Friday, October 31, 2008
Happy Halloween
Kate wanted to be a witch this Halloween. Liam wanted to be a dinosaur. Luckily, we had a hand-me-down costume from their cousin Jack that was actually a crocodile, but ALL Liam saw when he saw it was dino-tastic-ness. Tyrannosaurus Liam!!!! Kate had a blast being a witch. She was most excited because I let her wear a bit of orange eye makeup to enhance her costume. Too funny! Below are several posts of all the kiddos over Halloween.
Happy Halloween
Tyrannosaurus Liam
In front of the house - ready to get some candy!!!!
Love this sign - both Halloweenish and Bostonish.
Dino-riffic
This year we went with Mr. Potato Head pumpkin decs. The kids LOVED doing it! And it was sharp-object and stinky pumpkin gut-free! :)
Cheers
Patrick, Jillian, Nick and I went out to dinner and for some cocktails to celebrate my bday. We had such a fun evening out! :)
Vegas
Long story short, I had the chance to take a quick jaunt to Vegas with my good friend, Kory...basically for free! I had a great little get-a-way with Kory and we danced the night away and walked our toes off during the day. No gambling or craziness, really, just lots of sightseeing and good dinners and dancing. Kory's cousin is a VIP Host at a hot club in Vegas and very kindly used his connections so we were treated like movie stars the whole time. SO MUCH FUN!!!!!!
Some of you may know that I have an unexplainable affection for Justin Timberlake. He was perfoming at the hotel we stayed at - the night we left. But there were posters of him everywhere. This is me trying to be cute.
Kory and Mags.
We were seated in the VIP section at a club at the Hard Rock hotel and this pic was snapped and posted on the internet - hence the logo in the corner. Oh so fake-important! :)
My impression of a Hollywood starlet in those hats they are all wearing. Not mine, by the way! :)
Kory and Mags at our table at KOI, overlooking the Bellagio fountains.....it was AMAZING.
Apples and Pumpkins
We spent the most beautiful, perfect, glorious day at Pine Tree Apple Orchard selecting pumpkins and apples galore. We took a tractor ride around the gorgeous orchard, posed for pics and ran around the corn maze. I LOVE FALL!!!! Here are a series of pis in several posts.
Silly posing.
Liam on the tractor
Sooooo many apples
Pine Tree Apple Orchard - a little piece of heaven on earth. Seriously.
The gang on the tractor ride around the orchard.
Apples and Pumpkins
Maggie and Liam - strolling through pumpkin patches and corn fields on a perfect Minnesota day.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Hi
Where has the time gone? Was my last post really three weeks ago? I must say, I think that the adjustment to grad school along with everything else has cut into my blog time! The good news is I have finished my first grad school class! I LOVED the course material and am really enjoying being a student again. So far so good…..
Despite all the studying, the whole Harris crew has been super busy! Nick has been traveling all over the country for work. I took a quick jaunt to Vegas, Nick and I celebrated our birthdays, my Mom came to town and SO much more. We have had lovely fall excursions with the kiddos, Liam and Kate are entrenched in their various activities – little gym, music class, dance class, Chinese class and school. SO – there have been lots and lots of photo ops. I will be sure to post soon. Just didn’t want anyone to think the blog had faded away.
For now I am calling it a night, but keep an eye out for pics and posts – coming soon! ☺
In the meantime, I thought you might like to know that the other day Liam announced to me – in true Boston fashion – “Mom, I’m wicked cool”. I pretty much fell on the floor laughing. Clearly confidence is not a problem with this one!
Despite all the studying, the whole Harris crew has been super busy! Nick has been traveling all over the country for work. I took a quick jaunt to Vegas, Nick and I celebrated our birthdays, my Mom came to town and SO much more. We have had lovely fall excursions with the kiddos, Liam and Kate are entrenched in their various activities – little gym, music class, dance class, Chinese class and school. SO – there have been lots and lots of photo ops. I will be sure to post soon. Just didn’t want anyone to think the blog had faded away.
For now I am calling it a night, but keep an eye out for pics and posts – coming soon! ☺
In the meantime, I thought you might like to know that the other day Liam announced to me – in true Boston fashion – “Mom, I’m wicked cool”. I pretty much fell on the floor laughing. Clearly confidence is not a problem with this one!
Sunday, October 05, 2008
One, Two, Three Funny
Some funny snippets of kiddo conversation:
ONE
Location: The Children’s ER
Time: 2am
Reason: Kate has the Croup and sounds like a sea lion.
Scene: Kate is sitting in her jammies in the ER with her arm in a blood pressure cuff. It is the automatic kind, hooked up to a machine. Kate is terrified of what one nurse once called “the huggie bear” and the name – and fear – remain today.
I had a chat with Kate on the way to the hospital, anticipating a meltdown when it came time for “the huggie bear”. I basically told her that she was 5 years old, now, so was old enough to use special tricks to get through it. I told her to think about happy great things while it was going on and JUST when it seemed like it was super tight on her arm, she had to think about the HAPPIEST thing in the world and then, surprise, the tightness would go away. This was a very lame attempt on my part as nothing else had ever worked on getting her to be calm during a BP check. It would lead to a vicious cycle – because of her stress, her BP would be high for a little peanut like her and they would want to check it again. SIGH.
Imagine my surprise when during “the huggie bear” Kate took a deep breath and said “OK, Mom, I am going to try your special trick”. She was tense, but closed her eyes and just as I expected her to say something like “ponies” or “princesses” she took a deep breath and said “Ok. There is an anaconda on my arm. There is an anaconda on my arm. It is squeezing my arm but will go away soon. Go away anaconda, go away.”
