Halloween Part 2

Thankfully, the rain stopped early this morning and the weather held out for some Trick-or-Treating.

Devin was so excited! It was a thrill to watch her so happy:)

She made some graceful concessions on the clown outfit. Her hat was just a bit too small and kept blowing off in the wind during the preschool parade yesterday. She was in love with my make up job & didn't care about not having her beloved clown hat.

We also skipped the clown shoe covers that came with the outfit. Also, too small.

Two giant bows looked kind of "clowny," don't you think?




She pointed to a face on the box and I did my best.


















People handed my tiny clown candy by the handful and her Elmo head was full after about 20 houses. She seemed satisfied and said she was ready to go home and see what she could have.

It was so weird. Mom and I prepared for the usual amount of kids, plus some...assuming a Saturday night with decent weather would bring them in droves. Nope. This Halloween brought the fewest amount of Trick-or-Treaters ever. We both have so much candy left over, it's not funny. (We've both run out in previous years)

While we were out, Matt managed to burn his fingers on a cookie sheet pretty badly. Have you ever set a cookie sheet on the stove top, when you forgot to turn off a burner? We're idiots and coudn't figure out why some of the Pigs-In-Blankets were burned and some were cooked perfectly. About 30 minutes after we pulled the cookie sheet out of the oven...Matt grabbed it, assuming it was cool. Two of his fingers have huge blisters and hurt a lot.

Boo.

Halloween Part #1

It's always fun to review previous Halloweens!

Almost 6 months old, my little mouse.


18 Month old Kitty Cat.




2 1/2 Years...my beautiful peacock:)




3 1/2. My tiny clown.






She had such a great time at her preschool Halloween party. I took a ton of pictures!

Since I can't ask all 16 parents permission...I won't be posting those pictures, but the kids were so cute!

Lots more clown pics to come. And probably some kitty cat. We've been dressing like a kitten now...haven't seen Dorothy the Dinosaur in a week!

Peoria Trip-October 2009

We made the trip to Peoria this weekend. As soon as Grandpa got home, Devin wanted to play the piano with him.

You can tell by this look, it's one of her favorite things to do with Grandpa!


The twist on this trip? Dev's cousins were in from Colorado...and here's her first lesson in sharing.

See this look?


The table conversation amongst the 3-10 year old crowd was fascinating. Devin and Nicholas were discussing his age.


As always, Devin was drawn to the costume box. So, we got to see a lot of polar bear, Spider Man and Dracula.





Alexander's so photogenic...but I love this picture of him avoiding me!!


See? I snapped this picture the instant he looked at me. One millisecond later, he was off to the races!


Ken and Patty arrived after lunch and got in on the costume fun.



This smile, meant it was pumpkin carving time.








It's challenging (an understatement) to get the 3 kids to pose for a picture at once.






Devin had a great time seeing her cousins and she always loves Gma and Gpa's house. She's a good little traveler:)

October Fest

Today was one of those perfect October Days.

It was the kind of day where you could wear 3 or 4 layers of clothes and still be comfortable. In this picture, she's wearing a t-shirt, sweatshirt, Dorothy costume, tutu costume & still playing catch with Dad!








What could make Dev smile this big?


A sparkly ghost cookie!!!!









We went to the church pumpkin patch, just as they were closing.

I couldn't get her to look at me & I wanted to enjoy the pumpkins...so I gave up:)

A Good Week For a Change

It's amazing how fast things can change. Devin's on the mend, finally. More than 10 days later, she's still congested and coughing some. But, much better overall.

My meeting with the President of the competing company couldn't have gone better. She offered me the job on the spot, with the same hourly pay and more flexible. She even wrote me a check that morning for work I'll do this week. I was stunned, thrilled & relieved.

I'm doing PR and marketing work for the 2nd largest taxi company in my city. (I was previously with the largest company, which is about 2x the size) It's a really challenging and fun job, that I can do from home. They also have taxi top advertising, which I sell for a commission.

Having all the drama behind me, allowed me to focus on tennis today. I won a tough doubles match this morning. Devin had a ball playing with Miss Debbie and exploring the playroom at the tennis club.

Don't call the child psycholigist just yet

We were a bit alarmed, when Devin started writing, "DIE" on all her art work.

Then she told us that's her name! See the D and V on the left? It's a Devin word jumble.

I love her E's, with 4-6 horizontal lines.

Our First Baby

I'll bet you didn't know we actually purchased a "baby" in 1999. 10 years later...she's still with us.

Our beautiful and scary fast M3.




Matt's (and I) have taken meticulous care of our 1st. She's had just about everything replaced once, usually with the racing upgrade.




