Halloween here we come!

Are we really supposed to think that smile is real Christopher?

As usual, last minute, I dragged myself out of the house to take the kids to Stu Miller's Pumpkin Patch this morning, just so they would get on a ride or 2. Besides, I passed there a couple weeks ago and spotted a jumpy thing and blow-up slide which I know the kids would have enjoyed.

I wanted to make this quick so I didn't even bother to take photos of the kids next to some enormous pumpkins. Alyssa said, "wooooooo, pungkin" Christopher didn't seem to care for them. All he wanted to do was go on the blow up slide.

Alyssa wanted to go on the swing things so I told him as soon as she gets off he can go on the slide. Well that worked.

Don't let that face fool you for one bit, she enjoyed that ride and wanted to go back once it was over but we had to keep it moving.
My kids are the strangest people I know. Christopher does it also. All and any rides except maybe a tea-cup ride or something similar, there will never be a smile present. It's serious business, no smiling allowed with these kids.

So we were off to the slide

You know Alyssa had to follow her brother

Christopher passed her again and again encouraging her. "Come on Lyssa, you can do it!"

Then he waited for her. What a great big brother.


She was determined. It took her about 15 minutes to get to the top. She watched other kids doing it. She's never done this before

Yay! Again, she loved it. Ignore that scared look! She went back again and again.

It was almost time to go. I still had to run to the store to get candy!

Alyssa thought it was time too so this was the last run! Plus I had used up all my tickets and had no intention of spending more money. We had 20 tickets and this particular one cost 1 ticket per child but they get 2 slides. Alyssa used 3 tickets on her swing and the rest were used on this ride. Crazy ain't it?

We're ready for the Trick or Treaters....

....at least the first 13! I got sick to my stomach packing these trick or treat bags. I don't like the smell of many of those things you see up there, especially the Reese's YUCK! no offense. I dislike peanut butter so that made it worse. The combination smell was terrible so I rushed through it.


Each baggie had a small pack of chips of some sort, 1 sheet of stickers, a cool pencil with additional eraser(I couldn't leave them in the store), 2 Starbursts, 2 paydays, 1 Reese's cup, 6 dum dums, 6 smartie rolls, 1 squishy reptile. Then I went through the cupboards and used this as an opportunity to get rid of the candy that my husband hides up in there.

I found a bag of unopened Valentine's Day jolly rancher lollipops so I got rid of them all. I was able to add 2 to each bag. We did Brick or Treat at Legoland on Sunday and they gave the kids way too much candy so I grabbed most of them to distribute tonight ~ 4 Wonka chocolate laffy taffy were added to each bag.

I managed to carve only 1 pumpkin out of the 3 I had and I'm afraid I may never get to the other 2. I'll take some photos of the lame front door display once it gets a little darker.

Stay Safe everyone!

Update: I am out of candy. I suck! I emptied a bunch in a bowl also. I had no idea so many kids would come. Well, now I know

New Holiday Projects

I've been an e-bay member for about 2 years or a maybe little less but I have never purchased a darn thing. I was a looker. I was just too scared. But last week, I took a chance.

I decided I wanted to make 2 blankets, one for each child. I even strayed away from the normal pink for Alyssa.


So I placed my first order last week and once it arrived 2 days later, I was so excited that I hurried back on to the site to get some more. Over $50.00 in yarn & that's a lot for my cheap self. Hopefully it will be enough for both blankets. Alyssa loves her blankets so I know she will love whatever I make for her. Christopher chose the colors for his own. He's such a little big man...hehehe

I even pulled out her baby blanket tonight so she could use it. It brought back memories. I had made it for her before she even arrived. of course it was pink. I'll have to take a photo of it tomorrow but she loved it. It was so soft & fluffy. I forgot the blend.

This time around I chose chenille and I just love it. I hope to have some wonderful photos of the finished products if I ever find enough time to complete this project before Christmas.

So wish me luck

Superman lives with US!

My babies

I told him to flex his muscles and this is what we got

We were lucky, in that we found a store that was carrying this costume. After a couple tries this morning at different stores we got lucky, but spent way more than we had planned. Apparently Superman is popular. I wonder why! I was just happy that he was happy. Even though I tried to convince him to be a Ninja after we couldn't find his costume this morning. I failed by the way.


