October 31, 2005
Happy Halloween
Boy do I LOVE Halloween. I got to hand candy out to all sorts of gouhls, princesses, and other little monsters. This was almost as fun as the actual trick or treating. Dad just left the door open and I stood watch for more kids.
Then Mommy took me trick or treating around our street. As soon as the doors opened I shouted “Trick or Treat” and held my bucket over my head for all the candy. As I left every house I would begin muttering, “Gotta get more candy” until we made it to the next house. Then we headed home and it was Daddy’s turn to take me around to lots more houses. We had a blast until a scary Monster jumped out at us from one porch. After that I was ready to get home. I made out like a bandit. Three buckets of candy in all.
Like a great big sister I shared my loot with the little pumpkin. She had to stay home so its the least I could do.
October 30, 2005
Boo At The Zoo
We were good parents and took Sydney and Reagan to the Zoo’s Halloween deal again this year. Its fairly crazy because its a 1 weekend deal so everyone in town is there. This year Sydney is starting to get into what you have to do at Halloween a bit more.
Sydney was very excited to see a real panda bear walking around the park. What a zoo! You can hug the animals.
Another pose with the bear of the day.
As we walked around the park, all we heard was “Elmo!” and “Hey, Elmo” and “Its Elmo!”. Kids would come up to Sydney and want to say hi to Elmo. She started giving some of the smaller kids hugs when they came up to see her.
October 25, 2005
Potty Update
Project Pee-Pee and Poo-Poo on the toilet has been a huge success. Yeah!!!! I am now in big girl underwear all day at home, except for bedtime of course. Not quite ready to tackle that one yet. Mommy has the whole setup for me so that I can even go to the potty all by myself. I got my squishy toilet seat, step stool, and Kando kid wipes. I have had no accidents since the first couple of days. Yesterday I even asked to use the toilet at the restaurant even though I had pull-ups on. This has been one of the easiest things I have tried to tackle yet. I am definitely an official big girl now.
I’m a Great Big Sister
Reagan has been sitting up on her own for just a short period of time. So I thought it was time for me to let her take a turn sitting in my Dora chair while we watched cartoons together. I can tell she thinks I am a great big sister by the way she smiles as soon as she sees me. I think she is pretty cool too.
October 24, 2005
I Wanna Be Dora
I love to play pretend these days. My favorite new game is to pretend to be Dora the Explorer. For this game I must put on my backpack, Dora hat, and have my trusty sidekick boots at my side. Then I have Mommy or Daddy check the map to see what my next grand exploration is. So far they have me do a lot of cleaning up, but that only works for so long. I prefer to live more on the dangerous side. Here I am climbing up Squishy Mountain to Rescue my pal Boots the Monkey. After each task is completed I even sing the “I Did It” song.
October 18, 2005
Big Girl Underwear
All is pretty calm around here now that Reagan is completely over her colic and now a very happy baby. So we decided its time to add a new big project to our lives. We don’t know how to live without a little daily chaos around here. So what’s next…potty training.
The first few days were very hit and miss. She would start to go in her pants, stop as soon as she was wet and then finish after a run to the toilet. Her underwear made her think she had a diaper on so she would just go. Next we decided it was naked time. So Syd ran around naked all day and she would run to the potty when nature called without any accidents. Now that she knows what the call feels like we can bring back the underwear and she goes to the toilet when needed. We are still not at 100% by any means but getting better. #2 is downpat but #1 still causes the occasional accident if too busy with something.
Next step to conquer is the out and about training. We are on the lookout for portable toilet covers for use in restaurants, etc. For now we use pull-ups when out but she immediately goes back to thinking its a diaper and just goes in her pants. As you can see from the pictures we can’t keep clothes on the kid anymore. Now that she learned to undress herself for the toilet she prefers the buff. Oh, and the magic trick that made her excited to use the toilet was a combination of Carebear and Dora underwear. Much cooler then a dumb ole diaper.
