Santa saves the day - and it's not even Christmas!

Okay, so after I posted last night I was definitely feeling a little guilty about the whole not getting Ian either of the gifts he requested thing. But as I said, the Star Wars Legos were just out of the question right now (plus they all start at like age 7) and we really could not decipher what he was trying to tell us about this Cars thing. However, we had attempted to do another grilling in the car on the way home from the illegal Santa portrait session and got just enough information out of him that another Amazon search late last night pulled up what we believe he has been talking about: the Disney/Pixar Cars Playset Piston Cup 500 Track Set. (Just try and say that one five times fast!)

So, being the completely amazing parents that we are, we whipped out the credit card (so handy, those little cards are) and two seconds later we were selecting the "rush shipping" option so our son could have all his dreams come true on Christmas morning. And now Jeff gets to drive BACK to Costco (after he had made a special trip there just yesterday morning) to return what was supposed to be his big Santa present - a tabletop foosball game (actually air hockey was the original idea, but they were sold out) - so he can have his Disney/Pixar Cars Playset Piston Cup 500 Track Set instead. (PS - Do you think the person who named this product realized they used the word "set" twice in the title? Because it's kind of unnecessary, but that's just my opinion.)

I have to say, this Santa stuff is kind of exhausting.

Until I write again.

Sit on Santa's lap...check

Of course no holiday is complete without a visit to the local mall Santa where your kid gets to sit on "Santa's" lap and tell him about the iPod, iPhone and Wii Fit he wants for Christmas. Oh wait, maybe that's me. Anyway, a couple of years ago I was tipped off to a Santa at a large strip mall joint not too far from our house, which is, shall we say, a little less trafficked than Washington Square Mall. (See prior post for more information.) Maybe it's the Hello Kitty store...I mean, is Hello Kitty even still popular?

Still, with the big date fast approaching, we suspected that pretty much any Santa who is worth his weight in presents and reindeer would be quite popular today. So once again, we got strategic (we are a highly strategic group, we Burpos) and decided to head over shortly before Santa's quittin' time for the day. We strolled right up to a lovely woman who said, "Wow, you timed it just right...we've been running at least an hour-long line all day but now we're empty!" "Well lucky us!," I said as I peered over toward Santa who seemed to be stashing a clear bottle behind his chair. Probably some Perrier...I know Santa likes the fancy water.

So off Ian goes to share his biggest hopes and dreams for this Christmas with Santa - which consistently seem to be a Star Wars Lego set (not happening) and a "set" to go with his Cars stuff. Now, "Santa" may actually bring Ian a Cars "set" if "Santa" could ever figure out what he was talking about but since "Santa" (nor Mrs. "Santa") could not and have reason to believe that what he wants might only exist in his head, well, he's probably not getting that either. Of course he's getting plenty of other things - including two other Lego sets that do not feature Lego people shooting one another. (Besides, he has no real clue what Star Wars even is - he just heard about it from someone at school. This is why we need to get him that bubble we keep talking about.)

Truth be told, I hope he's not bummed out on Christmas morning when neither of these items appears under the tree because on the way home when we were asking him exactly what he and Santa conversed about up there, he said he told Santa that he wants these two particular items and "that's all I want for Christmas. Just those two things." Hmmm...well what about that damn "It's a Pillow! It's a Pet! It's a Pillow Pet!" I practically tackled someone for during the gift exchange at Jeff's holiday party and then had to lay down 20 smackers for one at Fred Meyer when they wouldn't give it up because apparently their kid wanted one, too??

Anyway, suffice it to say that all went very well with the Santa visit. Except Elena, who we quickly gathered wasn't into the large man in the red suit yet when she immediately started screaming bloody murder as soon as Jeff sat her down on Santa's other knee next to Ian. Of course it was actually kind of funny but just so as not to be contacted by CPS tomorrow, I suggested to Jeff that he scoop her back up and we just go ahead and take a pass on bro/sis Santa pic this year. Ian did take a couple of cute pictures with Santa, which the lovely woman was more than happy to sell us at the low, low price of $16.95 per shot - but I figured, why do that when I had slipped the ole' Canon PowerShot out of my coat pocket while the lovely woman was occupied at her camera. With that said, here's our official Illegal Mall Santa Shot of 2010. Enjoy!

Until I write again.

Justin Bieber does Washington Square Mall

Or at least that was the only explanation I could think of for the sheer and utter chaos I encountered when I so innocently decided to head out yesterday afternoon to wrap up a little Christmas shopping. Okay, either that or apparently a few other people had the same exact idea I did. Go figure.

I knew the second I entered the mall vicinity that I had made a bad decision. A very bad decision. But when it comes to the mall and shopping, I can not be intimidated. Even if there were 50 gazillion people whose job it was to try and intimidate me. Strategy #1: Instead of waiting in the line of about 156 cars trying to get to the spot next to the main door with my name on it, I immediately zipped into a vacated spot out in the North Forty. Good thing I had my comfy Franco Sarto Bocca flats on. (Love those shoes.) Strategy #2: No browsing allowed. Attack my mission with purpose. And knock down any 13, 15 or 17 year old who might be in the way. A tall order, indeed.

Okay, well here's where strategy ends and honesty begins. Of course I browsed!! But it was very minimal. I wasn't even going to go into Nordstrom at all because it wasn't high on the list of needs for the day but that just seemed like a crime so I kept it to about 10 minutes right at the end, which might be a personal record. I really did stay focused for the most part and within a couple of hours had achieved all of my shopping goals.

I could have kept it even shorter if I hadn't made a detour into a certain store for a large dose of slick marketing by that company that specializes in slick marketing. I won't name names but they sell computers (which I happen to be in the market for) along with a few other cool gadgets (some start with "i") and their logo is a piece of yummy fruit that can be red, green or yellow. And that's all I'm going to say about that for now. But stay tuned for potentially more on one of the great debates of our times...Mac or PC?

On tap today: Target with Ian so he can pick out a gift to give Elena for Christmas. And of course when I say "pick out," I mean attempt to strategically steer him toward the musical piano toy I've already identified for her. (Which I believe is the same one their Cousin Ellie has and loves, which means that we already have two-year-old validation that it's a great gift, so there you go.)

Until I write again. (And until then, I strongly recommend that you not go within five miles of a mall - or any shopping area - if you can avoid it.)

My not-so-funny Valentine's story

I feel that I've learned a fair number of things about parenting since I became one a few years ago. I mean, if I were to say, major in parenting - I think I'd definitely be beyond the basic courses at this point and into the advanced course work. (At least in the early childhood major.) And like all good courses of study, it's not all easy going. Every now and then an exercise comes up that really stumps you. Which is exactly what happened to me this week:

So, as everyone knows - tomorrow is Valentine's Day. Day of Cupid, true love, bows and arrows, blah, blah, blah. When we got Ian's class newsletter at the beginning of this month there was a big reminder on the front (and only) page: We'll be having our class Valentine's party on Friday, February 13 this year! See attached list for names of everyone in the class! My very first thought was, Huh? And then my very second thought was, Oh, right, Valentines! I think I vaguely recall some required exchange of little cards with silly sayings on them. Of course, I also recall things being a little less politically correct back in my day and being crushed to death when Fred didn't give me a Valentine, or that girl who I wanted to be best friends with so badly...of course not bad enough that I remember her name right now. And my third thought was, Oh goody - another item to add to the to-do list!

