Barton Hills Farms and some General Halloween

IYesterday we went to Barton Hills farm with the Girl Scout troop.  The high was 97 degrees.  Super Fall-like weather.  The place was about 45 minutes away.  I had never been to this one before.  They have a really big corn maze and a smaller maze.  Of course the girls voted to do the big maze.  Of course.

Before the maze we hit up the bouncy pillow.  Always a hit.

So off we went into the maze.  There were 10 stations where you answered questions and it told you which way to turn.  At station 3 Logan asked to be picked up.  He was so red and sweaty.  So I carried his ass to the next 2 stations.  Luckily there was a way out after station 5 and all of the parents were like 'yay!  We made it!' And left the stupid maze of heat and death.

He looks thrilled.

After that we got lunch and found an actual shady spot.  It was tolerable for being 96 degrees out.  After lunch we sped by the small petting zoo, took some pictures in the actual pumpkin patch, hit up the slides and train and called it a day.

For some silly reason I decided to run errands after the sauna fest.  Gotta get that glitter to glitter pumpkins!

Sunday night was the premier of Walking Dead!  Yes!  I attempted to make some zombie/spooky stuff.

Caprese salad eyeballs.  Or something.

Skull veggie lasagna.  Isabel would like it known that she likes the 'regular lasagna' better.  Well don't we all like sausage, ground beef and fat?

It was fun.

Today Isabel went swimming with a friend (because, you know, the high was 99( while Logan and I glittered some pumpkins and he made a masterpiece watercolor.

Isn't it gorgeous?!  I love it.

Some random Halloween pictures around the house:

Our glitter pumpkins!

Bless their hearts

They tried.  And they tried to rationalize, deflect, etc etc.  We called them out.  We had our point taken.  Turns out chatting with the assistant director of special education for AISD at a parent support meeting the night before you have a meeting scheduled can result in, well, results.  We will see what happens in 3 weeks.  It was very emotionally taxing.  That's all I'm going to say on the interwebs.

After the long long meeting Brian and I were both spent.  Brian was planning on working from home, but ended up just trying to regroup.  ABA got cancelled, which was sort of a relief.  Logan and Brian hung out while I took Isabel to the pool. 

Everyone was starving when I got home and I realized that we had no food in the fridge.  Oops.  So we made due with a smorgasbord of stuff.  Not too bad and everyone (at least the kids) was full.

We have no plans this weekend.  Amen!  Even Isabel's soccer game was rescheduled from Saturday to tomorrow night.  Is it wrong that I just want to head to Houston and get spoiled by my parents?  Probably.  It has been a long few weeks and it looks like it will be a long road ahead.

At least we have our AMAZING Halloween village to gaze at!  My dad did a fantastic job and I really can't thank him enough.  All of my brain power was taken up with Logan's stuff so I called him one day literally to ask about how to plug things in to an outlet.  No joke.  Anyway, it turned out absolutely amazing.

Halloween 2013!

Halloween was really fun this year.  We had great costumes once again from Gramma.  We did the assisted living trick or treating on Tuesday.  Thursday we had the preschool parties.  The costume parade was cancelled due to all of the rain and flooding.  The playgrounds still had standing water.  Apparently Isabel's class decided to have a 'beach Halloween' and swam in the puddles.  They had a little pinata at the end of the day too.

Halloween morning at drop off.

Isabel wanted Daddy to drop them off at preschool.  He said yes!  PS-These are scary faces.

It's a water playground today!

Isabel and her amazing teachers.

Beach Halloween!

Izzy's turn at the pinata.

Thursday night we had mummies for dinner and hit the street to trick or treat.  Logan was super into it this year.  Izzy was too, but was a little shy.  She did manage to hit up the super spooky house.  They stepped up the game by adding a live zombie.  Creepy.

Shut up.  They're mummies.

Logan's eyes. Hahaha!

Logan was really excited when he woke up Friday to go trick or treating that night.  Next year Logan, next year.

I watched Maddie all afternoon yesterday.  She and Isabel played nicely.  Logan was having a tough day, so I tried to do things with him by ourselves.  I busted out the key ring bead making kit I bought a while ago.  Yeah, not for the 4 year olds.  They weren't kidding when they said it was for 6+ year olds.  I made Maddie a dragonfly, Logan a lizard, Isabel a butterfly, and a puppy for myself.  I actually really enjoyed doing it.  I know what everyone is getting for Christmas this year!!!!