October 17, 2005
October 14, 2005
Baking with Grandma
One thing you can say about Grandma Hakes is that she knows how to bake. Sydney got her first cooking lesson with Grandma. We didn’t mind the feet in the pie plate or the several sneezes in the cinnamon roll dough. Still tasted great!
October 12, 2005
Johnny Appleseed Festival
During our visit to the Fort, Mama took me and Reagan to our first Johnny Appleseed Festival. This is the big annual old time festival in Fort Wayne. Mama and Daddy both were regular fixtures at this festival growing up. They must have run into each other dozens of times. Little did they know they would be bringing their own kids someday. Mama helped her Grandma’s sorority out at the sack race every year. Daddy’s Mom volunteered to help run the festival for years so Daddy would tag along. He was let loose to reek havic around the festival wherever he could.
The festival is set in the days of Johnny Appelseed so if you are working there you have to dress the part. Here is Nana all dolled up.
They have a kiddie section with all sorts of old fashioned games. Here I am searching for a block in the barrel.
Next I moved on to a sort of bowling game. You would hold a rope with a weight on it and try to knock over the pins. Honestly, on my frst try I kocked over all three pins. My prize was a cool turtle necklace which you can see in other pictures.
On to Candle Making…
Isn’t it beautiful…
Next we hit the Maze. I liked running into the ends and trying to push my way out yelling “Help, I’m Stuck.” Very fun.
Finally we headed over to the Boy Scout Games. They have tons of cool, swings and other games that they handmade. I was too little to go on most but I loved the monkey bars as usual.
Here I am going through the cave in the obstacle course. This was another one of my favorites.
On our way out I got to meet the one and only Johnny Appleseed himself.
Too much excitement for me. Time for a nap.
October 10, 2005
October 8, 2005
My New Friends
Ok, so we are back from Fort Wayne and I finally have a minute to post some pictures. Since getting home Sydney keeps asking me the names of all her new friends, aka family in Fort Wayne. We know have all the names down. Here are a few pictures.
I loved playing with Christian most of all. Once I got back home I soon declared Christian as my “Best Friend” while we were driving to school.
He had a cool bed with a slide. We quickly made trash of his room after a few rounds.
We made it back to the Fort Wayne Children’s Zoo. Christian and I just ran around screaming like little monkeys, so this picture was quite fitting.
Caught in the act. I don’t remember what we were into at the moment but we sure look guilty.
Christians’ Mommy took us on the Merry-go-round. You were supposed to scream as loud as you could on this ride. Least that’s what Christian and I did.
Next was the train. We got to sit in the operator’s chair.
Did I mention Christian is my best friend?
Later we headed over to Grandpa and Grandma Coburn’s house. Christian and I liked to play on Mommy’s bed. We threw all the blankets on the floor, and hid under the covers. Swiper the Fox was trying to get us, but we fooled him. We eventually got banned from the room for a jumping on the bed incident. It wasn’t my idea, I swear.
We took a brief break for a cousins photo. Eddie and Ryan were too cool to lay on the floor with us, but here are the youngins. Christian has his own baby Jonathon.
Next we headed over to see Papa Knox. He is Mommy’s Grandpa. Mama warned me that he may try to pinch my knee real hard but I thought he was a sweety. We tok him to lunch and I had the job of helping Grandpa get into the restaurant.
I’m exhausted. Time for a nap wth Grandma. Or maybe Grandma was the exhausted one.
October 3, 2005
Pun-Kin Patch
Since fall has arrived, it was time to go to the pumpkin patch to prepare for Halloween. Last year, we went late and it was a bit picked over. So this year, we are going early!
Give the kid the shears to carry!
Time to play in the maze. Sydney learned about these at a recent festival and now they are all the rage.
We said smile and Sydney decide to make some type of telescope out of her hand to look at us through…
Thought this was a good shot of the Boulder Flatirons — not so good of us.