He refused to take the thing off once we tried it on at home.So I let him keep it on. He took it off for a second, but when daddy got home, on it went AGAIN!

Then he said to me so shyly, "Mama, can I fly?" It was the cutest thing.

That's my superhero baby. I'm so happy he is mine.

Getting ready ~ My very own Mulan

Christopher chose this costume for his baby sister. We received it early last week and only now, had we decided to try it on the child. Luckily for all of us it fit. I don't mean to sound like this but when I took this photo and uploaded it, I saw it on the monitor and thought, " My gosh she is gorgeous." Of course she is! She's my baby!

Stay tuned for Christopher's photo. Sadly we have not been able to get his yet as what he wanted was not available on the Disney website and has been sold out in most stores I've checked.

A break in the wind

I took this when the winds had died down a bit in my area on Monday afternoon. Turn up the volume. There's a glimpse of the husband's head. You won't believe what he was doing....Give up? Securing his grill. Can you say crazy?
Notice the blue skies though. The smoke had not gotten to us from Sunday's fires as of yet

I also headed out for a drive yesterday. Notice the lack of vehicles. But things had cleared up considerably.

I took this some time on Monday when I was out in the backyard. Poor quality but you can see the color of the sky a bit

Smokey Skies on Wednesday

I heard from the news that more ash is basically suspended to the west over the water and once the Santa Ana winds die, we're going to be getting winds from off the ocean heading east and it will be raining soot on all of us.

The fires in Southern California

IN 2003 we went through the Cedar fires. We lived in Poway then. And I remember standing next to my vehicle with my pregnant belly watching the flames creep down the hill behind our home. The winds weren't half as strong and the fire was taking it's time.

There were no reverse 911 calls (that I knew of) then so we sat at home and just kept an eye on the mountain while many of our neighbors packed up their vehicles and hauled ass. I don't think we realized how close we were to being fried.


4 years later we're a little further in North County only this time it's much worse. I won't go into all the details as I am sure the news is all over the country but we're not in any danger at least in this area. I was pinned to the TV on Monday as the night before I barely slept due to the high winds that I was hearing outside. Never in my life had I experienced winds with such force. When I tell you they were strong enough to blow you over, I'm not kidding. Even the chairs in the backyard were thrown across the small grass area and landed underneath the plum tree.

My husband and I stood in the backyard looking at the neighbors' palm trees and tried to estimate where it would land if it could no longer fight against those winds. We concluded that although it would destroy the fence it won't come flying through any windows. One less worry. Only one branch from our palm tree in the front yard fell off and the neighbor was kind enough to move it. No damage done. Ashes were on everything and the air was nasty. Needless to say every one's allergies began to act up. All sorts of things were blowing about outside. I've been sneezing for 2 days. I don't mean to complain as that is the least of our worries.


It's a strange sight outside as the skies were red yesterday and this morning but thankfully they have cleared a bit. I have many friends in affected areas none so far have lost their homes. My SIL, in Del Mar had to evacuate at 9pm last night, and is still unable to return. Another friend in the San Diego Country Estates, Ramona had to leave his home. My mother is a wreck. She's been calling almost every 2 hours, for the past 2 days to make sure things have stayed the same with us.

To my blogging buddies in Southern California, I hope you all are still safe & doing well. I've been keeping up on reading your blogs for updates.

So thank you everyone for the e-mails. The family is safe. We are so blessed.

Was it too much...

...to just put some garbage bags in the trash cans? I'm not doing it. I swear I'm not. Let's see how long it can go with no bags.

Call me stubborn, lazy, or what have you, but I will use my little grocery bags to put whatever trash I have. The kitchen will become a total disaster, filled with little grocery bags overflowing with trash hanging form all the cupboard doors. I need to break him of this habit, NOW. I just have too much to do during the day to deal with this mess.

I really love my husband. Honestly I do, but we need to correct some things. Starting with this.

And to top off the nonsense, he just went upstairs and asked me when I was coming to bed. I said in a few hours. I have to clean the bathroom downstairs since your son started to lsose his aim AGAIN.

He says, "You know what I mean, not just to bed, but to bed"

Honey, PUHLEEZE!!

There will be no action 2night!