Anyway, in my attempt to be an involved parent I signed up the next day to bring apples in for the big bash. And, I figured I'd just stop in at Freddie's (notice how they seem to get a lot of publicity on this blog?) and pick up a box of those cute little Snoopy Valentines I remember from 30ish years ago, fill them out and call it a day. Fast forward to Monday of this week. I was picking up Ian when one of his teachers said, "Oh, so just to let you know - we decided to change the party from this Friday to this Thursday because the librarian is coming into the class on Friday." Which, for me, now meant that I needed to have the Valentines ready by end of day on Wednesday since Ian doesn't goes to school on Thursdays. This also meant that he wouldn't able to attend the Valentine's party, which was a bit of a bummer. However, for some reason, the Wednesday Valentine deadline didn't actually occur to me until Tuesday evening. Still, I thought, Oh, no big deal. I'll run out and get them after I drop Ian off tomorrow morning, fill them out and give them to the teacher when I pick him up Wednesday afternoon to distribute on Ian's behalf Thursday morning.

Enter Wednesday morning. By this point, I already knew that our Freddie's did not in fact have any Valentines (at least that I saw) - so I headed straight for Target after dropping off Ian. Now, let me say here that I must admit that one of the huge benefits of being unemployed...or excuse me, not working outside of the home...is being able to go to stores like Target on weekdays. Really, it spoils you from ever wanting to have to out shopping on a weekend again (though don't get me wrong - I do it anyway). So, I walk in and immediately soak up the calmness that is Target on a Wednesday morning. Ahhhh! Of course I don't go straight to where I need to go because, duh, I'm in Target. So I meander a bit, hitting the toy section to scope out some potential new mini gadgets to surprise Ian with on our plane trip to Texas next week. Of course, not that this "occupy them with new toys" strategy I keep reading about has ever worked for us before, but it doesn't mean we stop trying. Anyway, it's there in the toy section that I'm confronted with Super Annoying Mom #1. (Which, by the way, is a trade off of shopping on weekdays.) You know, the one roaming the aisles with the cell phone glued to her ear, not paying attention to her cart or where she is, but instead yapping nonstop about how little Johnny didn't sleep a wink last night. Meanwhile, she has this cute little girl trailing along behind her who she's paying zero attention to, except to turn every once in a while and yell, "Come on, Madison!" And she's just like Visa: Everywhere I want to be.

Next, I venture over the Valentine's section. Which is where I discover that the store wasn't as quiet as I thought it was. Because every person from at least half the cars in the parking lot was pretty much within this two aisle radius. Which I guess shouldn't have been all that surprising given the proximity to the official Hallmark holiday of the year. But I couldn't take it so I retreated for the main greeting card area which - big surprise - is where the other half of the people were. Ugh. Still, I had no choice so I suffered through before moving back to the Vday section where I encountered Super Annoying Moms #2, 3, 4 and 5. Maybe more. I lost count. There was all sorts of stuff going on in these aisles...little bins of picture frames, pencils, you name it - they had it. But what they didn't appear to have was a box of Valentines. Finally, I located them in a relatively small area. They looked a little different than I remembered. And there was no Snoopy or anything relatively cute or neutral. The choices were Hannah Montana, SpongeBob, Batman, Cinderella and a couple of other options I can't recall now. But let's just say they weren't good. And they definitely weren't like I remembered. I was confused. I kept thinking...there must be something I'm missing here! But not really. I mean, there was one box of "Make your own cards!" that involved a bunch of foam, some pens, some beads...I didn't really understand it so I put it back. Now I was getting a bit frustrated. This was supposed to be a quick outing and I had other things I wanted to get done that day while Ian was in school. You know, things that might actually lead to a paycheck at some point. But never fear! I had another idea! I'd just go down the way to my new favorite store Michael's and they would have exactly what I needed. Michael's never disappoints (at least they didn't when I re-discovered them over Christmas)!

So, I walked in the front door of Michael's fully expecting to be overcome with heart paraphernalia. Instead, I was overcome by plastic flowers (spring is coming, after all). I wandered around for a bit before coming across one measly display area of red stuff. It was right next to the measly display of green stuff for St. Patty's day. And oh yeah, they definitely had some Valentines...but it was the exact same stuff they had at Target. Apparently Miley Cyrus is making a killing off Valentine royalties this year. Plus a couple more "do it yourself" kits laying around that made no sense to me. It was at this point that I started aimlessly wandering around Michael's getting panicked. I had approximately five hours to deliver some Valentines to Ian's class and I was totally stumped! I knew I only had one choice: I needed to find my inner Martha. But I didn't even know what a Valentine was supposed to look like! How big are they? What do I write? Do I need envelopes? Luckily this saleswoman must have noticed me looking frazzled because she offered to help me and I was more than happy to oblige. And even better, she had young children. So, after a crash course in Kid Valentines 101 and a few ideas, I set about collecting my own materials. That's right - I was just going to make my own, darn it!

Approximately 2.5ish hours after I had dropped off Ian, I finally arrived back home armed with Valentine-making materials. By the time Jeff got home that afternoon, I was knee-deep in colored card stock, scalloped scissors, foam heart stickers, and gold and silver pens. Along with the class name list, of course. And now all I kept thinking was, Who are you and what did you do with Melinda? But seriously, talk about how I didn't intend on spending my day! And of course in the middle of all this I realized that it was only right that Ian have the opportunity to be involved in this little art activity. I mean, why should I have all the fun? So, I got a good start on everything else and left the stickers for him to place on the front when he got home that night. When I picked him up, I told his teacher that we'd have to drop off Ian's Valentines in the morning at which point she said, "Well, why don't you just bring him and leave him for a couple of hours?" Really?? Well, since you offered... (Oh, and by the way, it's not like we haven't already paid for about a million days over the past couple of months where he didn't actually go to school - including another day this upcoming Monday for the President's Day holiday. So I didn't mind taking her up on her offer for him to be there for a couple of hours on one of his "off days". Plus, I knew he'd really enjoy being at the party.)

On Wednesday night, Ian - with some help from Mom and Dad - had a great time putting the finishing touches on the Valentines for his school friends. We also cut up and put a small sheet of stickers as a little gift inside each Valentine. In the end, we had a lot of leftover stickers, which made Ian very happy. He was in heaven spending the rest of the evening - and Thursday - putting heart stickers all over new "cards" he made. On Thursday morning, he went to his Valentine party and came home with a whole bag of Valentines, most of them Hannah Montana, Cinderella, Batman... (um, can you say overachiever?) He also had some other special treats and a big smile on his face. So I think it's safe to say that his first class Valentine experience was a success. And of course I just can't wait until next year! Or even the next holiday, really.

Of course it also hit me at some point in this whole process that we needed to get Ian a little something for Valentine's Day. So, in honor of the fact that he does seem to be taking to chocolate these days, I got him some chocolate hearts from See's, a card and a little teddy bear (from Freddie's of course), which will actually be the first teddy bear he owns. As for Jeff and I, we are bucking our trend of staying in and making a nice meal at home and actually going out to dinner this year to a place we haven't been before called Lucy's Table. We figured what the heck, especially since it's on a Saturday this year and these days we'll pretty much look for any excuse to get out for a nice meal. And, if things go well, we may even get really wild and go out dancing afterwards!

So, Happy Hallmark Holiday...er, I mean, Valentine's Day to all!

Until I write again.

And you thought the holidays were over

Tonight we participated in our final - and arguably most important - holiday activity of 2008: Ian's school holiday program. (And at this point, I'm sure you don't need to ask why this was taking place tonight instead of before Christmas.)

At the beginning of December they started advertising the holiday program at school but Ian never said a word about it to us. I wondered - Would his class be in it? Were they even practicing something? Because if so, he wasn't sharing. And we didn't ask. So of course we were very curious about this "holiday program" and were very bummed when it didn't take place on its originally scheduled date before Christmas. Luckily, once classes finally got back in session this week the school director quickly pulled together the new date of tonight.

