Halloween '09

Bryn shouted "Sting or Treat!" all through the neighborhood.


Calvin used the more conventional, "Surrender your candy or walk the plank!"

And here is a special treat: a video of Calvin talking like a pirate (phrases we've been hearing from him for the last six months since he acquired a sword for his birthday), and Bryn's special impromptu bee dance:

For kicks and giggles

Bryn finished up eight weeks of soccer clinics today. She was so proud of her four million and three points (by her count). The bottom right picture is her victory pose after scoring another goal.

And here is her 4-man cheerleading squad. It was hard not to yell for her to slide tackle the cute little blonde or shoulder slam the ball hog, but she did pretty well on her own and we constrained ourselves to mostly positive comments (and a quick quiet cheer when she did take out the ball hog).

How do you entertain a 3 year-old during such events? A large body of water such as this helps:

What's that Bryn up to lately?

This afternoon Bryn walked out the front door with a leaf in her mouth. She stood very still on the front porch in the dreadful wind and the rain with the leaf in her mouth for a good five minutes before I asked her what she was doing. She looked at me and said matter-of-factly, "I want to be a tree." Apparently she'd had enough after that, and marched back inside without another word.

I took this shot when she had collapsed in a puddle of tears because Calvin had "destroyed the sun." On the picture she was drawing. Luckily, she was able to muster a smile when I told her to look up at the camera.

A Tail of Two Critters

A few people have remarked that Calvin and Ivy have the same face, but it's hard for me to see past the bright orange and dark brown hair. In order to take a more scientific approach, we have eliminated the confounding clothing, age, and hair variables and present the following two graduates of Bovine University for further evaluation:Calvin in 2006
Ivy in 2009

You be the judge.

A Tale of Two Sitters

He's been playing with this exersaucer for months now, but always from the periphery. Today he climbed halfway in and gave me a hesitant look. I nodded and he jumped in with all his might and drove his spaceship all over the galaxy.

She sits. Upon the pull-out sofa bed. No, it wasn't Friday (aka Take-out-the-secret-bed-in-the-couch-and-watch-a-movie-day), but we forgot on Friday and Calvin had a flaming sobbing meltdown that night until we promised to pretend the morrow was Friday. He asked through his tears, "But what if not everybody in the world knows it's pretend Friday?" PSA: Last Saturday was pretend Friday. And yes, Ivy is business in front, party in back.

Fall

We went for a walk in a local conservation area on Columbus Day. The autumn leaves were out, but that's not the "fall" I'm referring to in the title. Notice the photo in the lower right corner? The next photo was snapped right after that one. I'm glad I didn't hand him the baby, too; they fell right over.

This is as good as it gets when your tripod and camera timer are taking the family photo.

Electronic death becomes us

Our HP PC died (again). And our DVD player. And our VCR. And our digital converter box remote control (our digital converter box does not function without it). And our phone. And our car "service engine imminently before your car explodes" light came on. Our washer is making funny noises again. You probably don't want to stand near us during a lightning storm.

We're reading a lot of books.

Pecos Cal

Peter confiscated Calvin's blue plastic bat (he hit his sisters a few too many times) and put it up high where the kids have never been able to reach. We caught him doing this a few minutes later.

Dibs

PSA: Calvin has officially called dibs on every heavy construction piece of machinery ever created. As we drive, if he sees anything remotely machine-like, he says, "And I'm going to have that one when I grow up, too."

Today I asked him if he would build me a pool and he said, "Oh mom, you know I totally like to build people pools." I'm glad that's settled.

Now before you contract him for all your handy-boy projects, please know that he intends to keep using this plastic tool set to build with, even when he grows up.

Rugrats

Ivy had a playdate on the rug the other day with this lovely little gal, Abby, who is only 3 days older than her.