Not exactly what I had in mind, but whatever works!
TWO
Location: The Children’s ER
Time: 3:30am
Reason: Again with the croup.
Scene: Kate is getting ready to leave the ER after receiving steroids to make her breathe easier, literally. It is the middle of the night and we are tired…
Nurse to Kate: "Bye bye, Kate! Have a great rest tonight! Get some sleep for me – I am here the rest of the night working."
Kate – turning to look at the nurse – very calmly and frankly says : "Well, you know, if you are lonely and want to talk to someone in the middle of the night, you can call China. Everyone over there is awake right now because it is daytime there, so you won’t wake anyone up and I am sure they would love to hear from you!
Ok, then!!!!!!
THREE
Location: the mini-van
Time: sometime deep into a road trip
Scene: the kids have been in the car for hours and are ready to watch a video. This is from our Colorado trip and I have been meaning to blog about it for a while. I had purchased some special road trip games and videos and had been spreading out the disbursement over the trip. The kids were starting to get antsy so I told them I was about to introduce another surprise. The kids, especially Liam, were SO excited.
Liam, bouncing in his car seat, squealing: “Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!!!!!!”
Kate, somewhat indifferent due to her being pretty fed up with being in the car: “OK, thanks Mom. So what is it?”
Maggie, building it up from the front seat as Nick drives: “I don’t knoooowww. What could it beeeeee?”
I reach into the bag and find the new Strawberry Shortcake video (some gifts were more for Kate, some for Liam) that is tempered in it’s girly-ness in that it is about going to a Dude Ranch and camping etc. Given our wild-west vacay I thought it would be nice. Liam is giggling and squealing and practically escaping his car seat in excitement.
Maggie: “Here it is!!!!” (And I reveal the video).
Liam, instantly freezes in his seat and all joy flies from his visage. “Oh,” he says with a completely flat tone. “It’s pink.” He looks out the window, depressed.
Everyone in the car erupts into laughter. Well, except Liam.
ONE
Location: The Children’s ER
Time: 2am
Reason: Kate has the Croup and sounds like a sea lion.
Scene: Kate is sitting in her jammies in the ER with her arm in a blood pressure cuff. It is the automatic kind, hooked up to a machine. Kate is terrified of what one nurse once called “the huggie bear” and the name – and fear – remain today.
I had a chat with Kate on the way to the hospital, anticipating a meltdown when it came time for “the huggie bear”. I basically told her that she was 5 years old, now, so was old enough to use special tricks to get through it. I told her to think about happy great things while it was going on and JUST when it seemed like it was super tight on her arm, she had to think about the HAPPIEST thing in the world and then, surprise, the tightness would go away. This was a very lame attempt on my part as nothing else had ever worked on getting her to be calm during a BP check. It would lead to a vicious cycle – because of her stress, her BP would be high for a little peanut like her and they would want to check it again. SIGH.
Imagine my surprise when during “the huggie bear” Kate took a deep breath and said “OK, Mom, I am going to try your special trick”. She was tense, but closed her eyes and just as I expected her to say something like “ponies” or “princesses” she took a deep breath and said “Ok. There is an anaconda on my arm. There is an anaconda on my arm. It is squeezing my arm but will go away soon. Go away anaconda, go away.”
Not exactly what I had in mind, but whatever works!
TWO
Location: The Children’s ER
Time: 3:30am
Reason: Again with the croup.
Scene: Kate is getting ready to leave the ER after receiving steroids to make her breathe easier, literally. It is the middle of the night and we are tired…
Nurse to Kate: "Bye bye, Kate! Have a great rest tonight! Get some sleep for me – I am here the rest of the night working."
Kate – turning to look at the nurse – very calmly and frankly says : "Well, you know, if you are lonely and want to talk to someone in the middle of the night, you can call China. Everyone over there is awake right now because it is daytime there, so you won’t wake anyone up and I am sure they would love to hear from you!
Ok, then!!!!!!
THREE
Location: the mini-van
Time: sometime deep into a road trip
Scene: the kids have been in the car for hours and are ready to watch a video. This is from our Colorado trip and I have been meaning to blog about it for a while. I had purchased some special road trip games and videos and had been spreading out the disbursement over the trip. The kids were starting to get antsy so I told them I was about to introduce another surprise. The kids, especially Liam, were SO excited.
Liam, bouncing in his car seat, squealing: “Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!!!!!!”
Kate, somewhat indifferent due to her being pretty fed up with being in the car: “OK, thanks Mom. So what is it?”
Maggie, building it up from the front seat as Nick drives: “I don’t knoooowww. What could it beeeeee?”
I reach into the bag and find the new Strawberry Shortcake video (some gifts were more for Kate, some for Liam) that is tempered in it’s girly-ness in that it is about going to a Dude Ranch and camping etc. Given our wild-west vacay I thought it would be nice. Liam is giggling and squealing and practically escaping his car seat in excitement.
Maggie: “Here it is!!!!” (And I reveal the video).
Liam, instantly freezes in his seat and all joy flies from his visage. “Oh,” he says with a completely flat tone. “It’s pink.” He looks out the window, depressed.
Everyone in the car erupts into laughter. Well, except Liam.
Friday, October 03, 2008
Funny
You know you are an overtired parent when a comedien's bit about "Dora the Explorer" has you rolling on the floor laughing. Probably only fellow parents of young ones will find this remotely funny, but it brings the LOLs to our household and is clean humor.
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