8 November 2010

Conversation yesterday with Rose Pink:

Rose Pink: I really want to go to school next year, Daddy.

Mr. Brown: Why do you really want to go to school?

Rose Pink: So that I can make lots of friends and they can come over and we can make hominy soup with a BIG can of hominy! (She means a number 10 can size of hominy.)

Mr. Brown: Sweetheart, if that's the only reason that you want to go to school, I can make hominy soup with a big can of hominy for you right now.

Rose Pink: Really? Really?!?

Mr. Brown: Yes.

Rose Pink: Hooray! And maybe I can take the label off and paint the can!

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Since Halloween and the arrival of masses of candy, there has been some discussion about how Mr. Brown doesn't eat chocolate, and the children, crushed by the idea that Daddy might miss out on some of the windfall that came their way, have been diligent about finding non-chocolate candies for him to share. The other night at the table, we were talking about how we need to let Santa know not to put chocolate candy in Mr. Brown's stocking. Mr. Brown said that he would like to ask Santa to bring him some Pay Day candy bars. Nut Brown, very seriously, said, "Maybe Santa will bring you a new computer with more Duck Tales movies on it."

Halloween 2010

So we've been working on Halloween prep lately...

Painting our batcars... Trying on costumes... (thank you to Jessica for the loan and the idea!!) And here is the culmination of work in the church parking lot pre-Halloween party: (Mr. Brown is dressed as a monk. Geoffrey of Monmouth.) The batcars are painted cardboard boxes with shoulder straps. Besides the bat symbols, the kids did all the painting and gluing and I just put the straps on.)

Happy Halloween! I love my two little batpeople!

Halloween with Pictures

Rose Pink this year for Halloween said that she wanted to be a house. So I made this really awesome fun haunted house costume. The roof ties under your chin (Mr. Brown made it) and the dark outlines and vines are pipe cleaners. The windows are construction paper and with foil ghosties, and there are windows on the back as well. Here's what she would have looked like if she'd worn it: Here we are on October 31st:

Nut Brown is a ghost, so he can haunt her house. But she decided to be a witch instead. If the costume she's wearing in this picture looks familiar, it's because it's the same dress and hat she has worn the last two years. Oh yes, this is her third year of being a witch. And Nut Brown is a ghost made out of a bedsheet with holes cut in it.

Having gone to the trouble of making really good house costume, I wore it to take the kids trick-or-treating.

And since everyone else had tried it on, Nut Brown wanted a turn too.

Rose Pink ended up going around with her friend Macayla's parents (Macayla is the little girl with the red and black dress on) and I took Nut Brown to some houses. He was too slow from the girls. He got cold really quickly, but even though he was shivering and shaking, every time I suggested we go home, he insisted that he wanted to knock on one more door. It was really fun! They were both so satisfied and pleased with themselves.

Thanks to Mr. Brown for uploading the pictures for me!

12 November 2009

I unexpectedly was approved for ten days off work at the beginning of November, so we have been out of town enjoying sunshine and warm weather with Gia in Oklahoma. I'd requested the second through the 11th off, and my leave request was approved on October 29, so it was all very last minute. We debated leaving on the 31st, but decided instead to stay home and celebrate Halloween. Mr. Brown started packing Sunday morning before church. We packed til 8:30, then rushed through breakfast and into Sunday clothes and dashed to church, arriving only two minutes late to discover an empty parking lot... daylight savings time. So we went HOME! TO PACK SOME MORE! We finished loading the car and came back exactly an hour later (yes- late again!) but then left from church and spent the afternoon in Iowa City and drove on to Des Moines where we spent the night. We were certainly eager for this vacation.

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I bought a camera the day before trick-or-treating because our kids' costumes were too cute NOT to photograph. We went to Wal-Mart and purchased the hundred-dollar Kodak model, because I HAD TO HAVE PICTURES. I actually like it quite a bit. It's not perfect, but for a hundred bucks, I definitely got my money's worth. Of course, the pictures are still on the camera, waiting politely at home to be downloaded, and the computer is now on the fritz. Sigh. But I do have pictures that I will post eventually. Maybe by Christmas.

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The kids had such fun trick-or-treating. Rose Pink went out with her friend Macayla and another little girl named Ruby, and Nut Brown and I hit a few houses together. He was pretty psyched about the whole thing, and even when he was shaking from the cold bravely maintained that he wanted to keep knocking. We also attended the ward trunk-or-treat and that was EXTREMELY CHILLY, thanks to a freezing wind. It went really well, though, and it was really fun to hand out candy to such sweetly-costumed children.

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Rose Pink had a Halloween party this year on the Wednesday before Halloween- a cakewalk, Halloween stories, bobbing for apples, and a pinata. It was a success. Anything involving a pinata is a success, right? We broke the pinata stick and had to borrow a bat from a neighbor, but everyone had fun and got to wear their costumes one extra time.

how-ween!

Nut Brown has learned to say "Halloween!" (how-ween!) He is going to be a ghost and Rose Pink is going to be a haunted house. Mr. Brown has made the rough framework of her costume out of a box, and she and I are going to decorate it to look like a house with markers, colored paper, foil, and pipe cleaners. Nut Brown has been having a ball pretending to be a ghost. He asks for available loose fabric to be draped over his head and wanders around saying "oooooo!" He is most gratified when we shriek and run.

I went to visit a new baby the other night with Nut Brown, and the family asked how old he was. Trying to show off like any other proud parent, I said to Nut Brown, "How old are you?" Nut Brown held up crossed fingers and announced, "THREE!"

Rose Pink loves to make up stories and tries to involve us in them. Tonight as we were walking she was working on one (they're dialogue-heavy) and she says to me, "Do you want to be my mother?" Well, I had a pretty good day today, so I said, "Yes!" and she said, "Really? For real?" and I said, "Can I take you home?" It just made me laugh inside. We were at the skywalk downtown to run around because it was 1) dark and 2) cold and 3) Mr. Brown was sick. He's got some flu bug or something.