Football!

Tis the season for Football! Luke is already a fan and will cheer during games and shout encouragement to the players on TV. (ex: "Almost guys! Almost! Try again!")

But what Luke really loves is to play football. Daddy found a little football for Luke and we have spent a great deal of time playing. He will run around, find it and ask us to play with him. But he has to be wearing a hat to play. He will adjust after every catch or throw, which is so random and quirky.

And if he misses the catch, Luke will say, "Good try, Daddy. Try again!"

Nothing like having a little parrot to make you realize what you must say all the time.

The throw. (please note the form. Daddy the football coach is very pleased about this.)


And the catch. He is so proud of himself when he plays!

Oh Birthdays . . .

. . . you are everything awful and wonderful at the same time.

Kids birthday parties are so exhausting. Your child never acts like your child at a birthday party. They act like some possessed demon child that is all hopped up on sugar and makes other parents glad that that kid isn't theirs.

Okay, Luke really isn't that bad and he has been listening and following directions much better. But still. Its all the kids his age that get him all hopped up like a spider monkey.

But then, the joy on that kid's face when he gets a cupcake. Its like he was handed a cup of sunshine with frosting.

I'm willing to put up with the craziness for the cupcake bliss.

'Tis the season to be Fall-y

It is that time of year again!

The Great Glass Pumpkin Patch in Palo Alto! It is an eagerly anticipated day for a group of my dear friends. I don't get to see them often due to distance and time constraints (man, everyone had kids!) which makes the annual event even more special. I hadn't gone since I was pregnant with Luke (yikes!) so I had forgotten just how gorgeous, expensive and dangerous it is.

I think what I love most about it is all the artistry that goes into each individual pumpkin. All the pumpkins are hand-blown by local artists and no two pumpkins are alike. This does create a multitude of problems, which shall be discussed a little later.

There are steps to visiting the pumpkin patch, which most of the attendees seem to know.

Step 1: Arrive obscenely early and be first in line, primed with bubble wrap laden basket in tow.
(I arrive just before it opens because I'm driving up from South SJ - not a quick little trip)

Step 2: Wish that you could bum rush everyone when the open, but realize that you are standing in a field of one-of-a-kind expensive breakables, so pretend that you're friendly, but know that you're really not. Not on the inside, where it counts. Everyone's out for the good ones.


Step 3: Grab what you love with only minor interest in the cost. You can sort the cost out later, but if the one you love is gone, it doesn't matter what the price was. You don't have it.

Step 4: Set up a home base with your initial finds. Leave delicate breakables and set out again for another lap. Be sure to know what your friends are on the hunt for too - you look for them just as much as you look for you. And they look for you too, that's why they're your friends.



Step 5: Spread out all pumpkins. Note that you gravitate towards the same color/size/pattern pumpkins year after year.

**Please note the volume of green pumpkins.

Step 6: Debate the qualities of pumpkin. Qualities include: color, size, price, pattern, inconsistencies, stem, iridescence, transparency, squash-qualities and price. Price price price. Ugh.

Step 7: Include friends in on debate. They will remind you of your current collection, including what you bought the previous year. Will ask profound questions like, "Do you really need to start a new color family?" and the like. You will take pictures with pumpkins that are clearly out of your price range.

note: $165. Yikes! But so pretty . . .
I took a picture with a faboo pumpkin that was $250 - I was about to grab it when someone else swooped in. My friend asked how much it was (for me), the swiper replied "$250" and my friend declared it was "out of her price range." True that.

**It's the Great Christmas Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!**

Step 8: Fend off poachers who make their way around everyone's home bases hoping that the pumpkin they weren't fast enough for will get put back. (They will be taught a lesson about timeliness. Or that they should at least have a timely friend in line for them.)

"It's the Great Christmas Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" or "A Very Dr. Seuss-y Christmas?" Difficult decisions.

Step 9: Send representative out to put back ousted pumpkins. They will bring back other pumpkins you will fall in love with and then be frustrated, just as you were getting to a good place with your decisions.

Step 10: You will head out yourself, just in case. You will pick up one pumpkin, put it down and pick it up again and repeat a number of times. You will barter with your friends about the pumpkins they have that you want and the ones you have that they want.

The pumpkins in question. I was in a "glow-in-the-dark" pumpkin kind of place. Most of the pumpkins I grabbed looked like they could even though they didn't.

Step 11: You will finally make all your decisions, trying to rationalize your choices by saying important things like, "It's an investment" and "I'm supporting local artists" or "It's not as much as a trip to Costco/Target" etc.

The final three, from top to bottom:
*ocean-y, swirl-y, blue one
* tan and blue mottled
* very Tim Burton pumpkin-esque.

(Discovered I enjoyed a matte stem. Made a note of that for next year)

Step 12: You will stand in an obscenely long line to pay.

Step 13: You will watch 18 year olds take your one-of-a-kind artistic creation off to be carefully wrapped. Most of the time it's okay. I've (unfortunately) seen a time it was not. Easily the most stressful part of the day.

You thought there was nothing to this Glass Pumpkin Patch, didn't you? Well, you were wrong. The patch is not for the faint of heart. I'm stressed the whole time that I'm going to belly-flop on a whole section of them like Chris Farley.

But then you get them home and you unwrap them and put them with the pretty ones you already have and you know that fall is finally here.

Celebrating!

While Todd was off in Nor Cal for the Homebrew Club Festival, Luke and I were off to celebrate our good friends' daughter's first birthday.

Luke was fairly disinterested in most of the birthday extravaganza, but, of course, loved playing with his buddy, Jake. They are quite the pair, two little peas in a pod.


They mostly played with a little car - Luke was quick to get into pushing position while Jake held on. There were a variety of near misses, including but not limited to being pushed into:

* a brick wall
* the street
* a car
* children
* the bushes

When the time came to switch positions, Luke would have none of Jake pushing him. He kept yelling, "FASTER! FASTER, JAKE!" and would point forward with determination, "GO! GO THAT WAY!" and Jake would push at an even, reasonable pace.

So Luke had to jump off and just run. So Jake continued to push the little car and Luke ran alongside him. So they ran and ran and ran and ran. I don't even have a picture of the birthday girl due to chasing 2.5 yr old toddler. What a handful!

We had a lot of fun though - a first birthday party is more of a survival celebration for the parents after making it through the first year.

New Camera

Todd was so sweet and upgraded my point and shoot camera to a lovely new (blue!) Sony 12.1 mp camera. He got a great deal through Linda (Sony) and got a refurb. Mostly, I love that it's blue.

So I've been testing it out and messing around with it and having a lot of fun. My old camera was a gift from Linda years and years ago and had finally had enough. A day after receiving new blue in the mail, Luke thought it would be a good choice to throw my old camera at the kitchen tile. The tile won, the camera lost, and Luke received a quality time out. My poor ol' camera.

But now my pictures are much much better, due to higher mp and a lack of being tossed around in my purse at any given moment.

Popcorn.

This kid won't work for peanuts, but he will work for popcorn.

I was able to go shopping and get him a haircut all for the price of cheap-o Target popcorn. Thank goodness.

What do you do with yours?

My big boy underpants function in many ways.

You can wear them as a hat.


You can wear them like Superman.


Wear them like you? Ridiculous.