Playing Scrabble With A Seven Year Old...

... Is very time consuming. 

Playing Piano On The Water Front

Amelia and I went to the Children's Museum this morning, where we discovered that there were pianos all around town in honor of Arts Week. Here is Amelia happily banging away on the piano in front of the museum:

Halloween Costumes!

Mike took the kids to pick out their Halloween  costumes this afternoon; Amelia is Minnie Mouse and Charlie is "Chop Chop" -- a character from Skylanders, and whom I still think is a glorified ninja, so basically he's been a ninja 3 years in a row now. Here's a pic:

Back To School Night

Today was Charlie's Back To School Night so we all got to meet his teacher and see his classroom as well as get to see a few of the projects he's been doing at school and tour the "media center" which is a fancy name for the library because it has lots of computers in it. 

After we finished we decided we might as well go to Chillis and just make it an annual tradition, since the last time we went to Chillis was after last year's Back To School Night, and we came out to find the car broken into and my purse stolen. This time I brought my purse into the restaurant with me to avoid any problems. Amelia did, however, take it upon herself to tell the waitress that she "has a lot of money" in her piggy bank, and then proceeded to tell the waitress her address. I was unaware that Amelia actually knew her address and have since decided that three year olds knowing their address does more harm than good, since we then had to have a long discussion about appropriate information to share with random strangers. 

I totally forgot to take a picture of Charlie in his classroom so here is one of him by his locker :-)

New Tattoo

I got a strand of ivy tattooed on my side yesterday, twining around/partially covering two scars from when I was born. Very happy with the new tattoo!! But I think I'll be stopping at two. Not that I am ruling out making the one on my foot a little more intricate at some point...

Apple Cake

And we still have half a bag of apples left. 

The Prodigal Whistler

Apple Pie

As you can tell by the huge bag of apples I still have a LOT more baking to do!

Difficult Questions Of A Three Year Old

Amelia: "How does an airplane fly?"

Me: "Ummm..."

Amelia: "Is it because the engine makes it go really fast?"

Me: "Ummm... Probably...?" 

Amelia: "What do sea horses drink?"

Me: "Umm... Seahorses? Do they drink...?"

Amelia: "Is a grasshopper an insect?"

Me: "Umm.... I think so...?"

Amelia: "Why doesn't Rapunzel have a bathroom?"

Me: "Uhh I'm sure she does --"

Amelia: "No she doesn't! She has a bedroom, but I don't know where her sink or her potty are. And why doesn't she have a car?"

Me: "Umm..."

Amelia: "Is this Elm Street?"

Finally! A question I can answer!

Me: "Yes, it's Elm Street."

And all of these questions were from today and yesterday. Apparently being the mother of a three year old means I have to walk around with my phone on Google 24/7. I hate to think what four is going to be like...

My Little Helper

Amelia helped me bake a cranberry apple cobbler this morning from start to finish:

Enamel Hypoplasia...

... Is the reason why Amelia has to have dental surgery in October or November. 

Basically, the enamel on her four back molars didn't form in utero -- usually because of a high fever, (umm swine flu anyone?) which interrupts the normal enamel development. Because of this her back molars -- which don't typically fall out till she's 12 so need to last another 9 years -- are on track to start rotting out of her head in about six months, a year tops. She has been followed by a pediatric dentist for a year and a half now, and he has finally told us its time to do something about this. The "something" is capping all four teeth with stainless steel caps, that will last until these molars fall out and her adult ones come in (which should not have the same enamel problem.)

Since Amelia has to be restrained immediately upon seeing the dentist (never mind opening her mouth for him) she needs to be put under general anesthesia for the caps. Because insurance is, well, insurance, they won't pay for general anesthesia for a dental procedure over the age of four unless the child is developmentally delayed (never mind that I know a few adults who would have trouble sitting in a dentist's chair for four caps!) So the procedure has to be done imminently, even if the dentist did think her teeth could hold up for another six months. 

The caps will be done at Franciscan Childrens' Hospital in Brighton; the office will be calling me once they are able to book the OR; likely for October or November. 

Tooth updates will be following!

One More Picture...

Apple Picking

We took the kids to our favorite orchard today for apple picking, caramel apples and cider donuts (Mmmmm!)

