Little Bird Loves Leaves

Little Bird enjoyed throwing leaves at her brother. It's one of the few things she can throw at him without hurting him. He didn't seem to mind, and we got in a leaf throwing fight later on.

I hear the phrase "I do it" coming out of Little Birds mouth about a hundred times a day. She wants to sweep, rake, take The Chief's shoes and jacket off, vacuum, etc.  Most of the time she's quite the little helper, when she's not angry and screaming. :)

Look, a picture of The Chief and me. If I sit close to them and try to get a picture they grab the camera so I went for this method instead.

Costumes 2013

This year Lizard wanted to be a dragon so all our costumes needed to coordinate with hers. I was so much fun designing and making the costumes this year. I got the idea for Little Bird's dress from a tutorial online with a few changes to the sleeves and front, and made up the rest. 

Lizard is a dragon, Little Bird is a princess, The Chief is a knight and I'm a jester. I looked at medieval paintings and old school costumes to get ideas for my costume and found that a lot of the old jesters had elfish ears on their hoods rather than the pointy hats you see more often.We were in a hurry taking the pictures so we don't have close ups of The Chief or me.

Here are some pics of just the costumes to give you a better idea of what they look like. The Chief's costume was based on the crusader knights but instead of the typical cross on the tunic I put a dragon to match his sister.

 

Little Bird loved being a princess. She is all girl.

Here is my fierce dragon. She has an 8 foot wingspan. When we were going over the design of the costume she said she wanted her arms to be the wings so this is what I came up with. 

Hubby had class Halloween night so Lizard went trick-or-treating with friends while I stayed home with the little ones and handed out candy. The photo above of all of us dressed up was for our ward Trunk-or-Treat. It was a lot of fun. I have never seen so many adults dressed up for Halloween. There was an "Up" family, a Lord of the Rings family, etc. I loved it.

 

 We have three neighbors with kids all grown up and they all made special treat bags for the kids. They are so nice!!! We love our neighbors. 

The Chief Turns One

A week after hubby's birthday The Chief had his birthday. That means that within ten days in October Hubby, The Chief and I have our birthdays. Kind of a bummer because it's fun to have parties spread out, but kind of cool because we were all born in October.

Little Bird gets some attention before the party begins.

The Chief isn't walking on his own yet but he can climb onto just about anything.

Lizard wanted to help him open his presents.

My sister gave him a fun "tablet." It lights up, plays music and has lots of buttons to push. Most of the time Little Bird is stealing it from him, but they do have fun playing with it together.

 My parents gave The Chief some cool shirts. It's fun to dress a boy after dressing two girls.

Because The Chief can't eat milk we had to eat his Samoa Cake for him. I know that sounds mean, and I could have made him something without milk, but he really doesn't like food very much. He subsists on a diet of Cheerios, fruit and vegetables and me. I am still working on weaning him. He doesn't have any teeth yet and prefers food that is pureed or that he can suck on. For his birthday dessert he opted for some of those puffy snacks that dissolve in your mouth. Hey, whatever makes him happy. 

Hubby Has a Birthday

Three days after my birthday it's hubby's birthday. He's a year and three days younger than me. But enough about me...this is his birthday. :)

Lizard gave him the Fantastic Mr. Fox which is a movie he really likes. His mom made him a nice card.

I gave him antique cufflinks that I bought behind his back at the Iowa State Fair.

This was a card from my mom.

My parents gave him a balloon shark that you fill with helium and then use a remote control to fly it around. It must be fun because look at the guys on the front front of the box. They're having a blast!

 I could only find one candle for the "cake." It's a brownie tart. The crust it is chocolate pie crust with a brownie bake into it and a butterscotch glaze. It's sad, but it only took us two days to eat it. So yummy!

Lizard tons of fun with Grandpa

My parents came into town for a week (to be here for The Chief's 1st b-day) and the last two days of their trip Lizard was out of school because of parent/teacher conference days. She had a lot of fun hanging out with her grandpa.

They went to the zoo.

They went Roller Skating.

 And they went to the Amazing Pizza Machine.

My dad was impressed by how clean both the Roller Skating rink and the Amazing Pizza Machine were. Lizard especially liked the go carts and the ribbons she won.