Halloween!

I think I consider this E's real first Halloween.  Yes, last year she won her first costume contest, but she didn't really react to the decorations and she was too shy to trick or treat past our 4 neighbor's houses.

Totally different this year.  E is in love with all things Halloween.  I decorated the yard with skeletons and tombstones and a flying bat.  I was a bit afraid that it would scare her but she was enthralled with them.  At first she called them "ooo,ooo's!" (monkeys) but corrected herself after hearing me talk about them and started calling them "skeltens!"  We spent hours "flying" around the front yard like the bat and making the bat fly by tossing it around the yard.  She also loved burying the skeletons in pine needles and singing "where or where did the skeltens go?"

Every time she saw anything Halloween related she gleefully pointed it out and shouted "pumpin!" "skeleten!" "wich!"  "pider!" "goes!" "bat!"  She is still obsessed with the laughing, light up pumpkin card from last year and is very proud that she can push the button herself this year.  We made a pumpkin for her felt board and she loved decorating it into a jack-o-lantern with black felt.

Unfortunately, Ken's job scheduled him to go to Brazil for actual Halloween.  But we didn't let that stop us from celebrating!

We went to her Little Gym Halloween Party this year, she didn't sweep the costume contest two years running, but that's okay, there was a SUPER cute SCUBA baby who won (and I'm totally writing it down so that I'll remember when/if we have another kid).  But this year she actually understood that she was supposed to play games.  She loved kicking the soccer ball into the goal and using the baseball bat (even if she used it more like an ax).  We did the dorky family theme costumes since we know we have very little time before she decides that's not cool.

We went to Houston Zoo's ZooBoo just before Ken had to leave for Brazil (as in we got home and he left for Brazil a few hours later).  It was a pretty toasty day so we nixed the full fur cat suit (especially since it sheds ALL over her.  When we left Little Gym she had hairy armpits, hair legs, black hair that stuck, clung and went everywhere)  While we were getting ready to go she asked to take Stitch with us. Lightening bolt moment!  We dressed her up in her green Hawaiian print dress and let her take Stitch along, instant Lilo!

She was fascinated by the dance performers who were dressed in animal costumes, some even on stilts.  She loved watching the other kids who were all dressed up.  She liked the pumpkin patch and painting the pumpkin with Daddy. We really only went to see the elephants and the komodo dragon, the rest of the time we spent watching other kids, but she loved it.

And then Daddy left.  And E was sad.   And E sang herself "Grown ups come back" to make herself feel better. And E spent the week saying "daddy go bye bye"  "Daddy in Brazil"  And E was naughty.  So much so that her daycare sent home a note that she wasn't following directions in class.  I asked her if she was said and she said "'es"  and I asked her why and she said "Dada bye-bye"  I think we are both glad Daddy is coming back tomorrow.  I told her she'd see him tomorrow when I put her to bed tonight and she got all squealy and giggly and super happy.  I'm excited to see how she reacts when she sees him tomorrow.

Despite the naughtyness, I tried to make today as good and Halloween-y as possible.  She had gym class this morning and we went out for lunch then she got to play on the playground.  While we were there another kid threw a toy car up the tube slide while a younger girl was sliding down and the car hit her in the face.  E got super concerned about "baby's cryin!"  E helped me get some ice for the other girl but spent the rest of the afternoon talking about "baby cryin!"

To help distract her we went to the grocery store and looked at pumpkins.  We decided to pick one up to carve while we we waited for time to Trick-or-Treat. She was not about touching the pumpkin guts at all.  She tried a few times but just wasn't into it "mama do it!"  But, when it came time to cut out the face much to my terror E wanted to help cut the pumpkin.  so we cut the pumpkin together (carefully!).  And then it was time to go Trick-or-Treating! E can switch between happy and chatty to clamed up and shy so I was worried about how she'd react to talking to complete strangers.

I'd planned to take her just to our 4-5 neighbor's houses and then come back...but E had different plans.  She LOVED Trick-or Treating.  She loved ringing the door bells.  She loved saying "trik-o-tree"and "happy haoween!"  We ended up going all the way up and down the block.  She loved, loved, loved it. Lots of people wanted to take pictures of E because she was so cute.  We were out pretty early so most of the costumes were not scary, we got to one house where she saw a scary clown from far away and as we got closer she started to cling to me and hide her face.  The person took the mask off when they realized she was scared but after that she kept asking about it. Despite the clown we spent over an hour trick-or-treating!

Then when we got back home all she wanted to do was pass out candy to the big kids.  We had to sit in front of the door and eat dinner.  She'd eat a few bites of dinner and then say "big kids knock door and byebye!" "big kids are comin!"
There were a lot of costumes she recognized and some that she (thankfully) mis-interpreted.  There was a big kid dressed up as Chucky who she called a tiger, and a girl carrying a baby doll that was bloody and mutilated who E just happily called a baby.

After she ate dinner, I let her pick a piece of candy from her basket to eat, and she picked the raisins.  Once she went to bed I switched out most of her candy for her favorite fruit snacks, pretzel packs and other healthy snacks....because, yes, I am THAT mom and she's only 1.

Overall it was a pretty fantastic day and the cherry on top is that  Daddy comes home in a few hours!

Imagination, independence, empathy and song

I drive the fire truck!

 We are in the midst of a phenomenal visit from Oma and E is loving all the attention!  She is going a million miles an hour and having a blast.  She's been doing some wonderful imaginative play and showing a great deal of independence, some surprising empathy and through it all there has been songs!!

E loves to play with her "babies" she swaddles them and feeds them milk and changes their diapers.  She also loves to cook in her kitchen.  Her current specialty is "yummy sauce"  which she makes by pretending to mix everything on her spice rack into a pot, putting the pot in the oven, then on the stove and stirring it then proudly serving it up to us and declaring it "yummy!"    

I climb the rock!

She also loves to play with her "people" which are little knock off duplo people.  We build parks, houses, zoos all sorts of wonderful things out of the duplos and she plays with her people.  She has little conversations between people, she has them play on the equipment at the park, the animals escape the zoo and have to be caught by the people.  It's wonderful.

I swing monkey!

Recently she watched an episode of Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood where the characters hosted a birthday party for stuffed animals.  E was already obsessed with birthdays from reading her Elmo's Birthday book and singing to relatives who have had birthdays lately  but this took the obsession to a new level.  She has a birthday cake toy that she's played with a few times, but after seeing the cartoon she took it out, brought her monkeys to the table and then requested "party hat?" from me. We then had cake, sang the birthday song, played birthday games, and even wrapped and opened presents for the monkeys.  She was in heaven.   We have revisited the game several times.
She has been taking "friends" to the playground.  When she takes her monkey she makes it hang from the monkey bars and play.  It's adorable.

I play dragon!

E's most common phrase these days is "BABY DO IT!" usually shouted at the top of her lungs, hence the caps.  She is becoming fiercely independent.  She is most stubborn about brushing her teeth, getting into her highchair.  She will quite often work herself into frustration at whatever task but refuse help when offered with an indignant "baby do it!"  She also loves to help whenever she can.  She loves to help cook for real in the kitchen, so much that when I start cooking she will go to the dining room and drag a chair into the kitchen so she can stand on it to reach the counter to help.
She also likes to tout her accomplishments.  whenever she does something (and sometimes only midway through) she will shout "I did it!" with gusto.

I oo-oo (monkey)

 E is also showing a great capacity for empathy.  She has always been bothered when she hears other kids crying but her empathy is reaching new levels.  Last weekend gootball was on TV and a commercial came on where a toy robot falls down because it has a dead battery.  At the end of the commercial E started screaming bloody murder.  We didn't realize she'd been watching the commercial so it took us a while to get her to calm down to tell us what was wrong.  Eventually she blurted out "SAD ROBOT!" and we put 2 and 2 together.  It took showing her the first half of the commercial again on my phone to show her that the  robot was ok to get her to completely calm down.  Occasionally she will still get all flustered and sad and say "sad robot" and needs reassurance that the robot got new batteries.

Mew, mew, I'm cute and
I know it

We went to the Renfest to celebrate our 4th anniversary and took E to the joust!  She was very engaged until the lances started shattering and riders started falling off their horses, then she started flipping out, screaming bloody murder.  "SAD HORSIE!" thankfully the riders got back up and we were able to show her they were all okay.  We took her to a pony ride that day and she kept saying "no fall down" I had to show her that the horsie had a seatbelt to reassure her she wouldn't fall off the horse.  After that she rode the horse like a champ. She was the smallest kid there and on the biggest pony but she did great!

And through it all she sings.  When she sees a barn in a picture book she starts to sing "Old MacDonald"  When she has new food on her plate she sings "Try a little bit" from Daniel Tiger.  When she's bored she sings "Wheels on the bus"  When it's raining she sings "rain rain go away" and she sings, and sings and sings, and it is the sweetest sound in the world!