The festivities got started at school around 5:30 p.m. Instead of picking up Ian from class, we were directed to go straight to the school gym and take a seat there. The back wall was all decorated with adorable handmade decorations, with a paper garland Christmas tree as the centerpiece above a wooden stage. Already I wondered if I might cry at the sight of my son in his first school performance. Quickly setting thoughts of potential waterworks aside, we started chatting with the parents of one of Ian's classmates when we heard a commotion at the doors of the gym. The kids were ready to begin. Director Tricia gave a short intro and the music started to play. Only, we're not talking Frosty the Snowman - it was Stayin' Alive. As in, from Saturday Night Fever. Yeah! This is going to be even better than I thought! But it turns out that was just the toddlers' walk-down-the-aisle music. Once all gathered on stage - a feat in and of itself - they started singing Wheels on the Bus. Well, actually, the teachers started singing. The toddlers just sort of stood there. One started crawling down off the stage and running toward his Mom. And one started wailing. By the end, things weren't going well overall. Which just made it hilarious.

Next up was the 2 1/2 year old class - starring Ian Burpo (okay, maybe he was just the star in our minds). The walk-down-the-aisle music for his class was Mariah Carey's All I Want for Christmas. Which, I pretty much have to turn the channel every time that song comes on the radio because it's one of my least favorite holiday jingles ever - but that's okay. Maybe he'll get Jive Talkin' next year or something. Jeff and I had positioned ourselves (along with the other parents in Ian's class) at the front with video camera and digital camera in hands. Quite a juggling act indeed (as can be seen in the video quality).

Once they were all situated, they started their little song and dance. Now, let me pause here and say that one of the reasons that we were really intrigued by this whole thing is that we were curious how Ian would perform on a stage given that - as I've talked about - he's not the most extroverted of kids in group settings. So a whole auditorium of camcorders and flashes going off? Hmmm.... I half expected to see him do a repeat of the stand-and-stare toddler act. But no sirree. He seemed pretty into it from the moment they got started with some rendition of Row Row Row Your Boat that I must admit I had never heard before. But there were bells and jumping and twirling and it was all good. And if one song wasn't enough for these adorable little people, they concluded with We Wish You a Merry Christmas - including a big Happy Holidays! shout out to the crowd as their big finish. At which point the whole audience jumped out of their seats in roaring applause. The crowd was going wild! Or, maybe that was just the parents of the 2 1/2 year old class. I'm not sure.

Anyway, it was all pretty cute and now my holidays are officially complete. A video version will for sale on Amazon.com very shortly. PS - We're pretty sure Ian had fun despite how things might look in this photo.

Until I write again.

2009 has been a great year...so far

Okay, so we are actually only on the fourth day of the New Year but I have to say that so far it's been a really good year. Here's our year in review so far:

Countdown to Day One. Of course our New Year officially started off on New Years Eve where it wasn't until about 4 or 4:30ish p.m. that afternoon that we decided what we wanted to do that evening...which was sort of nothing. But being home never stopped us before from creating our own party and having a good time, which is exactly what we did. First, we popped over to Freddie's for some tasty dinner makings (yes, steak and baked potatoes were involved). Once home, we kicked on the "Party Favorites" on the music channel and that's when things really got rolling as we revived our official living room version of Dance Party USA (which admittedly has not made much of an appearance since leaving Dinwiddie Street). While I unfortunately don't have any photos to commemorate the revival of DP USA, I do have some video - which I may or may not be sharing in the near future.

Once Ian enjoyed his requested New Year's Eve meal of a "tostada" (aka, quesadilla) and a piece of Santa chocolate - he headed off for a bath and bed (well, not by himself - we were there to help him). After Jeff and I wrapped up dinner we returned to the dance floor - some of us longer than others - before heading back out on tour with the Stumptown Burpies downstairs. And then before we knew it, it was approaching midnight so we called off the tour and came up to watch Dick Clark...who now looks frighteningly similar to Ryan Seacrest...drop the ball. And let me just pause here to say, wow is that show bad. And besides that, what I really want to know is, who are these people who actually think that standing in Times Square with zillions of people screaming while freezing their butts off for hours on end actually sounds fun?? Because personally, you couldn't pay me to be out there. Well, I guess it would depend on how much you were offering - but it would have to be a lot. Maybe enough to pay off our mortgage or something like that.

Day One. Our first day of the New Year started off on a very positive note with Ian sleeping in until something like 8:30 a.m. Though, I have to say that with the holidays and recent weather issues throwing off all our schedules, he's been sleeping later a fair amount. That was the first 8:30 morning, though. I sprung out of bed with bells on and was M-O-T-I-V-A-T-E-D to start the year off right. How, you ask? Organizing, of course! Being it was the beginning of a new year and the fact that the weather was super nasty out (rain nasty, not snow nasty) - what better day to get the household in order? So that's pretty much what we did from morning till night. We took down the tree, the lights outside, packed away all of the Xmas stuff, I filled boxes with the latest round of outgrown Ian clothing and put it in the garage, we broke down boxes and hauled out trash and recycling for Friday pickup the first time in 2+ weeks, we made some money by selling our old high chair and fireplace set on Craigslist (we hated that high chair but were sad to part with the fireplace set - though we just didn't know if we'd ever need it again...), I reorganized our main storage closet in our den while Jeff cleaned out and organized the garage, and I put new pictures in frames...it was great!

Day Two. Jeff worked from home on this day, so Ian and I were on our own. Still tuckered from the previous day's activities, I have to say that we weren't overly ambitious about getting out early. And Ian is really into being in his jammies these days. In fact, we are having a lot of battles about putting on our "day clothes", but that's a story for another post. So he was running around with stickers all over him (Santa brought him transportation stickers in his stocking) and at one point I see him walking over with this big fat Elmo phone stuck to his ear. He's clearly having an important conversation with someone when he goes over to the drawer with our takeout menus and pulls out the menu for Lin's China Jade - still with phone to ear.

Me: What are doing, Ian?

Ian: Please be quiet. I'm ordering.

Me: Oh, okay, sorry to bother you. Carry on.

Ian: (Walks over to chair in the living room and puts menu down point at items.) Yes, I'd like a grilled cheese. Yes, and a peanut butter and jelly, too!

So, apparently the Chinese joint has expanded their menu since we last ordered from there, which is good to know. But since I know that kids often mimic what they see their parents doing most, I'm not sure how to take that little episode - but it was funny nonetheless.

And speaking of takeout and food, the real highlight of Day Two of 2009 came in the evening. After we had subjected ourselves to some crazy number of nights eating at home (it was at least four!), we were overdue for either takeout or a dinner out. So, we went with the latter. We decided to splurge a bit and take Ian out to a nicer little Thai place (but still kid-friendly) that we usually just get takeout from. And let me just say that we had the loveliest dinner with our two-soon-to-be-three-year-old! More and more lately it seems that we are finally reaching a point where we can enjoy a meal out w/o anxiously gulping down our food at light speed and asking for the check halfway through the meal. And boy have we waited a long time for this day! We actually sat there perfectly relaxed amidst candlelight, ordered appetizers (!!), had not one - but two - glasses wine and enjoyed a tasty dinner. Ian loved his sticky rice and chicken satay with "peanut butter" sauce. Heck, we even had to wait for him to finish his dinner before asking for the check! This is a new and pleasant trend, for sure. Of course, I should also mention that a little added bonus of this particular place is that it has full-length windows that sit right beside the light rail train track - so a train would come through every few minutes, much to Ian's delight.