Here are some pictures from the afternoon. Apple pies, apple cakes, apple crisp and apple cobbler to follow!

Fall Pictures 2013

Monkey Joes

Is finally in MA! Guess we won't have to compulsively go there every time we go to Charlotte anymore...

Where's The Advil?

(a.k.a Amelia started tap/ballet class yesterday:)

Happy Birthday Mike!

Mike celebrated his birthday today by watching the first Patriots game of the season with his brothers at a local sports bar. The Patriots obligingly won and it looks like the boys has a few beers!

The Zombie Infested 5K

Erin and I completed Run For Your Lives! The Zombie Infested 5k at Haunted Acres in Candia NH today. 

The way the race goes is that the runners are each given a belt with 3 flags attached to it and the zombies try to get the flags -- if you make it through the race with one or more flags left you're a "survivor" and if you make it through with no flags you're "infected". According to the race organizers only 10% of people make it through as survivors, and I definitely believe that statistic. 

Erin and I both made it past mile number 2 each with one flag left but then Erin lost her flag in a horde of zombies that she for some reason decided to run headlong into. (Our usual strategy being wait till the burly guys running behind us caught up and ran through, then follow in their wake.)

I lost my last flag at the start of the last leg of the race, when I had to climb over a zombie guarded fence into a field -- I discovered that climbing a fence while trying to ward off a zombie is difficult to do! If I hadn't lost my flag then I definitely would have lost it shortly after though; the last leg of the race involved running through a field that was swarming with zombies, having to crawl under an 18 wheeler that had zombies hiding in the wheels, a "blood bath" to wade through  and an electric fence that we decided to go around rather than crawl under after Erin got zapped by it. 

The only two people that were running in our vicinity and made it through with a flag intact cheated -- a girl had her flags rolled up and stuffed in her pants despite the very clear rule that the flags had to be clearly visible; and a guy (coincidentally her boyfriend) actually picked flags out of a trash can at one of the water stations. 

Charlie was rather disappointed that my race medal says "infected" on it, and Amelia, upon seeing my commemorative zombie run T-shirt said, "Is that your loser shirt?" But we had a great time nevertheless! Here are a few pictures:

*FYI we look clean because the had outdoor showers after the race, not because we didn't get covered with mud :-)

Rockin' The Fall Clothes

First Day Of 2nd Grade

Charlie's first day of 2nd grade was a success -- his teacher, Mrs. Roche, is reportedly nice, having brought in juice boxes and a special treat for the kids' first day of school and letting the class have snack time outside. 

Charlie's classroom is on the second floor this year and he has a locker instead of a coat room, which are both big pluses in Charlie's world. 

There are 20 kids in Charlie's class but Charlie only knows a couple of them -- 1 from his first grade class, 1 from his baseball team and 2 from his kindergarten class. 

Here he is getting on the school bus this morning:

Water Heater ESP

With today being Charlie's last day of summer vacation I had a full day planned which included taking the kids to the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology (per Charlie's request) and to our favorite playground at Cambridge Commons. 

Before we left I was trying to get a few things organized and ran down to the office to print something. I finished printing and as I was leaving the office I happened to notice Charlie's scooter leaning against the door of the closet that houses the hot water heater. For some reason this prompted me to go over, pull the scooter away from the door, open the door and inspect the water heater. 

Which turned out to be leaking. 

Fortunately the water had not gotten to the finished part of the basement at all, but probably in a matter of a few more hours or days we would have had 55 gallons in our finished basement. 

So instead of a fun day out with the kids we spent the day hanging out at home while the hot water heater was replaced to the tune of $2400 because its a high efficiency power vent blah blah blah and needed to be replaced with the same thing. 

But still better than having 55 gallons of water in the basement :-)

Trying Out Their New Backpacks

The kids are excited for school tomorrow!

If you can't tell from the picture, Charlie's backpack has snakes all over it :-P

Rainy Labor Day

We spent a very rainy Labor Day up in New Hampshire; the weather may have been wet but we all still had a good time. Charlie discovered the Robinson love of Scrabble and the fish were biting in the rain -- Charlie & Mike caught a decent sized bass and even Amelia caught 3 fish!

Here are a few pics: