Pink Octopus

After procrastinating about Amelia's Halloween costume for the past 3 weeks, this is pretty much the best we could do:

I know, she doesn't seem to be too thrilled about it either. Neither was Charlie -- I tried to pass her off as the Swamp Monster's pet, but he informed me that the Swamp Monster does not have any pets and if he did, it would not be a pink octopus.

Amelia's On The Move

Jack O'Lantern Extravaganza

We visisted the Jack O' Lantern display at the Roger Williams Park Zoo last night. The pumpkins were quite spectacular -- my attempts at night vision photography do not do them justice. If we go next year, though, we will definitely go at an 'off peak' time -- it was extremely crowded and we weren't able to take our time and look at everything we wanted to.

After A Week Of Obsessing

(just ask my co-workers who had to watch this video about a thousand times) I bit the bullet and bought the Baby Jogger City Select to schlep the kids around town in:
Just click here and then on 'watch it in action' under the City Select. Purchased in Ruby red of course.

Pumpkin Carving

We carved our pumpkin last night -- Charlie opted for the bat from our pumpkin carving kit, so here it is:

Because You Can Never Have Too Many...

... you guessed it....
HAIRBOWS!!
This time Charlie wanted to get in on the picture taking action.
The Dot Twist:

Red:

Pink Fuzzy:

The Sickies

My lack of blogging over the past week has been due to a bad case of sickies in the house -- Amelia was diagnosed with her first ear infection last wednesday and is steadily recovering on twice daily amoxicillin. Other than a slightly runny nose she is back to her chipper self. Charlie, on the other hand, was sent home from daycare on thursday with a fever and is still pretty much down for the count, with a continued fever and awful head cold to boot, he is a pretty miserable kiddo! He was supposed to have his first dentist appointment this afternoon but I canceled it and re-scheduled it for (oops!) the day after Halloween; good thinking on my part... We did manage to finally drop Amelia's passport application off at the post office this morning, with assurances from the clerk that we were doing so in plenty of time for our January trip.

Tomorrow we are back to the doctor if Charlie still has a fever, and if he is feeling better I am hoping to carve a pumpkin, inspired by Mandy's Jack O Lantern...

Swamp Monster

Charlie has been telling us for weeks that he wants to be a Ninja for Halloween, but once we got to the costume aisle at Target he decided that he much preferred the $30 swamp monster costume over the marked down to $7 Ninja costume...

The Birds & The Bees

(According to Mike and Charlie.)
I, thankfully, was not present for the following conversation:

CHARLIE: "Daddy, what are penises used for?"
MIKE: "They're used to pee and to make babies."
CHARLIE: "NO!! That's not right!! You can't make babies with them -- you'd pee all over them!"

A Much Needed Haircut

Before:

After:

9 Month Check Up

I took Amelia in for her 9 month check up today; she is 28 1/2 inches long and 19lbs 14 oz, which is 90th percentile for height and I couldn't tell you what percentile for weight because, to put it nicely, Charlie was rather demanding during the appointment. The pediatrician pronounced her right on target developmentally and was pleased with her eating -- she has now tried toast, waffles, macaroni and cheese, pasta, and bananas all fairly successfully, and loves her yogurt and a wide variety of baby food.

She had two shots, which she handled far better than Charlie, who was completely undone by having to get the flu vaccine in nasal mist form ("It's making my nose feel funny!")

We have to go back in a month to get Amelia's 2nd flu shot, and then not again until her 1 year check up!

Apple Picking

We had a great time apple picking this morning at Honey Pot Hill Orchards -- we enjoyed great fall weather amd delicious apple cider donuts as well as all the apples we could eat!
(And yes I know Charlie's hair is out of control, he has an appointment to get his haircut on tuesday!)

A Princess & A Pirate

(You can't tell, but Charlie's vest and shirt are both pirate themed.)