A Mouse and a Jack-O-Lantern

So on Halloween, I dressed Rowan up in a borrowed Halloween onesie and subjected her to a few flash-bulbs.
She had no clue what it was all about, but she took it in stride. This was good, since it was nothing compared to what was coming...

First, we had a mouse...Minnie Mouse to be exact.

Mickey, eat your heart out!

This Minnie Mouse didn't know what was going on, per say, but she liked her costume well-enough, especially when she was allowed to color in it!

What's the big deal with coloring you might wonder? Well since our resident two-year-old genius eats crayons...coloring is a monitored and therefore, limited activity!

Still we think she made a darn good Minnie!

And Rowan, well she's just the cutest darn Jack-O-Lantern we've ever seen!

"Again, with the pictures Mommy?" Rowan groaned.

"Oh well, might as well enjoy the inevitable." Then it was down to Grammy and Grampy's house where we celebrated the real fun of Halloween.

Walking around the very crooked sidewalks...

and falling asleep...

while big sister begs for chocolate.

And quite a beggar she turned out to be.

As you can see, Kaylee quickly ditched her Minnie Mouse ears.

"Mommy," she told me, "My character is very recognizable. I hardly need the ears for people to know who I am!"

It was hard to argue with that logic, and with a mouse for that matter!

And that was our Halloween! Hope yours was Happy too!

Apple Picking With A Toddler

First, you should be aware that when planning an apple picking trip with a 2-year-old with, take the time you think the activity should last and divide it by at least 3. Our apple picking adventure, which I had hoped would take an hour or more, didn't. Such is the attention span of our little monkey.
Anyway, on Sunday afternoon we headed to our local apple orchard to get some apples. Here's Daddy leading our little apple-picker to her quarry.
"There it is," he tells her, "Out yonder o'er near that there pumpkin patch." (Please note: the previous quote was intended with the worst hick impersonation imaginable.)
Kaylee wasted no time figuring out what her job was...and she did it with great gusto.

And expert apple-picker has been born.

She managed to wrestle even the most stubborn of apples from their perch.

Then it was time to sample her pickings...Kaylee had a whole peck to go through to find which specimen would have the honor of being the first to be eaten.

She inspected each apple closely, wanting to find the perfect one.

Soon she found the one she wanted, and held it close, her coveted prize.
Then she dug right in.

Kaylee sure does love those apples.

We really like this picture, the pumpkin patch was really a beautiful backdrop for our adventure.

Then it was time to explore the pumpkin patch and see what trouble she could get into.

"There sure are a lot of great pumpkins around here," Kaylee thought.

She quickly found her favorite.

She was literally head over heals for that pumpkin. Yeah, ok, that was bad.

Then it was time to recount her adventures to her Mommy on their way out (as Mommy had spent most of the time photo-documenting the event and shielding Rowan's eyes from the sun.)

Well that was fun...all 20 minutes of it!

That's all till tomorrow when hopefully I will get a ton of cute Halloween pics!

a "Great" visit

On Thursday, after our library story time, we headed down to visit Great-Grandma Chip. She lives a little over an hour away from us and we hadn't seen her since Kaylee's birthday party.
Kaylee wasted no time re-acquainting herself with her "birthday balloon bashing buddy." She and Great-Grandma had had a whole lot of fun at her birthday party, and clearly Kaylee remembered that.

For a while we hung out in the lobby/lounge of Grandma's Retirement Village. This is the best way for Grandma to show off her great-granddaughters you know...to everyone coming and going.

Then we headed up to Grandma's apartment for some lunch. Kaylee got to eat her lunch with her new bear and while watching "Caillou," who could ask for more?

Apparently, the bear could. But Kaylee was more than happy to share her carrots with her furry friend.

"Alright bear, this is your last one, the rest are for me!" Kaylee exclaimed. Jeez those bears are

greedy.

Well, after all that Rowan finally woke up...and after she had her lunch, she spent some time getting to know her great-grandmother.
They seemed to get along just fine right away.

Then, on some other day this past week, Rowan was being particularly cheerful, and I tried to catch a smile on camera for a good 20 minutes with no real victory. But some cute shots all the same.

I did however, manage to make her start to cry with all the flashes in the face.

"Mommy stop with all the paparazzi stuff!" Ro complained.
Here's a sort of smile.

And again, that was like 0.001 seconds after a smile...

Here's a shot, where she turned her head while she smiled, so still no good.

This is the best one I got and it still isn't even close to one of her genuine cute smiles. Oh well, someday right?

She complained to Daddy that evening. "Mommy wouldn't leave me alone with the camera all day!"

Rowan is officially sitting up in her bumbo seat now! Can you believe, its been 8 weeks?

Again, she was feeling pretty cooperative so I took several shots.

She sits up nice and straight for a while, but then, slowly...she starts to lean over...

And then, she gets mad!
Rowan has also finally taken a shining to the swing. Now the swing was ever so important in the early days of Kaylee's youth; but thus far Ro hadn't been digging it. Although, I suspect the zeal in which her sister pushes her in it might have something to do with the indifference toward the swing.
But Mommy finally wizened up and put her in it while Kaylee was napping and 'viola.'

And so even Mommy got a tiny little nap in on the couch that day.

Then, when she woke up Mommy was feeling a bit crazy so she turned the camera on herself...literally!

And so that was a Rowan-heavy blog entry...but Kaylee usually has the spot-light, so this time, she can share.
Ciao.