This is Halloween!

Friday, Oliver and I met up with Judith and Phineas for the My Gym Halloween party. My Gym is a relief for me. Oliver has been there enough now that he understands that it is safe. I get at least a half hour of cling-free time. That makes me one happy mommy! His favorite place there is this little house they have there. He is very territorial of "his" house! We also watched The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown movie. It is sure to be a Schulz Halloween tradition!

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Well, it is 8:30 and we have been out of candy for about a half an hour now. We dressed little Yoda up one last time. Before candy time, we carved our first pumpkins as a family. I forgot how fun carving pumpkins is! Bill mocked me for the amount of time I put into mine, but you can't rush pumpkin perfection! :) (Plus, there were a ton of pictures taken of our pumpkins, which I thought was kick a**!) Can you guess whose is whose? Mine on the left, Ollie's that I carved in the middle and Bill's on the right.

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The Schulz's did a little reverse trick or treating. Bill loaded up Oliver's one-eyed monster basket with his homebrew. We then went and handed out Spruce Stout to our neighbors. Once we went through our stout, we had a ton of tick or treaters! I'm so excited for next years fun!..

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Keep it together I will not

So, today was our Halloween playdate. I guess I haven't learned my lesson yet. When I really want things to be *perfect* on any given day, it goes completely opposite. Today was one of those days. Last week, Ollie was really good at My Gym and the Y. I really thought we turned a less-clingy corner. Well, I've found this to be a two steps forward, one step back type situation.

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Anyways... If you didn't understand my title, Oliver is going to be Yoda for Halloween this year. My first choice was pirate, but once Star Wars came into the debate, I could tell he really wanted his son to be something Star Wars related. Okay, done and done!

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He looks pretty cute, right? Let me introduce you to some of friends. This is Scott, the Globetrotter. Can it get any cuter? The answer is NO! I don't care how cute your kid is, this is the CUTEST THING EVER! That is Scott's real hair! I love it!! I always want to pet him. His mom, Shakira, is probably weirded out by that. The giraffe that is kissing the monkey is his friend Lauren. The monkey that is receiving the affection is Phineas. These are the three amigos. Scott and Oliver are both rough boys. Mac, in the stripes is in the middle. Then, the cute girly monkey is Jordyn. Those are all his buddies that are his age.

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Here are the kicker pictures. The pictures I will show his girlfriend when he is 17 and trying to be a stud. This kid couldn't keep himself together. Poor Yoda... Luckily, I brought the pumpkin home. I'm hoping for a second try this weekend.

What, What, What!!

So, I will first apologize for the tone of my voice in this video. It is crazy to hear how excited I got over this milestone. Give me a week, I won't be this excited about this new found freedom. Also, this video again is quite terrible quality. Picture this: Ollie taking some steps and me seeing it out of the corner of my eye. Me, rushing to the diaper bag and literally ripping all the contents out, not finding the flip. Then, I rush to the piano and see it under the flap of the SLR bag. I tip-toe to the kitchen to capture more of the OFFICIAL first steps! AH!!!

ENJOY!

Ha!

So, certain shirts for kids, I'm not a fan of. I don't need anything for Ollie that says, "Troublemaker" or "I'm in charge," etc. I don't need to curse my child's behavior!! But, I do appreciate funny shirts. "Mommy's alarm clock," "I can't read," "I'm not a girl," etc. So, when I saw this, I needed to purchase it. Because, once Oliver gets to the age where he is actually a fan of people his own age, the novelty of this shirt will wear off. I find it hilarious to put this on, since he doesn't have the warmest reception to kids his own age these days.

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Dads out there: Especially lock up your daughters when my son puts on this charming face. Lady killer!!

Pumpkin Patch Craziness!

Today we ventured to Tim's Pumpkin Patch. Actually, we were talking about going to a pumpkin patch and we got invited to go to Tim's with the Wilfkoskey family (Julie, Jordy, and Ian too). The story of Tim's is that 20 years ago, Tim planted some pumpkin seeds and sold his crop for a dollar a pumpkin. Each year he planted more pumpkins and kept selling them for $1 until 2006 when they got raised to $2 each. It was crazy to see the huge fields full of pumpkins. There was a little hobby farm, a great selection of specialty pumpkins (picture green and white ones straight out of Martha Stewart Living), a food stand (yummy pumpkin funnel cake), and much more. It was a chilly day out there, so we didn't stick around too long to take in the extra activities. We did find 3 pumpkins that called our name. I also bought a large pumpkin that went to our friends Judith and Phins' house. It is going to be hallowed out to stuff kiddies in at our Halloween playdate. Another cute photo op waiting to happen! Happy Fall, y'all! (Even if my midwest friends and family seemed to have lost out on this season and went straight to winter!)

This is how I roll now

It is funny to look back at what I thought my life was going to be like... in high school. Never did I think I would be married, let alone have a kid! I was going to be a professional with no thoughts of ever staying home. So, today just made me chuckle a little about how much my life has changed from my original plan.

This afternoon was the epitome of a great fall day for me these days. Oliver has made some more new friends from My Gym. All the mommies, except for our friends Shakira and Scott, met up at the zoo today. So instead of being a labcoat like I always thought I would be, I am knee deep in nuk retrieval and puffs. This is how I roll now...

Here is the crew from top to bottom: Lauren, Phin, Ollie, Jordy, Emma and Seth

All the kids from My Gym are basically the same age. Ollie is the oldest and the youngest is his girlfriend Jordyn. All the other boys and girls are in the middle. So, it is great that at about the same time they had a huge meltdown. It was like clockwork... around 2:30 they all started crying. We all scrammed said a quick good bye and off to nap time.

Having a bad day?

So, I have these videos that I watch if I'm having a bad afternoon. I hope it has the same effect on you. My camera skills got a little out of control once Ollie busted out that sweet move. Please forgive... Oh, and weims play with their mouths. No, Porter is not trying to eat Oliver!