Merry Christmas!

Aunt Judy's famous holly cookies have found their way to Minnesota

It's Christmas week!  It's Christmas week!  It's Christmas week!!

My favorite holiday of the year has absolutely flown right to us.  And boy have we been in preparation for it!

First thing first, we had to get Miss Ali Pants all set up in her really big girl bed, so we could show Brother Elf that he really could let Santa know that she has been making leaps and bounds in her third year.  Let's just say that as soon as this giant bed was erected, the nighttime visits to mommy and daddy's bed have ceased completely.  Now I just feel bad, she was probably all cramped in that little tiny bed like a giant goldfish in a tiny bowl!

Just LOOK at all this space, Brother Elf!

I, on the other hand, have been to task with my creative juices flowing.  I tried my hand at maintaining a Christmas tradition that I had previously been contracting out.  Grandma Dambro used to give Mac and I the most beautiful hand-painted ornaments every year.  They had whatever the hot cartoon was at the time, and our name and year on it.  I have Care Bears, Snow White, some kind of 80's princess with legwarmers...You know the drill.  I wanted to continue the tradition with Alessandra and Marley and for the last few years had them ordered from Etsy (GREAT site, by the way, if you haven't visited yet).  Despite that last endorsement, the ornaments kinda turned out..well...not as sweet as they used to be.  And I was paying like, $30 a pop.  So, I decided to try my hand at this business to see how I could do.  As it turns out, way better than Etsy!  Now, look, I'm no Norman Rockwell, but you can't beat the price!

Ali's pick this year

Cardo's pick...He is no fair weather fan!

A little somethin'-something' for Uncle Mac

Marley's pick

I also talked Ricardo into a second REAL tree!  I can finally get my smell on!!!

Hooray for realness!

The other law when it comes to Christmas is squeezing in some time for baking.  Well, in our case, not necessarily baking, but creating sugar-laden treats that we have no self control over eating in large quantities.  And this year, I have a real helper!

Chocolate covered pretzels, coming right up!

One can't help but indulge...Or is that her Italian moustache already growing in?!?

Carefully placing the Red Hots on the hollies

Alessandra is a pro when it comes to sprinkling

Cardo thought it would be hilarious to take a picture of my giant 34-week belly behind all of the treats that will soon be in it

All dressed up for the Torres Christmas party

So, this has all been our last couple of weeks in a nutshell.  This week Cardo's parents come into town to fulfill our need for family since we can't go home this year.  We are looking forward to it, but Ali is REALLY looking forward to it!  We are still really going to miss going home this year though.  :(

Lots of shopping, cleaning, and baby nursery prepping to get done still, but somehow it all manages to get taken care of.

I'm just about at 35 weeks (on Wednesday), and am at the point where I'm kinda over being pregnant.  I waddle, I wheeze, I grunt, I ache, I complain.  Differences from last time due to seasonality:  No swollen feet (yet), and not overheated, in fact, just right!  Weather is STILL extremely mild here (it was almost 50 degrees yesterday, and no, I"m not exaggerating), so most of the time, I'm just rockin' a hooded sweatshirt and that's about it.

So, that's all I got for ya this week...Lots of Christmas updates next week!  

Merry Christmas!!!

 

The most wonderful time of the year! Guest Writer :)

I thought this week would be a good time to do my second blog entry of the year as we enter into my favorite holiday season. There are alot of things keeping us busy this year as we prep not only for Christmas but also the birth of our son. I don't think that there is one night that we are not working in the new baby room, cleaning, running errands, decorating the house or Danielle sending me to Target to get God knows what. To me, its training for what I hear having two kids would be like. (By the way, I am super pumped to have my little boy coming soon)

So I will keep this short and sweet and not write a novel like Danielle. But I wanted to remind everybody to remember what Christmas is all about. It's about God, family, food, tamales, hugs, laughter, giving, patience and love.

The best Christmas story I have is from my Grandma Torres. She would put an envelope on the Christmas tree with all the grandkids names and put a few dollars for us kids. It's funny how I could not tell you what my favorite toy was every year, but as a kid I remembered my Grandma putting a few dollars in an envelope for me every year. Love and miss you grandma Torres.

