Halloween Themed Playdate

Today we went to Audubon Park where our playgroup was meeting for a Halloween themed playdate. It was lots of fun, Nancy (our assistant organizer) made a pinata which all the kids liked taking turns hitting though it was us parents who actually broke it. This time we put toys in the pinata instead of candy since there were plenty of sweets on the table which everyone brought. Chance got a car from the pinata and that was all he cared about. He also had a good time eating a big sugary orange cookie, he doesn't get sugar all that often especially not in large quantities but this time he finished the whole cookie. These first two pictures are the before and after. He has orange all over his face and hands. It really was cute. Lots of the little boys and girls were dressed in costume but since Chance is not loving the costume thing I decided not to ask him to wear it until tomorrow night when we go trick-or-treating. It seems like Chance is really trying to talk and today he said "bad", it is strange after so long of not really saying any words he has racked up three new ones in two days. It is funny at this age with the pinata they are all afraid to hit it because all of us Moms are constantly telling them not to hit and now we give them a stick and tell them to hit the nice pumpkin. They are not sure what to do, Chance did a good job hitting it though after he decided that it was in fact ok to hit it.

Pumpkin Carving

Today we carved the pumpkin we bought last week at the pumpkin patch. i did most of the cleaning out of the pumpkin and Scott did most of the carving with a little help from Chance here and there. Much like last year, Chance did not want to get his hands icky so he played with the pumpkin bits that were in a bowl but mostly used a spoon to touch them. He seemed to have a good time though. We also drew on our two little pumpkins and that Chance had a really good time with, he drew all over them then Scott and I added faces and we glued on hair, they are pretty cute. Also, Chance has said a few new words in the last few days. On Monday when I was away for a while doing early voting Chance said "goldfishies" Scott said he just pointed at them in a bowl on the table and said it jsut plain and simple. Then today when we were pointing out the face on the pumpkin he said "eyes" just like that. He still isn't talking too much but he is saying more and more words here and there.

ChaCha - 242242

ChaCha, what it is and why you should do it. Ok obviously most of you know about the dance 1,2, cha cha cha. But have you heard about ChaCha the mobile answering service?

Probably not and I say that because I had never heard of it until a friend told me so I will give you an overview. Let’s say you are sitting in your living room and you are thinking to yourself “self, I wonder what the capital of Croatia is?” now what do you do. You have a few options for sure.

You can dust off your old encyclopedia, flip through the pages hoping to find the answer and also hoping that it is still correct after all the changes in the world since you bought it however many years ago. You can get out the trusty computer and scour the internet in search of a fact based website to find the answer. Or you and just grab your cell phone and either call or text your question to a guide who will find the answer from a reputable source and text it right back to you. In a few minutes your phone will beep alerting you that you have a new text message “Zagreb (who in 1994 celebrated its 900th birthday) is the capital city of Croatia.”

You don’t have to do anything but ask and the answer will be delivered to you also if you would like to see where the guide found this information you can go to chacha.com and log into the chacha account for your cell phone. This is where you can see all the activity related to your phone and see the source pages for the answers that were sent to you.

Now, why am I telling you this? There are two main reasons

1. A few weeks ago I became a ChaCha guide, I am loving it, I have learned so many new things and I can answer questions any time of the day or night from my laptop plus putting a few extra dollars in my pocket always gets two thumbs up. And

2. It is fun. It sounds like fun doesn’t it? Go ahead and try it, I know you want to, you know you want to so think up a question, any question there is nothing too ordinary or too wild, nothing too gross or too easy ask anything your heart desires, anything that comes into your head.

Text your question to 242242

Remember though ChaCha is free, check your cell phone plan for your text messaging fees.

Aquarium Playdate!

On Friday we had a playdate scheduled to go to the Zoo but when we woke up it was raining so we went to the Aquarium instead. Chance really likes the Aquarium and since he is such a good walker these days we did not even take the stroller. He had a ball and I had a good time talking to the other moms in the group. It seems like every time we go to places we have been many times before Chance discovers something new or looks at something a little different. This time he really seemed to notice the fish in the tanks as fish and not just shiny moving objects. We also did something completely different this time, there is a spot where you can pet a shark, we had never done this before because I just did not think Chance could understand and follow direction well enough to put his hand in a tank with a shark. This time though we gave it a shot and he was amazed. He did exactly as he was told and petted the sharks back. The shark was only 3 months old and did not have any teeth yet. I couldn't get any pictures because I was helping Chance reach the tank and I wanted to pet the shark too, he was slimy. We did get to do another new thing that I could get pictures of though and that was walk the treetop loop in the Amazon area. We don't usually get to do this because of the stroller and there are a lot of stairs but this time we did and Chance really liked it. He walked all around, there were all kinds of birds in the tree tops but he wasn't much interested in them. He was enjoying the experience on the walkway itself. We stayed a long time but Chance was really having a good time and didn't get cranky at all, he passed out as soon as we got home. Chance liked exploring the replica of a prehistory shark's jaws with our playdate friend, Octavian.

