick.

Anna had to compete with the boys for tractor space. For some reason, she was the only girl on there.

They had a few other fun things to do. There was a tractor that I'm guessing was only supposed to be a backdrop for pictures but how can you have a tractor and not climb on it? There was also a hay ride and corn maze. We weren't able to do those though because we were unprepared for the cash only place (it's a good thing Anna's pumpkin wasn't any bigger).

We were able to have some shave ice at the end though so it was all good.

Funny Monday

On Jason's blog, he posts funny things on Friday. Naturally, we have a lot of fun looking for things to put up. Last week he put up some videos we found on youtube called How It Should Have Ended. There are lots of good ones there. For some reason, he didn't post one of my favorites so I'm posting it here.

It just cracks me up every time I watch it.

I also found this one based on New Moon. The animation is not as polished but it's still hilarious.

I think my favorite part is where he rubs oil on himself.

Gettin' Crafty

Now and then, Anna and I do crafts. Here are some pictures from the times I thought to get out the camera.

This started out as a simple macaroni necklace. Of course that wasn't fancy enough for Anna. She wanted to paint the macaronis first.

As you can see, she loves painting.

Then, once they were dry, she strung 'em up.

Here she is wearing the finished product, and so proud. I don't know if this was a different day or if she had just changed her dress. I'm betting on changed her dress; she loves to change clothes in the middle of the day. I've found myself saying (as apparently my mom did before me), "One outfit per day in the laundry."

Then, we played with glitter. I read about this one in a book I have called Unplugged Play. It's a pretty cool book with lots of ideas for things for kids to do. It's broken down by age group and kind of activity. In the book it says to use confetti but they didn't have it at the store when we went and what's more fun than glitter?

I love her look of concentration as she sprinkles the glitter on the glue. What you can't tell from the picture is that she's shaking that container with all her might and generally getting it just to the side of where the glue is.

Our picture. For the most part, I put down the glue and she added the glitter. I think we added a little bit more before we stopped.

We've been working on some Halloween crafts but that will have to be for another post. Let me just say, looking at cute crafty kids blogs is totally dangerous. I have a new favorite one: Frugal Family Fun. The stuff is way cute, actually looks doable and uses simple supplies. Another one I like to look at is Little Page Turners. This one has tie-ins to children's books. We haven't done any of these ones yet but I like looking at them and thinking I might some day.

Half Way

Here are some pictures from the ultrasound. We got the one 2d picture and some 3d ones. This one is the crispest even if it's only half a face.

I am just past my 20th week in this pregnancy so I'm now half way along. All in all, things are going well. A couple of weeks ago, we had our ultrasound and found out we are having a little boy. Fortunately, we've been preparing Anna for this for some time so she isn't disappointed that it's not a girl. (At first she would say the new baby could only sleep in her room if it was a girl and a boy would have a sleep in our room. She is now willing to share a room with her little brother.) He seems to be growing well and all looks fine.

I am feeling him move around quite a bit now and his little kicks are even strong enough to be felt from the outside. Unfortunately, they are more like isolated kicks so it's been hard to have Jason or Anna feel them. Anna says she has but based on her reaction, I don't think she has. I always feel like when he kicks it's like him saying, "hi Mom!"

My biggest complaint these days is being hot. The weather is always the same, upper 80s. This may sound nice but frankly, it gets hot. I hear from people that live here that it will get cooler after October. I really hope so because frankly, I've never been good with hot. The heat is then compounded by the support hose I get/have to wear. Other then the fact that they make me more hot, I don't really mind them. I can tell a big difference with how my legs feel when I wear them and they make doing things possible. They do lengthen out how long it takes me to get ready in the mornings (since I have to put my feet up for 20 minutes before putting them on) but with lower expectations, it's going well.

Between the heat and getting bigger, I've had to scale down what I can get accomplished in a day. Generally by around 3:30 or 4 I need to have what we call Mommy break time. This is pretty much just time when I sit with the fan on me and rest for a bit before I have to get up and make dinner. If I don't do this, dinner becomes something like salad or even just leftovers.

Anna has been a rock star during this whole ordeal. She lets me sleep in in the mornings (she gets up before Jason leaves so he gets her breakfast and turns on a show), mostly leaves me alone during my break time, understands that when my feet are up I can't do things for her and just generally takes good care of me. Earlier on, she wanted me to see something outside so she set up two chairs in the doorway: one for me to sit on and one for me to put my feet up.

We took this on Saturday while we were out hiking. As you can see, I was on water bottle duty.

So, we have gotten through the sick, just looking fat part of the pregnancy and are embarking on the uncomfortable, so when are you due part. Should be fun.