Christmas is not about opening gifts or who spends the most on who, its who you are with those 1-2 days out of the year that make this holiday. Enjoy your family, enjoy those that you are around this holiday season. My tio Richard drives from family to family stopping by visiting and talking to his brother and sisters, I think that is why he is one of my favorite uncles.  Talk about the good times, talk about the time when your dad tried to regrow the Christmas tree in your front yard as a kid. Enjoy the company around you and laugh.

To all my family and friends that I will not see this year, know that I will miss all of you. We are truly blessed and should be thankful for all that has been given to us. All that matters to me anymore is having a smile on my daughter's face. That my friends, is a gift that you can't wrap.

Merry Christmas/Feliz Navidad & Happy New Year from the Torres family.

Ricardo

Elmo, Elves and Other Musings

32 Weeks

I think I'm going to rename this blog "The Bipolar Chronicles of Motherhood".  Last post (or was it two posts ago?) I was all sappy talking about how much I love my kids.  Today I'm feeling the impending doom of motherhood to two.  As you already know, I have quite a habit of talking about what an angel Alessandra is, and for the most part it's pretty true.  But up until I started really trying to remember what having a newborn is like, I can say that I damn well pushed some of that misery into the back of my mind.

Never mind labor, even though that sucks too.  It's the first few weeks/months that I've conjured back up that I'm terrified to endure again.  And that's coming from my experience with an angel.  I can't imagine I'd be lucky enough to have two of them in my brood, that's just too good to be true, so of course I am just preparing for the worst.

My first rude awakening (literally) was only one day into parenthood, our first night in the hospital.  I, in the comfort of my hospital bed, Ricardo on his vinyl chair-bed, asleep to the calm rhythms of my heart monitor.  Everyone I talked to said to send that child to the nursery if you know what's good for you!  So we did.  And Ali would not have it.  She cried and kept all the other kids up and so they had to wheel her back into our cozy, sterile den in the wee hours of the night, apologizing that sorry, we had to keep her now since she was squawking too loud.  I'm pretty sure I cluelessly shoved my boob in her mouth trying to get her to calm down, and I'm sure it didn't work, because little did I know, there's nothing in there yet.  That's for three days later.  When la leche comes in and those very same boobs that looked halfway normal a couple of days ago now resemble Dolly Parton's on steroids.  And lemme tell ya, things just don't grow that big that fast without exacting some EXTREME AND BURNING PAIN unto you.  I clearly remember thinking that the pain was a very close second to labor.  And I'm for real too, mijo.  Well, the only logical thing to do at that point is...well...to start nursing!  What's really awesome about that is that you get to trade in the pain of drastic inflation for cracked and bleeding...uh...you know.  And every time that little helpless child latches down on you with no teeth but weirdly bony gums OH MY GOD IT HURTS SO BAD I WANT TO THROW THIS KID ACROSS THE ROOM JUST TO GET HER OFF MY CHEST!  (Repeat this sentiment once every two hours, right after changing 22 diapers and rocking this crying lump back to sleep.)

...And speaking of sleep, nothing sucks any worse than finally, FINALLY drifting off when whomever is with baby brings the lump (still crying) in with a shrug and a "sorry but the kid needs to eat again" look on their face, and you are the one and only resource to resolve this issue, so you have no choice but to feel resentful of everyone else in the world who is not sleep-deprived and also very dreadful in anticipation of the pain that is about to make you see stars any second now.

I also remember a point in time when Alessandra was like a house of cards, constantly teetering between sleeping and Crying. For. Hours.  And it's not like she was colicky...This was a good/normal baby I'm talking about here.  I would finally rock her to sleep and try and put her down in her own bed, but as soon as I slid that last arm out from underneath her she would wake up instantly and start wailing again, all that work into that beautiful card house nothing but a pile of 52 pickup now.  This is how I learned that Elmo was a cool-looking manly black dude in real life, which I'll be honest, I was not expecting at all.  These are the kinds of things you learn at 4am when shows that teach you this useless trivia are the only thing on TV.

