adverbial update

He's sitting up, mostly.

He's teething, probably.

He gets up on all fours, wobbily.

He is eating solids, sloppily.

He sleeps in his own crib, finally.

He's my boyfriend, definitely.

He drools and spits up, frequently.

He poops at 4 am, religiously.

He smiles, beautifully.

He's ticklish, extremely!

He grabs and touches everything, curiously.

He wants my cell phone, desperately.

He is our baby, undoubtedly!

Put a pin in it!

For the last few months, "Let's pin it!" has been a common phrase around here.

And no, it is not a reference to my latest obsession with Pinterest.

Rather, a reference to Jack's latest obsession with bug collecting.

Everywhere we go, Jack is looking for bugs.

He finds them in our house.

He finds them in the park.

He finds them on hikes.

At school.

At church.

It is not uncommon for him to come home with a live bug in his pocket.

I keep finding my Tupperware in the yard housing a new critter.

Then they usually make their way onto the kitchen counter where they sit until "pinned".

Jack even found a black widow (yikes) on the outside of our house.

Thankfully, he knows NOT to touch them.

But dad had the bright idea of capturing it, along with her egg sac, and keeping it in the house (in some Tupperware, of course) until it died.

Well, a week went by.

Then two.

Then Three.

Then four, and that little widow was still ALIVE! Not only was she alive, but so were her new 200 baby widows...all crawling around in my tupperware! Talk about heebie jeebies! I'm doing the spider shimmy and shake dance as I type!

Once we realized these black widows were invincible AND they had just increased in number ten-fold, we decided we had no other option than to freeze them.

It worked.

So you see, it has not been easy making this bug collection. I am out of Tupperware, tired of seeing bugs in the kitchen, and ready to call the exterminator.

But Jack LOVES it and is so proud of his collection.

(He's since added a really impressive GREEN praying mantis, a grasshopper, and a bee.)

apple hill

I was beginning to mourn the fast disappearance of October when I realized it was the morning of the 29th and we hadn't done our usual fall outings to the pumpkin patch or apple hill.

So, we quickly got dressed at 8 am and headed up the hill to pick some apples and eat some warm donuts.

Apple hill is just as it sounds. It's up in the foothills below Tahoe where you can pick from 60+ apple orchards to tour.

We started out at Rainbow Orchards which is famous for their hot-out-of-the-grease apple cider donuts. Oh my. We each got one, then decided they were too good to stop at that so we went back for another round.

Our kids only care about picking their own apples which is fine with us because we much prefer the smaller orchards over the ones that practically have fair attractions that your kids beg you to pay for. We were a little late in the season for the yummy red apples, but with some serious searching we managed to fill a basket full.

It was a great way to start a Saturday. Click here to see last year's Apple Hill trip.

trick or treat

Halloween 2011 Highlights:

- We attended the ward Trunk or Treat. The kids made 16 rounds around the parking lot until their buckets were FULL. Jack threw up 4 times that night.

-Troy and I made dueling chilis for the chili cook-off. Let's just say that one of us won and it might have been the same person who won last year, and she might just be a girl.

- Jack's school party went off without a hitch, but after A LOT of food/party preparations our house looked like a category 5 hurricane had blown through! We still haven't recovered.

- We bought a cute crab costume for Sammy. We purchased a 9 month costume for our 6 month old and couldn't get it over his feet! We make kids jumbo sized over here, which is weird because we're so petite!?!

- Hollie treated us to warm potato soup and homemade artisan bread on Halloween night. We chowed down then sat in the driveway handing out candy.

- We carved 2 pumpkins barely in time for the holiday. Like, right before bedtime on Halloween night.

We had a real life "Captain Jack" Pirate.

Lucy was Ariel the Mermaid.

Grandma came to visit with some great Halloween books.

Our bum cousins came begging for candy!