Day Three. The perfect day of organizing on Day One was complemented on Day Three by a much-needed visit from our beloved Maria (who like many other things - had to miss a visit during the bad weather). And poor Maria - it is a wonder she gets anything done with Ian as her little helper who follows her every move like she is a rock star. As soon as she walks in, he whips out his broom and dustpan and helps her "clean" around the house. About mid-morning Jeff, Ian and I left the house for a visit to an aviation museum in McMinnville, which is about 30-35 minutes from here in the wine country. We came across it one time when we were driving to the coast and it looked quite impressive from the road so we took note to take Ian back sometime. I mean, this place isn't the Smithsonian or anything, but they have quite an impressive display of aviation nonetheless - including that it is now the home of Howard Hughes' infamous Spruce Goose. Ian seemed to enjoy walking around and looking at all the airplanes. Then, last evening we shared a babysitter with our neighbors and went for dinner to an nice Indian place on the east side, followed by a fun cocktail party that was being hosted by a good friend of both of our neighbors (and who we see fairly often as he visits our hood quite a bit).

Which brings us to Day Four. I'd say it's been sort of your typical end-of-holidays Sunday before the business of the New Year really gets started. Grocery store, a bit more organizing and all that fun stuff. Plus a little catch-up blogging, etc. But despite today not being particularly exciting, it's still good to feel like you are getting things in order. Tomorrow Ian will start going to school full days on Monday and Wednesday while continuing with a half day on Fridays. I'll be using that extra time to step up my search for something that might actually pay - ideally in the form of freelance work for now. It should be interesting to see how that goes as it has become apparent to me in recent months that there are a lot of job seekers out there right now.

So all in all, it's been a great first four days. Now just 361 to go!

Until I write again.

A new day

It's been nearly a week since I last posted so I figured it was time to get back at it. There have been many little things that have happened over the past week that are certainly post-worthy, and I realized that they could all be summed up in the title of this post: A new day. Why?

Well, first of all - it feels like a new day on the weather front for sure. By the morning of Christmas eve, about one and a half weeks into our seemingly never-ending snow/ice event - things were getting pretty frustrating. Really, when people can't go to school or work or finish up Christmas shopping or really go anywhere they want or need to go when they want or need to go there, it can start to get a little maddening. I mean, even the cats were at each other's throats by last Wednesday. Oh wait, that's normal. Never mind. The point is, there was definitely some stress building that may have even caused an episode (or two) of family bickering. Oh, and there was also that one semi-awkward moment of a slight breakdown at the FedEx facility where I trekked on Christmas eve to retrieve some packages that never made it to our house. I think it had something to do with the stress of most every road - including Interstate 5 - being like some combination of driving over a bed of rocks (huge chunks of packed ice and snow) and being on that car ride at Disneyland where you have to stay perfectly on the tracks without veering too much to one side or it would shoot you back to the other side rail.

Road stress aside - by late morning of Christmas eve, the weather conditions were looking up. The additional snow that they had forecast did not materialize and instead the temperature was slowly climbing. I believe it was at that point there was a collective "Yahooooooeeeeyyyyy!" that could be heard across the city. And we in the Burpo house decided that being it was Christmas eve and all, it was time to get over our frustrations and get in the Christmas spirit. So that, we did. Christmas eve we had a very fun evening with our two neighbor families and had a wonderful Christmas day watching Ian experience the joy of Christmas, cooking and eating a delicious turkey dinner, and talking with family members. By Friday morning, the snow was already starting to disappear (helped by lots of rain, of course) and though many roads were still in desperate need of a good plowing - they were starting to improve slowly but surely. With vastly-improved mobility under our belts - we did what any good American would do in this time of economic crisis: we headed straight for the mall. By Saturday, we were driving down the highway on actual pavement just like normal people would do. And today I went for my long-awaited haircut. Tomorrow, Ian will return to school and tomorrow eve we are planning to go to Zoolights at the Oregon Zoo, which we thought we had missed when the Zoo was closed several nights due to weather. So yes, it feels like a new day indeed!

But in addition to a new day in the sense of returning to normalcy after two weeks of things being not-so-normal, it's also very clear that this holiday season marks the beginning of a new phase in our parenting journey. The phase I'm referring to is, of course, the Santa Deception Phase. Because all of a sudden this year Ian clearly gets it. I mean, not only does he suddenly know who Santa is, but he knows where he lives. For example, on Christmas morning we went in to get him up and immediately he wanted to know if Santa had been to our house. We said, "Oh, I think he was definitely here last night and he left you some presents." And he said, "And now he went to the North Portland?" (Which for the non-locals, happens to be one of the "up and coming" areas of the city with a few kinks still to be worked out.) "Um, well close, but I think what you meant was that he's back at his home in the North Pole now," I said. "Oh," he said.

But as with many lies, you find that once you start telling a little white lie like the fact that there is this jolly old fat man who wears a red suit and climbs down chimneys to deliver presents to kids around the world all within one night - there's a whole other set of deceptions that now must follow that you don't initially think about. Which is frankly why it's much easier to tell the truth. For example: wrapping the presents. One day I was wrapping presents and it suddenly occurred to me that I only had one type of kid wrapping paper, when really I should have two types of kid wrapping paper: One for gifts that Santa brought (and of course had wrapped himself) and then one for presents from us. Dammit. Of course normally it may not have been a problem just to run down to Target for a new roll of wrapping paper to keep up with this little Santa charade, but when there happens to be a foot of snow on the ground and you have the very person you are trying to deceive locked to your leg, it becomes slightly more challenging. So then I started making up explanations in my head (as if my two-year-old is going to ask why the wrapping paper is all the same - just like I knew he'd never find the unwrapped gift under the guest bed): Santa clearly didn't have time to wrap all the gifts beforehand, so after he came down the chimney he snuck upstairs to borrow our gift wrap. Perfect. Whew, the path of deception was still intact!

And then of course there are the presents themselves. For example: what Piece de Resistance would the little come down to find from Santa under the tree on Christmas morning? This year, after remembering at the somewhat last minute that we were lacking an actual Piece de Resistance from Santa -we decided on, and procured, a "Grand Walk-In Kitchen" with so many bells and whistles on it that it would make Emeril salivate. Of course Grand Walk-In Kitchens don't just come already assembled. No way, Jose! They come in large boxes in about 50 bajillion (yes, you read that right - bajillion) pieces. And this is where the real fun begins for parents entering into the Santa Deception Phase, right? WRONG. So, enter Tuesday eve. I said to Jeff, "You know, we are going to be at the neighbors tomorrow night and maybe it's not the best idea to wait until Christmas eve to start putting this thing together." He agreed and so after Ian went to bed that night we went down the basement and pulled out a couple of engineering textbooks to get started. We had it halfway put together when trouble struck. Try as we might, we couldn't get the counter on. That, and a couple of other issues, led us to the conclusion that we had a defective product on our hands. Of course what we also had at that point was a half put-together Grand Walk-In Kitchen that was not coming apart. After about 20 minutes of two people with graduate degrees standing there perplexed about what to do next - we decided that one thing that was for sure was that this was not the kitchen that "Santa" would be giving to Ian on Christmas morning. So we had approximately 24 hours to get this one returned, procure a new one and put it together. Oh, and PS - there was supposedly more snow coming in the morning on top of already difficult roads. So again, it wasn't like we could just count on zipping down to Toys R' Us first thing in the morning.

Travel challenges aside, we knew we had to get this one back in the car. So we tore apart the car as much as we could and around 10 p.m. on Tuesday evening embarked on what I can now call a comical process of trying to shove a half put-together kitchen and rather large box containing the rest of the parts into the back of our car. (Remember that bickering I referenced earlier?) Then I went online to find out what time my favorite toy store was actually opening in the morning only to find out that low and behold - they were open until 1am that night. Well, hot damn! With more bad weather on the way and the clock ticking toward Christmas, I figured there was no time like the present to take care of Santa business. So off I went at a maximum speed of about 20 mph the whole way on icy roads trying not to kill myself and my defective Grand Walk-In Kitchen on a mission to retrieve a new Piece de Resistance. And let me just say that standing in the Customer Service line at Toys R' Us with a half put-together kitchen in my car at 10:30ish p.m. two nights before Christmas is most definitely one of the highlights of my parenting adventures to date. Frustrations aside, I have to say though that the process actually went very smoothly and a very nice man helped me remove the old and put in a new one - at which point I (slowly) trekked back home and Jeff and I did a Take 2 on putting together the Grand Walk-In Kitchen - this time very quickly and without incident. Thank God.
And so we have also entered a new day in the realm of holiday celebrations and all the good-natured deception that comes with it. But boy was it all worth it when he came downstairs and first saw that kitchen on Christmas morning. Which kind of sums up the whole interesting phenomenon I've discovered about being a parent: Even though you can feel a whole lot of frustration and sacrifice sometimes, really all they have to do is smile or give you a hug or say, "I love you, Mommy" and it makes it all worth it. And so I have included some pictures here of Ian's first glance at and moments with his kitchen, along with some general Christmas day excitement and festivities.

Until I write again.

The white stuff and Santa make an appearance

There are two things that I thought we were saying goodbye to when we left the DC area: The first was good restaurants and the second was seeing snow fall at our house. (Actually, I think there are more than two but these are the two that come to mind right now.)

Well, I was most certainly wrong about the restaurant thing given that there are many great eateries here that more than rival the best restaurants in DC. And as we go through our third winter now, it also appears that I was mistaken about that whole no snow thing as well. In general, it does tend to get colder here in the wintertime than I thought it would. I mean, it's definitely not typically that biting cold like you get back east but we still have our share of quite chilly days. More often than not, the most extreme weather issue we deal with is ice. But at least once over the past three winters we've also seen a bit of snow. Last winter we barely had any, but what did come was on Christmas day which was kind of cool.

So around last Thursday the weather people started making a fuss that we had a big storm approaching shore that would bring a lot of wind and rain (shocking, I know!) on Friday and Saturday. Then by Sunday (as in, today) temperatures would plummet to highs in the 20s in Portland and the rain would turn to possibly significant snowfall. Of course for the ski resorts who have been tapping their watches since before Thanksgiving waiting on Mother Nature to do her thing, this storm was music to their ears. But for those of us down on the "valley floor" as it's called - well, we were skeptical about the wet stuff actually turning into white stuff.

In general, the whole Friday and Saturday thing was kind of a bust. I mean, yeah sure, there was definitely some wind and rain - but nothing earth shattering, especially for December in Portland. Saturday evening we went to Jeff's holiday party at an art gallery in the Pearl District downtown and had a very nice evening. By the time we exited around 11 p.m. to make our way home, there was definitely a good bite in the air. And by around 8 a.m. this morning some white stuff started coming out of the sky somewhat fiercely and as of this writing has yet to stop. Our high was about 32 degrees this morning and it's been going in the wrong direction ever since. It's been very windy too, which makes for nice blowing snow dramatics as well as fun wind chill factors. And the awesome (and unusual) thing is that these 20ish degree temps are expected to stick around most of the week giving us the coldest weather here in about 10 years (at least according to the weather people and everyone knows that weather people are always right). Brrr! And to think that when we moved here I thought the coldest it would get was maybe in the 40s. Apparently I needed to beef up on my Portland weather history a bit more.

So, of course we had to take this opportunity to head outside this morning and do a little snowball action with Ian and let him enjoy his first real snow experience (that he recognizes and will remember, at least). There were also a couple of snow angels involved at one point which we caught on video. So all in all, it's been a wintery but fun Sunday here.

And in other weekend news - I think I've mentioned that this is the first year that Ian is really starting to get the whole Christmas concept. Of course for him this means a tree, presents and Santa Claus. He's been especially intrigued by Santa Claus so we decided to break Vow #683 on the "things I will never do when I become a parent" list and took him to see a mall Santa yesterday. The line sucked but at least there was some entertainment involved in watching all the parents shove their screaming babies in Santa's lap in hopes of getting the perfect shot. We offered Ian the option of backing out several times while we were in line but no such luck. He was very excited to get on Santa's lap. I said, "You know, Santa will probably ask you what you want for Christmas - so what will you tell him?" And he threw up his hands and said, "A tostada!" Awesome. I think we can handle that one. While we weren't really interested in taking out a second loan on our house to pay for one of the "professional" photo packages they offered us, we did manage to snap our own shot:

Oh, and then just to cap off the weekend extravaganza - I'm extra excited to report that less than a week after finally recovering from the effects of my last cold, I came down with a new one yesterday. Frustration and disbelief are the two words I'll throw out and leave it at that. (Ian came down with his latest around Wednesday and already appears to be on the mend, by the way.)

Last, I'll leave you with some food for thought: If you were awakened in the middle of the night fearing your house was on fire - do you have an evacuation plan? Because we don't. And I realized this at about 4:30 a.m. this morning when for some unknown reason multiple smoke alarms - including the one in our bedroom - starting going off in our house. Let me just say I didn't know I could move that fast. All I remember is jumping out of bed and racing toward Ian's room when the alarms just stopped after about 10 seconds and everything seemed to check out fine. I don't think my heart stopped racing until about midday today, though.

Until I write again.

LATE BREAKING NEWS: We just heard on the news that basically every school district in the region is closed tomorrow which means no preschool for Ian. Our first school closing experience. Bummer.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

We were very busy in the Burpo household this weekend decking the halls with boughs of holly. Though just to be clear - there wasn't actually any holly involved, but there was definitely a real Christmas tree and several fake items like berries and snowmen. But moving along, after a Friday evening of pizza and Rock Band with the Hyders (well, except Zach who just watched because apparently he's too good to play with the Stumptown Burpies) we sprang out of bed bright and early Saturday morning to begin our holiday extravaganza weekend.

Our first stop was at Village Inn so that we could all indulge in a highly caloric and generally extremely unhealthy breakfast (but boy was it tasteee!). It's good to know we can always count on the ole' VI to start our weekend off right. And this breakfast was particularly important because it was the fuel that would get us through our next stop and perhaps the main event of the weekend: securing the 2008 Burpo tree.

Now, there are a lot of Christmas trees in Oregon. In fact, not too surprisingly, Oregon is the #1 producer of Christmas trees in the United States. And where you get your tree determines how much of a True Oregonian you are. For instance, someone who goes to a grocery store lot is clearly not even eligible for their True Oregonian card. Actually, don't even bother applying. Now, if you've advanced to one of the plentiful "U-Pick" farms out in the country - then you are eligible for what they call a Semi-Oregonian card. And True Oregonian status? Well, that is awarded when you actually get your $5 permit from the U.S. Forest Service, pack up the car with safety gear and a sled, and hike into the Mount Hood National Forest to cut down your own tree. Some folks probably do some mountain climbing while they're at it because that's the type of thing that True Oregonians do for fun on the weekend. But seeing as how we clearly have not yet reached that status - we opted for one of the "U-Pick" farms. We chose the same one that we attempted to go to last year on perhaps the coldest, rainiest, windiest day of the winter. And let me just say that was a really good time until we decided that our lives were more valuable than U-picking our tree and aborted the mission in favor of heading to our local nursery on a lovely sunny day the following weekend.

This Saturday, we had much better weather. And now that I had the chance to get a good look at it this year without fearing for my life, this little farm called Lee Farms has everything a good tree farm should have: a store with ornaments, hand made wreaths and garland on site, and homemade apple cider donuts - which unfortunately we were not able to partake in due to the bacon, sausage, biscuits, gravy, french toast, etc. still sitting like a brick at the bottom of our stomachs. So our tree experience went like it usually does: We wandered around for a bit while Jeff and Ian patiently trailed along. And then once we hit about say, the 30 minute mark, Jeff started to get that look in his eyes. You know, the one that says, "Just choose a damn tree now because Ian is getting impatient and I'm ready to go home." Which of course only made me feel more indecisive because now there's major pressure on me which is really more than I can handle. But I worked through it and finally we all agreed on a beautiful nine-ish foot Noble.

The next stop was of course back home so that we could get the tree in the house, in the stand and begin the all-important decorating process. Jeff had already given us a head start by checking and organizing all the lights earlier in the week. The whole process went very smoothly until we started on the light application later in the afternoon. We had a few issues there, but nothing that a little spiked hot apple cider couldn't cure. By early evening our pretty tree was almost complete minus a little ornament project we were saving for later. We fed Ian dinner and then got him off to bed while Jeff finished up a very yummy "let's celebrate because we got the tree up" dinner for us of his special Cowboy steaks, crab legs, pasta and some tomatoes with a basil, pine nuts and melted cheese topping (or something like that). All quite delectable. Oh, and of course all washed down with an Oregon pinot. Later that evening we watched 12 Angry Men which I had never seen before but highly recommend.

On Sunday the festivities continued with outside lighting. At first things were a little touch and go because unlike the sunshine we had the previous few days, the weather had turned quite cold, rainy and foggy - and Jeff looked pretty comfy cozy on the couch watching football. But late in the afternoon we got up our energy and headed outside to complete the holiday preparations. This year we added a few little fake snowmen to the front yard that I think add the all-important cute factor. Plus, Ian appears to be a fan of the whole snowman concept. Then we went back inside and had a little impromptu ornament painting party. I had purchased a few unpainted ornaments from Michaels (which, by the way, might be deserving of its own post later on due to my new obsession with this store) and each of us decorated our own ornament and hung it on the tree. I like Jeff's snowman a lot, but I have to say that Ian's little teddy bear is my favorite.

So, I guess it's safe to say that our halls are officially decked. Now on to all that other stuff.
Until I write again.

Who's smarter than whom?

So, unlike how I usually operate at Christmas, which is to run around like a chicken with my head cut off the last couple of weeks before Christmas madly collecting gifts, I've actually tried to be semi in control this year. So in control as a matter of fact that I even had the forethought to buy one of Ian's gifts BEFORE Thanksgiving. It was a truck that he had eyed a couple of times when we were in Target. Okay, well I say "eyed" but it really wasn't as casual as that. It was more like begged for.

But anyhooskie, so I picked up this truck for him about a month ago when it was on sale. And when I got it home, I put it where anyone would - under the guest bed upstairs thinking, "He'll never look under this bed in a million years!" I mean, he's not even old enough to understand the whole concept of looking for Christmas gifts yet, and why would he ever have cause to poke his head underneath a bed in a room he barely ever goes into? Clearly this was the perfect spot.

Enter this past Monday. Ian was upstairs playing in his room while I was sitting at the kitchen table typing on the computer when suddenly I hear, "Mom, I need to open this! I need to open this!" Then I can tell that's he's coming down the stairs. Again: "Mommy, I need to open this truck!" So I get up to go around the corner to see what he needs, of course thinking, "What the hell is he talking about? What truck?" I said as much, too: "What truck, Ian?" By now he's reached the bottom of the stairs. He shoves the box in my face and says, "This one, mommy. I need to open this truck right now!" I know I clearly had some sort of startled, thrown-off look on my face as before me was the very truck I had hidden under the bed a few weeks ago. So, my quick-thinking self said, "Oh, well you can't have that because it's not for you," and snatched it out of his hands. This did not go over well. In fact, there may have been some tears involved. And guilt immediately fell over me as I realized I had just lied to my two-year-old's face and then made him cry. Great. But there was no time for bad feelings because I had to throw him off somehow - so I decided in that moment that it was time for him to go up for his afternoon "rest time" which went over even better, by the way.

Once Ian was cleared of the scene and upstairs in his room, I moved quickly to find a new hiding place. I went into the den and looked up to all the empty space way up high in the cabinets over the desk. Sure, they have glass doors on them but A) He barely goes in that room and B) If he does go in, he'll never think to look up into the cabinet a million years. Perfect! So in it went - with the box turned backwards for good measure. After naptime, not another word was uttered about the truck, so clearly the crisis had been averted and I was in the clear.

Enter today. I picked up Ian from preschool as usual and we headed home. Though I'll add, not before he threw a complete fit when I attempted to pull him away from his teacher. In fact, once I corraled him into the car it was only after I told him that Aunt Brianne and Uncle Zach were coming over to visit him tonight that he was able to compose himself. Not that I felt like chopped liver or anything. But, I digress. So, we weren't home five minutes and he started in on, "Mom, I need to play with my truck. I need my truck, right now." (Everything is "need" and "right now" these days, by the way. I mean, I understand that we all have our needs. Like, I "need" a million dollars "right now" but I'm probably not going to get it. Sheesh.) So, immediately I started to get a little nervous but thought, "I'm not going to panic. I'm not going to panic. He could be talking about something else." So I said, "Oh, what truck are you talking about? I don't know where it is so maybe you can help tell me what it looks like." "The blue truck, mommy. I need my blue truck. " Hmmm...well this Christmas truck does happen to be blue. Now I'm starting to panic. Again, "I don't know what you're talking about Ian..." Until he suddenly turns and starts heading toward the den and says, "This one!" pointing up right here:

Score: Ian, two; Mom, zero.

Until I write again.

A chip off the old block

I'm back! (From Thanksgiving break, that is.) We happily skipped town for a few days and traveled down to Klamath Falls in southern Oregon for the first time to spend the holiday with my Mom and Barry in their future and sometimes-current home at the beautiful Running Y Ranch there. (If it sounds confusing, it is, which is why I won't bother explaining.) Though the trip isn't exactly a hop, skip and a jump from Portland (driving time is about 5.5 hours), Jeff and I both noted on the way home what a blessing it feels like to have some family that is a car drive away (or will be at some point). For me, the last time I could say that was about 15 years ago.

But rather than spend this post-Thanksgiving post talking turkeys, let's talk sport. As in, the sport of ice skating. First, some of you may recall that I've taken a turn or two around an ice rink in my time. (Back in the days when not only could I drive to my family's home, but I still actually lived there - which means about a gazillion years ago now.) So, of course it goes without saying that one of us in the Burpo parental unit has been very excited about getting Ian on ice skates. And that someone is, of course, Jeff. Yes, it's true. I never said a word but one day - I think when Ian was about three months old - he started saying, "We gotta get this kid on ice skates." And he kept at it, too. Especially when we moved to Portland, for some reason. Maybe he was inspired by the super fancy rink in the Lloyd Center where that infamous Portlander Tonya Harding made her mark. And if you ever visit the Lloyd Center (which is a shopping mall), let's just say you won't be surprised that this was her home-away-from-home. (For the record, it actually is a nice ice rink that just happens to be located in the middle of a really bad mall.) Or, maybe it's the fact that Jeff gave up his dream of being a star hockey player to pursue management consulting instead, and is now passing along his unfulfilled fantasy to his son.

I'm not sure which, but anyhooskie, when my Mom called us up just as we were about to leave town last Wednesday and said, "Bring your skates - our ice rink is open!", you-know-who got very excited. I mean, he was upstairs grabbing his hockey skates (which I noticed are Nikes, by the way - very appropriate) and flinging them in the car faster than Sarah Palin can say Hockey mom's are pitbulls with lipstick! I, however, was a little more skeptical. Granted, I had never been to Klamath Falls before or the Running Y, but I'm thinking the "ice rink" there probably makes the Lloyd Center rink look like an Olympic venue. Plus, I wasn't sure that I was up for all the potential drama that might come with putting Ian on the ice for the first time while traveling for Thanksgiving. Still, I played along and put my skates in the car, too.

Now, fast forward about 6.5 hours (driving time plus one bakery stop to pick up the T-Day goodies plus one Golden Arches lunch stop). Just as night had fallen, we were pulling into the main entrance to the community when what to my wondering eyes should appear (yes, I'm getting into holiday mode) but one of the most grandiose outdoor skating rinks I've ever seen, sparkling in the night with holiday lights. Clearly I had underestimated the potential of the Klamath Falls skating community. Suddenly, I was intrigued. Maybe this whole skating thing wasn't such a bad idea after all. So, Thanksgiving morning on our way back from our big trip into town to check out the local Fred Meyer (which, by the way is about the best thing that Klamath Falls appears to have going for it in terms of shopping venues), we stopped at the rink to check out the schedule. There were a few people hanging around waiting for the rink to open. And from the looks of things, they were going to be waiting a while. Hmmm...okay so perhaps Ian's big skating debut would have to wait until Friday.

And Friday, it was. We showed up around 1:30 p.m. for the big event. The rink was already packed with locals who clearly were not out taking advantage of Black Friday specials at Freddie's. And not only were they not into bargain shopping, but they weren't the most graceful bunch either. So, at first I was little anxious about putting our son out there amidst a scene that more resembled Bang Up Derby (I just made that up, by the way) than Stars on Ice with Kristi Yamaguchi and Friends. But we decided to go for it anyway. And I must say, I was also nervous that this little adventure was going to be a big flop. Meaning, I thought for sure he'd be in tears before we could even get his skates fully laced up. But no sirree, Ian. Hands were flapping with excitement and exclamations of, "We go icing! We go icing!" He clearly couldn't wait to hit the ice. And if his first experience walking in ice skates on the floor was any indication of his skill level, he's bound for stardom because much to our surprise, he barely missed a beat when he stood up for the first time. No tipping over or anything funny like that.

After a slight Zamboni delay, we let the crowd disperse and then slowly made our way toward the entrance to the ice. I stepped out first and then Jeff lifted Ian out to me and came behind us. We held him tight between us while we very slowly pushed him along. I kept waiting for tears, but nothing. At first he stood there with his feet frozen in place (perhaps, literally?). He was like a little robot on steel runners. Except, he did occasionally lean backwards so we'd have to hold him up straight. Pleas to stand straight and bend his knees fell on deaf ears. Hmmm...perhaps two-year-olds are not as flexible as we first thought. Still, we made it around one full lap! At the end when we asked, "Ian, do you want to stop or keep going?" it was met with a resounding, "Keep going!" Okie dokie. The second time, he even started to move his feet a little. Not really a gliding or pushing motion, but more like a walking on ice motion. But hey, it was a start. We took one small break and went back out for another few rounds or so. And by the end, we were really flying! I think he even threw in a couple of split jumps while we weren't looking. Finally, after about the 50th time of asking him if he was okay and wanted to stop or keep going, he proclaimed that he was ready to get off. Which, thank God, because frankly, my feet were killing me!

And so our first ice skating adventure came to an end with a trip to the outdoor fire pit with Grandma Charla to warm hands and feet. A few days later, he's still asking, "We going icing today?" so I think it's safe to say that we'll be visiting the Lloyd Center soon - which I'm super excited about. I guess the only question now is - do we have the next Wayne Gretzky or Scott Hamilton on our hands? Only time will tell...

Until I write again.

The eense and the fider

Yesterday we celebrated our second Halloween in Portland and despite the gloomy, rainy weather - it was a good one.

Of course our Halloween adventures really started back in September when one day I realized, "Oh cr*p, Halloween is coming up!" which means that in order to remain on the list of good mothers, I knew I'd better locate and purchase a costume. And then I proceeded to do what I do with everything in my life - think about it for a few weeks before actually taking any action.

Finally, I decided that he should be a dinosaur because, well, he's kind of into dinosaurs right now. Great, dinosaur it is! So I spent exactly one whole afternoon researching dinosaur costumes online. At which point I realized that the rest of the moms in America were also apparently interested in remaining on the good mother list because most of the dino costumes (that were cute, anyway) were already sold out. Dammit. Time to move along to Plan B - as soon as I figured out exactly what "Plan B" was. Thinking, thinking, thinking - I've got it! He's really into the Itsy Bitsy Spider (or is it the Eensy Weensy Spider?) and we seem to sing that tune a lot around this house, SOOOO, I'll just acquire a spider costume and we'll spin it (again, it's the whole PR thing) as the Itsy/Eensy Bitsy/Weensy Spider - or as Ian says, the "Eense and the Fider." And that's exactly what we did.

It didn't take too much searching before I found a cute little spider costume at, where else, Pottery Barn Kids or again, in Ian language, "Potty Barn". (Yes, we drove into the mall parking lot one day and he said, "Mommy, we going to Potty Barn?" Like I go there all the time or something. Paaleese.) My thought was that at least something related to the potty is sticking right now. But, I digress. So yes, the perfect costume was located at PB Kids and while I won't go into the gory details - ha!, gory, get it?? - let's just say I got a good deal. Because that's what happens when you wait to purchase your kid's Halloween costume - you get it on sale, which was exactly my intention from the start. I of course wanted to purchase the "treats bag" to match it, but I decided that instead of paying some ridiculous amount for it, that I would take a gamble and wait until the last possible minute when everything was on super saver sale with the hope it would still be available. (And just so I don't keep you in suspense, I gambled and I won. Yes sirree, I got the last one the other day for a total of $3, thank you very much.)

Spider in hand, I made the introduction to Ian, which went something like this, "Look Ian! You're going to be the Eensy Weensy Spider for Halloween this year!! How great is that??? This will be so fun!!!...and all of your friends will be dressed up at school, too!!!" Just like that with lots of exclamation points and question marks. "Do you want to try it on and check it out?" At which point I got a resounding, "No!" followed by running out of the room. Hmmm, okay, well I wasn't going to panic yet. We'll just try again a little later. Next day - "Ian, check out your Halloween costume here. It's the Eensy Weensy Spider!!! Do you want to try it on?" Again, "No!" followed by running out of the room. Hmmm, okay, well, still no need to panic - we still had a week to go. But by then I was getting the distinct feeling that maybe he just likes to sing it, not wear it. Food for thought.

Moving right along, we went through about five more rounds of that before I brought in the big guns: Teacher Liz and Teacher Stella. This past Monday I said, "You know, if you have the chance, you might want to talk up the whole costume wearing thing for Friday because so far, he's not really going for it." Well, once I said something, they were on it like a cherry on a sundae and by the time Thursday rolled around, Ian was happily modeling the Eense and the Fider in anticipation of the big day on Friday.

Okay, so finally we get to Halloween morning. (Sorry, but I never said I was succinct in my storytelling.) I flip on the light and well, the very first thing I hear is, "Oh mommy, it's so bright!," which is the same thing I hear every morning now. But the second thing is, "Mommy, today Halloween?" Yes, today is Halloween!!! "And I wear the eense and the fider?" Absolutely, today you are going to wear your Eensy Weensy Spider costume! (Whew. All appeared to be a go at this point with crisis clearly averted.) So we go through breakfast, teeth brushing, etc. etc.. As we near departure time for school, I asked if he wanted to put on his costume then or wait until we got to school. "I put it on now!," he said eagerly. Okie dokie. So not only did we put it on prior to leaving, but he even smiled for the camera (this appears to be an exciting new trend) AND as an extra special bonus - kneeled down like he was actually a spider. I don't know where he pulled that one from but when things are going your way - it's best not to ask questions.