Brian got the engine for his car ordered and also a clutch kit.  Hopefully they can start work on it by the end of the week.  The truck now has new tires, a new starter, new brake pads and is inspected.  Phew.  Luckily Brian is handy and was able to do all of the truck work (minus the tires) himself.

The weather was gorgeous today so after a trip to Sears to try and get a replacement tip for our little air compressor we did Chick fil A for lunch and headed to the Hill Country Galleria for some window shopping.  We just walked up and down the sidewalks and enjoyed the weather.

Aggie football tonight!  Yes, we matched today.

Nightmares

Last night Logan had a nightmare about spiders.  Brian went in to calm him down and he flipped out.  He was screaming and trembling and was convinced that spiders were everywhere.  It was so sad to see.  Poor little guy.  I tried calming him down too, but he just wasn't having it.  We eventually got him to stop convulsing and shivering like a drug addict who needed a fix, but it took a long time.  We eventually decided that TV in our bed at 2:30am was likely the only way we were going to get any sleep.  It worked.  Little dude passed out after his show and slept until almost 8am!  I'm not looking forward to tonight.  He's already had a couple of freak outs and convulsions thinking about the spider in his bed.  :-(  It's so bad that you can't touch him because he thinks it's a spider.

Mondays are our pretty calm, not overly scheduled day of the week.  Today we had a birthday party at a park after playgroup from 4-6pm.  Not a great time for tired kids.  We lasted about an hour and then I had had enough.  This little girl was being just being mean to Izzy and kept coming over to tell me she didn't want Izzy to play with her and that she wanted to be alone.  Um, Ok.  We're at a birthday party with 30+ other kids.  Good luck finding that alone time.  And Izzy was just doing her own thing.  It's one thing to hear whining from your own kids but to hear it from other people's it another.  I seriously was about to go postal because her Grandma brought her and was totally oblivious to how obnoxious she was being, but thought better of it and tried to get away from her.  So we moved and this girl follows us and tells me again how Izzy is bothering her and won't leave her alone.  I'm like 'listen homegirl.  Back the eff up!

I don't know what your deal is, but you need to go have a chat with Gma over there because this Mom ain't havin' it.'  Gma finally realized what a little shit her granddaughter was being and came over to talk to her.  Gma did some regulating, which was sort of fun to see.  I was just glad it wasn't Izzy being the little shit for once.  And Izzy did get a little butt hurt over the whole thing, which always sucks to see.

So after Logan decided he needs to start flinging shit all over the place I decide it's time to get to peace out.

Isabel also started to get itchy eyes, so it was time.

I have a post saved about how life has been the past few weeks, but I realized how whiney it sounded, so haven't hit publish.  Basically we're scraping by to send Logan to therapy and now to try and get Brian's car fixed (it needs a new engine), and his truck tuned up in the meantime.  The truck got new brake pads and a new starter Saturday from Brian.  We're hoping a friend of a friend can do an engine swap on the Mazda for a reasonable price.  The shop the Mazda is at now quoted Brian almost $7k.  Hahaha.  So Halloween activities have been low key.  Gramma came a couple of weekends ago and spoiled us with a trip to a pumpkin patch and some lunches and watching the kids (including putting both to bed by herself!!!!) while we went to see a movie!!!!

Picking flowers at Sweet Berry Farm

Lunch!

A rousing game of tic-tac-toe

Logan stole Izzy seat for a minute.

Gramma checking out the 'train.

Riding the train!

Not a bad day!!!

I got a random FB message from one of my sister's friends Saturday morning.  He basically said he was in Austin for a company event and had prepaid for a bunch of spa treatments at this amazing spa downtown and a girl flaked, so if I wanted a massage and facial to be there at 10am.  Done.  Massage was good.  Facial was amazing!  Even gratuity was paid for!  I couldn't believe it.  Almost $300 in spa treatments for free.  What a nice guy.  I owe him one....or a million!

My super happy grateful face.

We have trick or treating at the retirement home tomorrow, an activity that I personally just love.  Seeing the older folks with the younger ones is just so fun.  And then the big parade and party at school on Thursday.  Fun!  Can't wait to see how it all goes!

I'll leave you with this gem of a conversation with Isabel:
Izzy:  One day will I have lots of hairs on my toes like Daddy?
before I can answer (and secretly glad she didn't say 'like mommy.')
Izzy:  and LOGAN YOU WILL HAVE HAIR ON YOUR PENIS!!!!!

I died laughing.  The end.

This dude.  Please please please sleep in your own room tonight!