Of course, I'm taking pictures so I can sell it on-line. Even for me, it's difficult. Driving this car, is an experience everyone should have at least once. And, we can drive it everyday. (Although we don't, to save the miles)

For Matt, I think it's painful. He's not involved in the selling process, but reluctantly gave me the ok. I don't to feel too sorry for him, with a turbo boosted Volvo as his daily driver.

I'm trying to sell it on cars.com, which links to our local paper as well. The ad should go up on Wednesday and we'll see how it goes. It's a very specific market, but these cars are very desirable when in good/excellent condition.

Devin continues to improve, but it's been slow progress. Her sleep is still interrupted by congestion, draining and coughing. I'm a bit concerned about her catching a secondary infection, while she's still recovering...which apparently is the reason people are dying from H1N1. She hasn't had a fever since Saturday, so she will go to preschool tomorrow.

Matt and I had the idea for me to approach the President of the company who directly competes with the company that just laid me off. I left a message for her and guess what? She called me back within the hour and wants to take me to lunch!!! We briefly discussed what I did for the "other" company and she was excited to hear all about it. It's a much, much smaller company...they most likely could not replace my pay. BUT, any income is better than zero. I meet with her tomorrow.

If I could get a few small, "selling things from home" jobs and sell the car...we'll be alright.

Someone's Feeling Better

I enter into evidence, Video #1.

These are two, life-size Golden Retriever stuffed animals given to her by my dear friend Debbie. Debbie is very involved in a local organization that rescues Goldens and finds new homes for them.

Debbie has 2 dogs herself: Trevor and Zoe!

She even got the 2 dogs personalized collars that read "Trevor" and "Zoe."





Video #2



Video #3








She's still feeling crappy, though. The sickness has moved into her lungs and she coughed throughout the night.

Around 11:30, we tried our favorite anti-coughing voodoo trick.

Vick's Vapo Rub on the bottom of her feet with socks. It's crazy. Within 30 minutes, her cough subsided and she went back to sleep.

The long week, just got longer

I was let go from my awesome part-time job today.

It was a wonderful opportunity while it lasted. About 4 months ago, the President of the company (who hired me) was unexpectedly fired by the owners. With him gone, I did everything I could to make the best of the job...the GM did her best to keep me around.

Well, this week SHE left the company to go work for previously fired president at his new, start-up company.

Let me quote the owner: "I'm throwing the baby out with the bath water." So, basically I was let go for knowing the ex-President.

Unfortunately, the new company is too new to afford a marketing/PR/salesperson at the moment.

I can't help but be sad. It was a good job that I liked. But, working directly for the owner would have been difficult at best...(Since this is a public blog, I'll leave it at that) Plus, I hate putting more pressure on Matt to provide our entire income. What a switch. At one point, I made 3-4x his income...and was miserable, traveling around in a high-pressure job.

So, I'm filing for unemployment and Matt's given me his OK to sell the BMW.

Do you know anyone who's desperate for a 1997 M3 with 140,000 miles on it? With all the racing extras, Matt's pretty sure we should ask $11,000.

We'll figure it out. We always do.

I think we'll start planning for a very scaled down Christmas:)

That was a long week

For a variety of reasons, this was a long week. Thankfully, Devin isn't worse...but isn't really much better, either.

Her "flu" has morphed into a super-nasty cold. She's 100% congested, sneezing, runny nose, lethargic. In general, she looks and feels like crap. But, I'll take that over puking any day. I forgot how tiring it is to be up and down all night long.

Unfortunately, she will have to miss her first "real" Birthday party for one of her friends at preschool. She was so excited to go:(

For some reason, I picked this week to start painting the master bath. It's tedious and time consuming, but looks good. Next up? Our bedroom. It's desperate for a fresh coat of paint and new flooring.

We Were Due For It-Flu:(

It looks like Devin's come down with the flu of some sort.

It started yesterday, when she woke up complaining that her throat was sore. I checked for fever, it was normal. She was a bundle of energy, asking to leave for school...and she had a great morning.

After her nap, she woke up sick.

Since then, the fever went up. And, so did everything from her stomach. All night long.

She was still getting sick this morning, but was able to rest all day. Now, it seems like severe congestion is setting in...along with the fever.

I'm hoping for a better night tonight.

1st Tennis Lesson

I took Devin to her first "official" tennis lesson today.

She. Loved. It!

I thought she would be at least a little hesitant to try something new...and not have me standing right there.

WRONG!

She ran onto the court, I introduced her to Derrick and DJ and I went back to the window.

Here she's learning to stretch her arms.


And, legs.












The kids were playing tag, when she collided with the boy next to her in the above picture. She's much smaller and took a spill to the court. Thankfully, it didn't dampen her spirits about the tennis lesson & she asked, "When we can go to tennis again?"