Friday, November 9, 2012

We made it through the rain...

 

You may have heard that we in the Northeast got smacked by a bit of a super storm last week.  Up where we live it wasn't too bad - I mean, it wasn't great, and it was damn windy for a good long time, but *knock on wood* we didn't get hit nearly as hard as New Jersey and New York (side note: I can't believe there are still people without power!  It's been well over a week!).  However, we did lose power for about 26 hours, which is a mighty long time to a preschooler and his mom.  Dashiell was AWESOME though.  He was a bit sad at first - he normally watches a little Disney Junior before bed, and knowing that the likelihood of us losing power was pretty great I told him he could watch a little TV in the afternoon instead just in case.  Of course the electricity went out 5 minutes after turning on the TV.  So that was our moment of sadness.  After that he was fine!  I think the novelty of using flashlights and candles was enough to pull him through.  AND he got to eat cereal for dinner since we had no way of cooking anything.  Bonus!

Our storm prep included making banana muffins (good thing we did!) and for some odd reason making goo.



Our "goo" experiment was what we did instead of going to preschool that day.  It was a big mess, but surprisingly easy to clean up.

Anyway, we made it through the storm and subsequent loss of electricity.  Aurelia barely even noticed it was darker than usual in our house - she was crawling around through darkened rooms like it was no big thing.

We thought for sure that Halloween would be postponed (the trick-or-treating part of it, that is) since that's what happened last year, but alas we still had to go out ToTing mid-week, just me and the kids since Rick was working.  Dashiell had a blast anyway!  This year he was going to dress up like Batman (a costume he already had in his "dress-up clothes" bin), but then saw the "Welcome Great Pumpkin" sign I had made for his Linus costume two years ago and decided he wanted to be Linus again!  Easy-peasy costume change, since he already had the sign and the blue blanket.  And all the teachers at preschool LOVED the costume, too. 

Dashiell and Aurelia pre-trick or treating:





Aurelia was a Cabbage Patch doll.  Note my original Cabbage Patch doll (Terri Lynn) sitting next to her as a reference.  Here's a better picture of her looking especially cute in the car:



The wig is a bit askew but the smile distracts you from it!

Here's Dashiell posing with our pumpkins the weekend before the storm:
He was making his "pumpkin face". Funny kid!





So that was our excitement last week!  I have a bunch of other pictures to post that have nothing to do with anything, so bear with me!

Dashiell just ADORES playing with Aurelia, now that she's more, well, interesting.  She plays back, in her own way, and D loves it!

Here they're playing "jail" at the baby gate:


And here D is trying to play pat-a-cake with her:

I believe he is marking her with a "B".  She seems more interested in his fire hat, though.

I love this picture of Aurelia playing with Dashiell's grill:

Mostly I love it because I remember giving it to Dashiell for his second birthday, and how excited he was.  He towers over it now, but back then it was the perfect size for him.  Now it is big enough for Aurelia to grow into!

Last but not least, we had to get a babysitter for Dash and Aurelia the other day, and knowing how much D hates being babysat by people he "doesn't love", I tried to make the transition easier for both of them.  I have a bunch of books and activities in my attic from my days as an Usborne Books sales rep, and one of those activities was a Dinosaur Excavation kit!  I gave it to D and told him he and the babysitter could dig out dinosaur bones while Aurelia was napping.  It was a huge hit!  She sent me this picture:


The safety goggles kill me!  And that look of concentration - that is so Dashiell!  Now he wants her to babysit again because he had so much fun with her!  Of course next time he won't have dinosaur bones to dig up but I think they'll have fun nonetheless.  Yay - I love finding good babysitters!