Of course the school scene was adorable with lots of ghouls, goblins, DINOSAURS, and Sarah Palins running around. (Just kidding - I think that last costume was saved for the adult Halloween parties.) When I picked him up, Liz and Stella said he had a fabulous time and they practically had to tear the costume off of him for lunch time. They did a parade around the school, a special Halloween "treat" which I assume meant candy and did some Halloween version of the Hokey Pokey. Does it get better than the Halloween version of the Hokey Pokey? I think not.

And the day got even better because around 2pm I put him in his room and immediately - SILENCE - which was the first nap he'd taken since I started this blog a little more than a week ago. Three hours later Jeff and I went in to wake him up for a snack and trick or treating. I'm pretty confident that even though he had not a clue what trick or treating was, he couldn't wait to participate. We had that costume back on, complete with the clearly uncomfortable hat to match, before you could say - "Boo!". Before venturing out, of course we took a few pictures to commemorate the festivities, but we also practiced the all-important trick or treating "script", if you will. I even attempted some role playing. "Okay, Ian, so I'm you and you're me. You hold the candy bowl and I'll knock on the door and you open it, okay?" So I knock on the wall. Ian looks at me and proceeds to knock on the wall. "No, I knock on the wall and then you pretend like you are opening the door, okay? "Okay," he says. So I knock on the wall. He knocks on the wall. Oh geez, just forget it. "Here's the deal, when we go up to the door, they open it and you say 'trick or treat', open your bag and then when they give you the candy you say 'thank you'." Got it? "Yes," he said. Alrighty then, here we go.

First stop was our friendly neighbors Mike and Connie who have a little granddaughter about Ian's age. Surely this will be an easy one, we thought. Door opens and it's Mike. "Oh, look at how cute! Who are you?" Ian says nothing, just staring like he's forgotten his lines - which he has. "Ian, do you remember what we practiced?," I said. Nothing. Okay, well clearly this is a learning process. But despite the slow start, I'm happy to say that by the third house - we were saying "trick or treat" AND "thank you" on cue. What can I say - he's a fast learner. We hit a few more houses - just about enough to acquire approximately three Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, two Snickers and one Twix bar (which Jeff later ate unauthorized) - before heading back home to order pizza and hand out candy to other kids in the neighborhood.

While we had quite a number of kids who came around last year, I have to say that this year was a bit of a bust on that front. We only had about five groups come around, but Ian really liked helping me hand out candy. In true form, I think he actually may have enjoyed that more than collecting the candy himself. The highlight of the candy distribution though was when some teenagers came to the door - of course all with really scary costumes on and one with a weird voice under a mask so you couldn't see his face. Ian wasn't quite sure what to make of him, but I don't think he cared for his costume. He stood there frozen with eyes as big as saucers until I took the candy out of his hands and put it in the kids' bags. When they left and we closed the door he said, "Mommy, those were scary big kids." Yes, that's right. Unfortunately you'll probably run into a lot of those, until you of course become one yourself someday, I thought. One last highlight was that after dinner Ian has his first taste of a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup after dinner. Now, again, this is a kid who doesn't normally like sweets, but we'll just say this one went over well.

I hope your Halloween was as spook-tacular (for full disclosure, I heard that word from someone else) as ours was. For a complete chronicle in pictures - from the patch to the treats - you can visit the photo album in Kodak Gallery:

http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=13mm790j.5ufy5wjn&Uy=ron72a&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0&localeid=en_US

(With apologies that the album isn't exactly in chronological order this time.)

Until I write again.

The Great Pumpkin patch outing

Shame on me. It's the evening before Halloween and I have yet to report on the annual Sauvie Island pumpkin patch outing at Kruger's Farm, which happened last Saturday. Now, "annual" outing might be stretching things a a little given that this is only the second time we've done this, but this is also only the second Halloween we've celebrated in Portland and I sense a family tradition coming on - so there you go.

Of course I can't talk about this year's outing without first saying a word about last year's inaugural outing. Last October, Point B decided that it would be nice to add more family outings to the mix of social events - so they organized a group outing to the pumpkin patch so that families (and anyone else who wanted to contend with the under five crowd) could meet there, do some tailgating with the Westies (a couple of Point B associates have Westfalia VW vans), enjoy a hay ride or two, perhaps a couple of carmel apples and some catered barbecue. Great idea except that the day of last year's event happened to be one of the wettest, coldest days on record in the history of the Pacific Northwest (perhaps matched only by almost exactly a year before when we were moving to Portland - hmmm...come to think of it, perhaps there is a trend here?). I'm talking complete with a hail storm that had us all huddled under the little tent where they sell all those cute little gourds that decorate your table through November until you pitch them in the trash can come December 1 when the Santas come out. Hail storms aside, the cool thing about last year though was that we pretty much had the entire place to ourselves.

But apparently Point B was not deterred by the weather "issues" because they decided to plan it again for this year. This year's outing was last Saturday and I'm happy to report that it was a beautiful day. And while we're at it, I'm happy to report that October overall has been a beautiful month with little rain to date. Of course we won't talk about how as of today, rain is in the forecast for the next seven or so days (read: as many days out as they can fit on the TV screen) - but then again - we are entering November now and well, you don't have to live here all that long to start knowing the drill. We're sure to see the sun again by at least next June, so we really can't complain. But Portland meteorology class aside, Saturday was a glorious day to head to the pumpkin patch with most of Portland there to prove it.

Once we got ourselves parked in the North Forty and hiked into the patch, we met up with the Point B posse and planned our route. First stop: The Pumpkin Launch. This isn't really so much for the kids as it is for the adults who want to act like kids. Naturally, several folks in our group participated in this activity, including Jeff. Just like it sounds, this is where you take a poor, innocent little pumpkin who was hoping to find a home with some little child who would cut it open and sit it out on their cold porch and launch it from a net with the goal being to hurl it through the mouth of the Great Pumpkin target some several yards out from the launch pad. But what you really get are a lot of pumpkin guts smeared all over the grass. Yucky.

The next stop was the corn maze where we had to answer questions from either the Bible or "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?" in order to find our way out. Let's just say that I feel lucky to be here blogging with you today. Enough said about that event. Then it was on to the main event: the pumpkin patch, which is really more of a field than a patch, but whatever. I'm in PR so I can appreciate the importance of spin. We grabbed a trolley cart and tromped around in the fields - I mean patch - a bit until we decided that really, this whole u-pick thing was kind of for the birds and that the better pumpkins were all the ones near the registers that had already been picked. So back we headed, but not before we took a few requisite pumpkin patch photos, of course.
The deal was that each of us got to pick our own pumpkin. Though, Ian got his little one as a gift from a friend who won it from his Pumpkin Launch efforts. And then Jeff picked one out that I didn't care for, so I put it back and picked another I thought was better. (I asked first and he said he didn't care...) And then I picked one out for me, so really just one of us got to pick our own pumpkin but I think that worked out fine. For me, anyway.

Next was the really good part: the eating! We had super tasty barbecued ribs, pulled pork and hamburgers (well, we each chose one - we didn't eat all of them), enjoyed some good company and then before we knew it, the sun was starting to set and we were all freezing our tooshies off. (If only that were more than just a saying...) So, it was time to depart - but not before I got my caramel apple for the road. Sure, Ian was being a little "challenging" by that point and I had to corral him like a horse to get him to stand in the apple line while Jeff hiked out to the car with the pumpkins, but I wasn't leaving Sauvie Island without my caramel apple - dammit!

Sunday, we carved the goods. Or, shall I say that Jeff and I carved the goods while Ian watched. Now they are on our porch waiting for the big day tomorrow. I'm sure they'll be more reporting on the big day tomorrow - well, tomorrow (or sometime soon).

Until I write again.