Pumpkin Patch

On Sunday we went to the pumpkin patch. This is the same one we went to last year and it was just as good and fun as I remembered it. After Chance realized he could wonder around all through the pumpkins that is exactly what he did. He walked all through the pumpkins having a good time. It was hard for us to get a good picture of him because he did not want to sit still. There were so many things to look at it was hard to get him to look at the camera. We picked out one big pumpkin to carve and two little Chance sized pumpkins to sit around. It was fun to see him really enjoying the pumpkin patch this year rather than him being so little he did not really know what was going on. This year he had a good time learning all about pumpkins. Seeing so many of them everywhere must be a really strange sight for him, so different. After the pumpkin patch we went to a nearby park that we had never been to but it seemed like Chance still had some steam to blow off and he did. He climbed all over the play area and must have gone down the slide twenty times before he was ready got tired.

After a Bath

Reading Reading Reading...

I love to read. As far as I know I always have liked to read but I remember distinctly when I really started reading books for fun. I can't remember how old I was I just remember getting lost in the story and loving it. Chance definitely loves books and to be read to and hopefully in the future he will love to read on his own too. While my Mom was here this past weekend she read to him a lot. These are pictures from one morning when Chance brought in Winnie-the-Pooh and Tiger Too! for her to read. Most of the time he sits right there and listens to the whole story. He can pick out all sorts of things from the pages now and he can pick out new things everyday it seems.

What's going on...

Sorry I haven't writen in a while ok it's only been a week but usually I write more often. Anyway my Mom was in town from Wednesday night to this evening. Actually she isn't even home yet but she should be soon. It was so nice to have her here while Scott is gone. It gets really lonelly here alone...anyway we most just hung out and did a bunch of stuff all at the same time. We finally got a halloween costume for Chance he is going to be a Little Monster/Frankenstein I haven't gotten a picture of him in it yet because it needs a little tweeking which I will do tomorrow and then we should be ready to go. These are a few pictures form last Friday. Every morning Chance wakes up between 6 and 7 am then he comes into our bedroom real quiet then after making sure I am there he starts bringing in the cars. I think this morning he had fifteen cars on the bed. He is really good at letting me rest for up to an hour while he drives his cars around and plays before finding a book and bringing it over for me to read. Then I will read between 2 and 10 books to him while still being able to rest in bed then it is time to get up. This first picture is of him playing with all the cars he had left on our bed in the morning. The next two are of him outside playing with his favorite toy (a car) and then later he decided to lay down next to the fence for a while. I guess he wanted to look up at the sky.

And For Dessert

Yummy

Daddy taught Chance a new way to eat yogurt and those single serving apple sauces. Who needs a spoon when you can just drink it? In the second one I asked him to smile but he had his mouth full, that didn't seem to matter.

Another Playdate

We went to another playdate a few days ago too. This one was a makeup birthday party for one of the little boys in our playgroup whose birthday party was called off due to the hurricane evacuation last month. His mom and dad made a pinata and all the little ones had a good time trying to break it. Chance took a few good swings after he understood that yes in fact he was allowed to hit it but the adults ended up breaking it open. When the candy fell out they were not at all sure what to do, we took a few suckers home but Chance doesn't really care about them, he will point at it and say he wants it then after a few licks he gives it back to you and never wants it again. This is all just fine with me since he regulates himself when it comes to sugar. Unless we are talking about cookies, in that case he is definately the one who sotle the cookies from the cookie jar.

Storyland Playdate

There is a place in City Park called Storyland. we had never been there before but our playgroup went last Thursday and so we went along. It was a lot of fun. Storyland is a kids play area built with themes from Nursery Rhymes and other children's stories in mind. There are the Three Little Pigs and each of their houses. A pirate ship from Peter Pan, the cow who jumped over the moon, Jonah and the Whale and lots of other things. There is also a old fire truck that was used by the New Orleans Fire Department Chance liked climbing all over that. He also really liked being able to climb up the steps and slide down the slides all by himself. We have taught him to go down on his belly feet first and so he climbs up to the top then turns around and slides down. He loves it. They had a place like this in Florida when I was little which I remember being huge, being able to really get lost in it but I bet it wasn't much bigger than the storyland here in reality. Anyway Chance really liked it here and so did I so now that we know how cool it is we will be going back. Chance and Jack (the little boy in the firetruck with Chance) had fun together. They both took turns driving the firetruck for a long time. Neither I nor his Mom had to ask for them to share or take turns they just worked it out on their own and had a great time.

P.S. I have loaded a bunch of new pictures into Flickr. I had to wait a couple weeks to update my pro account but now there are tons more pictures. I am also going to make a set of Chance's Playdates to make them easier to find.

Happy Birthday Scott!!!

Today is Scott's birthday. For his birthday my mom, his mom and myself got together to get him a bunch of tools and things to start making furniture which has been something he has wanted to do for a while. He opened his presents this morning and went straight to work. He already had a project he wanted to start so we all got our working clothes on and went outside. We are going to make his cake after Chances nap and as far as I know just hang out for the rest of the day. Today we are doing whatever Scott wants to do, it is his day.

He already finished his first project, a bookshelf. He built me a shelf for my dirt collection a while ago which took a really long time because he did not have the right tools but now he built a whole bookshelf in just an hour or so. It is really great because it is made out of old fence boards. And it matches the shelves he made a few months ago for my dirt.