We are going to be late.

The Diva was invited to her very first Halloween party this year. One of the little girls in her class had a party and invited the whole class over. Diva was very excited about this. Halloween is always a tricky holiday around our house. Diva does not  like people dressed up in costume. They really freak her out. This includes the cow at Chik Fil A, sports mascots and the mouse at Chuck E. Cheese. Halloween is a mine field. If anyone is dressed scary and approaches Diva it's all down hill from there. When we trick or treat we avoid any house that even looks like it might be scary. The candy isn't worth it to her. That being said she was very excited about this party. I explained that people would be in costume and that there might be some scary looking decorations. She explained to me that it is just pretend and that she isn't scared anymore. Well~ la de da. So...Mr. Mayer and I decided that since I knew the little girl and her mom I would take Diva. I was a little nervo...

It's been Fall Break around here. This is Diva's first "official" fall break. She's always gone to daycare. I had big plans of how Fall Break was going to go. Like usual those big plans didn't work out so great. Wednesday was Diva's last day at school. She had Thursday and Friday off. I was expecting my in laws to come late Wednesday night. Thursday was supposed be really great weather so I thought that maybe we could go to the zoo. I hadn't planned on Friday yet. Saturday was a TMOM's family picnic that we were going to and then maybe out to Oktoberfest. Pretty easy pace, nothing fancy. Well....let me tell you. That is not what happened. The in laws didn't come on Wednesday. Wednesday night Mr. Mayer started making a batch of Pumpkin Ale beer. Things were going well. I was watching some TV. All of a sudden Mr. Mayer starts going "Oh shit no! Oh shit no! Oh shit no!" He then said he needed a towel. Wait, he needed several towels....

When I am in the mood for comfort food my mind immediately goes to Spaghetti and Meatballs. It has been my favorite for as long as I can remember. My version of the dish consists of jarred sauce and ground beef or frozen meatballs because I didn't know how to make meatballs. Enter Nana Karen. When I was pregnant with Shrek and Donkey there wasn't much I could do the further along I got. Nana Karen would come over about once a week and make dinner and help me with whatever. She was a God send. It was an enormous help. One of the things she would make was Spaghetti and Meatballs. Wow! She made homemade sauce and from scratch meatballs. Every time I eat this dish I am in heaven. Nana Karen is an old school cook. She doesn't measure anything and makes everything from memory. A few weeks ago she found a pasta maker that her and I have been playing with and making homemade pasta. If you have never had homemade pasta it is divine!  She came over today to make some pasta. While s...

The pumpkin patch. I think it's mandatory if you have children. Right? It is in this family. Living up to our parental obligation and the desire to get some cute pics we loaded the clan up and went to the pumpkin patch today. Naturally, when we sit the boys down they run in opposite directions. Then the second the camera comes out Donkey runs away and wants nothing to do with having his picture taken. Diva immediately starts posing and hamming it up and Shrek....well, he is who he is. He was just having a really good time today. At this point in life we are happy to get any sort of picture we can. I made a collage but wasn't happy with how it was turning out. I decided that the individual pictures look better. We came home and had nap/quiet time. Then it was back outside to play some more. We took a few additional pictures. Shrek has learned how to climb onto the play set. We keep trying to block it off with whatever we can think of. He continues t...

I know that the dudes have changed immensely in this past year. It really hit me this evening just how  much they have changed. The weather is fantastic. We were having dinner on the patio like we do a lot of times. It was about this time last year when we were having dinner on the patio and took this: Donkey on the left and Shrek on the right.  Wow! Who are those tiny little people? Tonight looked much different. We took this while eating dinner tonight: Shrek Donkey They are way to big for their bouncy chairs these days. They were having a good time with their dinner and were some very messy little boys. As a side note: I made Crock Pot Chicken Enchilada Soup for dinner. I found the recipe on Pinterest. YUM-O is all I have to say. It was wonderful. Definitely going to be put into the regular rotation.

Circa 2005 I've had a blog post rolling around in my head all week. I want to talk about my brother in law Walter Joe. I just don't know where to start or what to say about him. Three years ago today my brother in law died suddenly. It was a car accident. I blogged about it a little bit last year. People wear your seat belts!   He's been on my mind a lot this week. Today Diva and I were driving towards downtown to pick up my co-op order. There was a man passing us on a Harley (or Harley like) motorcycle. He had a ponytail. For a split second I could believe it was him. I'm still listening for that motorcycle. I lost it. I don't think Diva noticed. She was 1 1/2 when he died and doesn't have any memory of him other than the pictures we show her. I think that's what crushes me the most. My kids will never know their Uncle Walt. He LOVED Diva. I have a picture of him holding her when she was a few weeks old (Naturally I can't find it right now) and h...

As many know I have been getting some pressure to cut the Dudes hair. There have been comments about them having mullets and they could dress up like Rednecks or Hillbilly's for Halloween. Rude. I love those curls. Mullet or not. I realize that their hair was a little crazy and mullet looking. I also realize that they would probably look better with a haircut. However, I also realize that if I cut their hair that they would look more like little boys and not as much as my little babies. I wasn't sure I was ready for big boys. I know it's just hair. I cut my hair on a whim pretty regularly. I have cut Diva's hair as well. I just wasn't wanting to cut my babies hair. But, Mr. Mayer started taking pictures and posting mullet pictures online last night. Again~rude. The time had come. I needed to get them a cut. Nana Karen came over this afternoon and went with me to Kuts for Kids with Mr. Will today. I was nervous! The little guys had a great time playing with all the t...