Halloween Greetings!

Our friend Jill hosted a great Halloween party this year! At the last minute, William decided he wanted to be an Indian. I made an "Indian weapon" out of a cereal box, duct tape, and a wooden spoon before Kindergarten. William helped, of course. Then he hit me really hard on the foot with it. We had short a discussion. He continued to be sort of scary and threatening all day, but did not hurt others. I considered this a success.

Margaret was the most domesticated of Spidermen, serving endless coffee from Greta's general store.
And, unable to resist a pun, or the opportunity to be wrapped in toilet paper...this mum got mummified! Thank you, Jill, for a great party! Happy Halloween to all!

Sweet pumpkins.

Pumpkin Time in Blogland!

Hello fellow pumpkin-crazed blogger-friends! William and Margaret went on a special outing with Dada yesterday and came back with a surprise for me: BIG PUMPKINS !
I was extremely surprised...I thought they had been talking about chickens all morning. But they had tricked me! Turns out when they said "chicken" they meant "pumpkin". I was getting pretty distressed because I didn't want any more pets than we already had. Thank goodness they came back with pumpkins. Just as messy, but make a tastier pie.
After pumpkin selection and transportation, comes the planning stage. What should the jack-o-lantern face look like? Senator McCain was just too hard to draw, but was the second scariest thing we could think of. We couldn't even stomach the idea of a Palin pumpkin. Nightmares!
Next came the scooping!
Everyone was in a pumpkin-y way. Congrats to us, the first 20 weeks are done! Note chair and balcony door give size perspective.
A few steps were not documented by the photographer, who took a prolonged time-out to make roasted pumpkin seeds and a jack-o-lantern pumpkin pie (which turned out to be quite yummy! say good-bye to canned pumpkin which you can't find here anyway!). William and Margaret and Dada were very proud of the finished jack-o-lanterns...but got a little bored while trying to take the perfect picture.

Siblings play!!

There is nothing better than this new phase: William and Marga playing happily together, sometimes for long stretches of time!!! Not only is it sweet to watch their relationship as sister and brother develop, but it is swee-eet to be able to perform basic household chores and activities of daily living without undue interruption!

Emory and Elena, again this video goes out to you.

If you're happy and you know it!

Margaret REALLY likes her new CD from Grandpa and Oma. But ONLY this song. If any of the other songs are played, she throws a (prolonged) fit. Thank goodness for the "repeat" function on her CD player!

"Hello" to Emory and Elena! This post is for you!

Look what William can do!!

It's a Boy!!!!

...Coming to theaters March 2009.

Piles of Books

In response to the recent post on Ebee's blog, I have made my own piles of books. Turns out I have a lot of books with a theme of parenting.


1.
2.

3.

4. Sarah Palin's Bookshelf.

Dear Ursi,

I didn't believe it either, but here is proof that eventually your children will also play together quietly for up to half an hour at a time! All you have to do is get through the first few months with a newborn and wait for the forgetting-hormones to kick in. You can do it! And don't go around ripping sections out of your Dr. Spock book and throwing them across the room when you get tired and stressed like I did. There are now and will forever be tremendous gaps in my knowledge of early childcare. This may be why William is still not completely potty-trained. Relieve stress in an adult manner, like punching a pillow or going to sleep instead. You are a wonderful and dedicated mother. Eventually you will get more rest. One day you too will experience the tremendous joy of your children entertaining one another instead of it always being you building the towers, finding the bouncy balls, pretending you are a doggie, and nursing Jesse all while trying to cook the pasta. Hang in there! It's worth it, I promise.

That's our girl!

Newlyweds!

Congratulations, Aline and Sebastian! Be happy and live long!

Happy Birthday Temporarylibrarian!

The Church of the Stinky Po-Po

Perhaps Sean and I have been a little lax about the religious education. This beautiful church was instantly dubbed "The Church of the Stinky Po-Po" by our loud-American 5 year old son ("Po" means "butt" in German). The name was then repeated and repeated by the equally loud 2 1/2 year old daughter. Sadly, certain parents found this hilarious and may have reinforced the terrible behavior. This conversation degenerated further and further until William made finally his first pun. Puns! The lowest form of humor there is. And this was likely the worst pun in history, especially given that we were driving around Tuscany trying to discuss history at the time. From the back seat William blurts: "POpe!" You said "POpe!" Get it? Get it? Hahahahahahahaha!

Playground in Lajatico, Italia

Waiting for Dessert

We Filled in Bubble Eight!

Today we sent our absentee ballots back to Monroe County! That's two votes for OBAMA -BIDEN and BARON HILL from us. Everybody, get registered and vote for diplomacy, health care, women's rights, and the well-being of the North American moose.

BAD blogger!

Okay Okay Okay! I'm SORRY! I know the blogging has been slim lately! But the computer suddenly went ultra-slow and the camera had dead batteries and a full memory card and and and I had to spend all of my avaliable internet time reading about politics and watching Saturday Night Live skits about Palin.

Today, I replaced the batteries in the camera and took care of the full memory card. I may have nearly maxed out on the politics. Grandparents, experience a glimmer of hope! After a blogging famine always comes a blogging feast!

Proud Auntie Introduces...

Jesse Alexander !!!!!!!!!!

Born 9am Seattle

26 September 2008

Proud parents and baby boy all doing well!!!

I'm such a proud auntie! YIPPEE!!!!!! Congratulations!

Dr. Hausfrau is Board Certified!

I can tell the difference between a rare African scalp disease and a tree across the street! I passed the American Family Practice Board Exam! Yippee!

An Overview for the Impatient

Hi everybody, we are back from our two week vacation in Tuscany with Beeba!
On our first night, before we picked up Beeba, we had dinner at a fancy restaurant in Parma. This was a learning experience for our children, who had to behave for SEVERAL entire courses. The dessert course was popular...

But before we got to the dessert course, we had to explain several things about fancy restaurants. One typically does not eat the tablecloth. Or use one's bread roll as an extra thumb...

The food, once it *finally* came, was very good!

Then Beeba arrived!

Wm and Mg were her immediate buddies. As long as she obeyed their commands.

We had picnics.

Some of us looked cute in the woods.

The landscapes went on forever.

We spent a lot of time in "The Beeba Garden" looking at photos.

Some of us were not always properly attired for visiting Catholic Cathedrals.

William wants to know: "Why does Jesus always live by the knights?"

Beeba and I climbed several towers. Here, we look down on our peeps, who are being very loud and wild in the courtyard.

The cities looked like this.

But before, more like this.

William and Margaret were good little siblings and demonstrated safe street behaviour at times.

Margaret's first wine tasting!

William actually got to taste all three local wines. The white made him scratch his tongue.

We toured countless cities looking like this. William is wearing balloon antlers. He is the "grown-up" Bambi.

Wow, look up! Check out that Cathedral!

If you can get your eyes off these characters, that is!