Saturday Night Live!

We had a seafood feast with Kim, JPK and Emily on Saturday.
Deb and JPK - - Tim, Troy and Kim - - Charity and Kim - - The oysters, crab legs and shrimp were delicious!

Mens' Bowling Night with the Neighbors! (take 2)

The NJ Pilot and his NH wife were in town so we convened for another Mens' Bowling Night at The Neighbors.
Chris had some fun with Troy boy.Matty with his mom, Kat. Baby Einstein time held their attention for a few minutes. Thankfully, Tim, Troy and I went home early while the rest of the crew stayed up late playing cards.

Letter to Grandma

On Saturday night we had our Canadian Thanksgiving (a week late) at our house in Virginia Beach. The whole family gathered for quite a feast. Even though Nana and PopPop were in town, it was important to remind Dylan to Type a Letter to Grandma. Chris and Mike are demonstrating the proper technique below with the girls supervising.The kids ate first and then piled in my bed for a movie.

Gameday

Seven-year old Dylan, took a break from the action of his football game. He had his own cheering section: Tim, Troy, Mikey, Poppop, Ana and not shown, Taylor, Nana, Tricia and Deb.

Troy tried to get the crowd fired up by banging the fencing. Another Mustang victory in the books. A post-game shot of Troy, Taylor and Dylan.

Halloween Dress Rehearsal: Take 2

Troy's daycare had their fall festival on Friday night. Having practiced wearing the costume the night before, the temperature being 30 degrees lower than the day before and with promises of seeing all his buddies twice in one day, we set off to daycare.Troy decided to create his own version of the bean bag toss through the pumpkin.

By playing with the pumpkin.

Then there was the throw the bean bag and knock the cans over game.

With these big dragon paws (claws?), it's much faster to do it the Troy way...with his hands.He had a good time at the Halloween Party even though he still wouldn't put on the dragon pants. We will see how he does next week when it's actually halloween.

Trick or Treat - Smell My Feet

I tried to introduce Troy to his dragon halloween costume all week. It was left out on the bed, next to the crib, put on the couch, etc. The costume, courtesy of cousin Brendan in Kentucky was worn last year by Terri's son Bodhi last year and now it was Troy's turn. Inspired by his pumpkin pluckin' earlier in the day, we tried our first dress rehearsal with the costume sans dragon pants. This was mainly because Virginia Beach set a record high of 87F on Thursday and it was just too hot to attempt.Trying to figure out his new "claws." Has anyone noticed the golf ball? Remember the last time it was dropped by accident? Review here.

Pumpkin Hunt!

Last Thursday at daycare, Troy participated in something of a pumpkin hunt. Tim snuck in to watch and had to hide behind a tree so Troy didn't spot him and think it was time to go home. He was very proud of his "pumkin" and held on to it tightly at the end of the day.

Peek-A-Boo

As most of you know, I work for the only free-standing children's hospital in Virginia as their web manager. CHKD is doing an easy fundraiser where you collect change and turn it in as your donation to help the sick children. You can do it as an individual or form a team. Learn more here, www.chkd.org/changebandits.

Here is a cute, clean joke:
Problem Name
The famous Olympic skier Picabo Street (pronounced Peek-A-Boo) is not just an athlete. She is now a nurse currently working at the Intensive Care Unit of a large metropolitan hospital. She is not permitted to answer the hospital telephones. It caused too much confusion when she would answer the phone and say,
Picabo, ICU.

Oh, come on, you know you smiled.

Ana's Birthday

We ate at Carrabba's for the first time last night to celebrate Ana's birthday. Here is my brother and sister-in-law at dinner.
Sorry no more pictures to share, I forgot my camera and had to use my new blackberry curve.

Oysterfest 2008

We had our first trip to Oysterfest in the Eastern Shore this year and had a good time. We pulled a pop up camper and met up with The Neighbors in their 5th wheel.
The lines formed early as did the all you could eating of oysters, clams, crabs and various other sides such as hush puppies, hot dogs and chowders. The kids enjoyed being pulled around in the wagon.After getting back to our campsite, we took the kids and dogs on a "nature walk" to see the animals nearby. Troy is walking JD but you can see Eli's massive size to the right of the frame. Then there were the black swans. Troy said, see the emu!

After an afternoon of fun, no nap, seeing new animals and a long walk, it was bath time. Morgan, Alexis and Troy enjoyed the quick soak.

The next morning was yogurt with Dad.
Then on the two hour drive home, total relaxation.

Takes a Lick But Keeps on Ticking

Yesterday, Troy took a spill and gashed the back of his head on a door jam at daycare. I took him to the doctor and we avoided getting stitches. After a two hour nap, we went to the Neighbors to see his girlfriends, Alexis and Morgan. It had a been awhile and they had a new toy, a four wheeler. It took him a few minutes but he finally got the swing of it. Guess we know what he wants now for his second birthday next month.

Not So Itsy Bitsy Spider

Troy knows the song Itsy Bitsy Spider and does some of the hand movements when I sing it. However, I think this creature seen yesterday morning outside our garage door would surely scare him. It would definitely scare Caroline who is a complete aracnaphobe.

I think we have his sibling on the back deck near the light too. They don't bother me unless I get hit by their web or even more scary, they are ON me. I had read about this sewing machine spider recently and thought it sounded pretty cool.

As Halloween nears, who needs a haunted house when you can just explore your own backyard.

Ladies Night with T.N.T.

With Tim in Kentucky visiting the Thaxton fam, Troy (aka TNT) and I had the ladies over for the afternoon and evening. Troy snuggled up with "Aunt CC" on the couch. Notice how she is representin' Philly with her Paddy's Irish Pub t-shirt. In case you've never seen it, it's the name of the bar in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. A completely hilarious and totally politically incorrect show on FX. (You can also watch it on Hulu.com.)Troy then aimed at "Aunt Kimmy" for some of her chex mix before bed.We were glad when Tim came home early on Sunday. Troy heard his truck and climbed up on the couch to look out the window. He said "DADA!" and started waving. Very cute.

Scarface

Troy decided to lift up the rug at daycare but didn't move his face fast enough. It looked much worse a few days later. Here are three faces of Troy.

"Joe Six Pack" Investment Plan

If you had purchased $1,000 of shares in Delta Airlines one year ago, you will have $49.00 today.
If you had purchased $1,000 of shares in AIG one year ago, you will have $33.00 today.
If you had purchased $1,000 of shares in Lehman Brothers one year ago, you will have $0.00 today.
But, if you had purchased $1,000 worth of beer one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the aluminum cans for recycling refund, you will have received a $214.00.
Based on the above, the best current investment plan is to drink heavily & recycle. It is called the 401-Keg Plan.

Since we typically buy kegs for Betty, it's hard to recycle for profit but this did make me laugh.

Pete and Re-Pete

Last week driving home from daycare, Troy was repeating every word I said for several minutes so I grabbed my camera to capture a few of the exchanges. The funny thing is that we have two dogs, Sydney and Sandy. He will not say Sandy even after I say her name. Enjoy.

This Pete and Re-Pete is fascinating unless we're watching Virginia Tech not execute well on the football field. Then we're all painfully aware of the words that could be repeated by a 23 month year old.
We kept my niece and nephew last night. Taylor was at softball practice so I only got a picture of Dylan.