You looked a lot more like Urkel in my imagination.

So, in a word, I'm petrified.  Because somewhere along the line, it got easy again.  Or else I just adjusted.  But it FEELS easier which is all that matters, and I am afraid to lose that easy-peasiness that I'm so used to again now.  So will the labor and engorging and nursing and lack of sleep be less difficult this time because I know what to expect?  Or will it be worse now because I have two little monsters to take care of, one slightly less dependent on me than the other?

I guess I'll find out in a few short weeks (8, to be exact).  I'll be complaining let you know about it then, I'm sure.

8 weeks kind of seems like a long while away based on my aching pelvis and squished-upon bladder, but at the same time, it seems SO SHORT when it comes to all the stuff I need to get done before then.  Sorting through all of Ali's old stuff to see if I can find any boy-friendly items, shopping  for even more boy-friendly items that we don't have, finishing the nursery, getting out all the old infant gadgets, and a million and one other things besides that. 

One item crossed off the list thanks to a long holiday weekend, new furniture=assembled!!!  I'm gonna be honest, I thought I could do it by myself.  I tried to do it by myself.  I failed miserably by myself.  Thank goodness for strong, burly husbands who come to the rescue.  (And to Alessandra too, who "helped" by putting all the styrofoam pieces back into their original boxes that all the furniture came in and then proceeded to shred them into eleventy billion particles of ear-shrieking, vacuum-clogging mess.) 
 

Nursery is still a major work in progress, but the hard part's done!

Alessandra herself will be enjoying the fruits of the New Furniture Fairy despite the fact that she has just converted to "big girl bed" very recently.  Little dinky daybed is making way for an even "bigger girl bed"!  She'll be giving up her crib mattress to her brother and her queen size mattress arrives tomorrow.  Luckyee!!!

Wanna know what else we did over Turkey Day weekend?  Well, I'll tell you!

Samantha (and Carlos) invited us to Samantha's annual family Thanksgiving dinner.  Since we're out-of-town transplants, we  usually end up crashing someone else's party.  Thanks for having us and making us feel like part of the fam!

Carlos and Samantha

Thanksgiving Day was 60 degrees, and no I'm not lying.  In fact the whole weekend was gorgeous.  We took advantage and hit up the Holidazzle Parade in downtown Minneapolis.  This is basically a parade that happens at night and all of the floats and people are strung to the gills in a bajillion lights.  It was all of our first times attending, and Ali fulfilled her end of the bargain by waving at every single person.  Incidentally, that arm stayed warm all evening as well.

The Hansel and Gretel witch's house float

Daddy and Ali at Holidazzle

It's the law that all kids must sit on their dad's shoulders during a parade

With all this 60 degree talk, you might be telling yourself "It must not have ended up snowing in Minneapolis after all!"

Wrong!!  We. Got. NAILED!  They predicted an inch, it was more like 3 or 4 in the course of a couple of hours.

Our backyard, a winter wonderland

Naturally, Ali was stoked to get out there and make the first footprints.  Too bad the backyard bunny (coined Germa Filly because she showed up on our back patio all tiny and just born the same week that grandma died) beat her to the punch!

Eager beaver ready to make some footprints in no pants and mama's boots

That's more like it, child!

Finally, she settled for helping daddy shovel the driveway.  Just like I documented him mowing his very first mowable lawn this summer, I had to document his inauguration to clearing his very first snow that he was responsible for too.  Thank goodness the pile wasn't snowblower-worthy yet...That may require it's own set of photos!

Ali doing a pretty respectable job herself

We also kicked off Christmas.

A new tradition that we've just started this year thanks to a suggestion from Aunt Yole is introducing Ali to "Elf on the Shelf".  Basically you buy a package at Target that contains the elf and a book explaining what he's doing there.  In a nutshell, Santa sends him to your house to spy on you and then the elf flies back to the North Pole every night to report back to Santa.  This is how Santa determines whether you are on the Naughty or Nice list.  Then, the elf ends up in a different spot in the house every morning to prove that he did indeed hightail it to the North Pole and back again, all while you slept.

The first day we hosted our new friend, the creepy little bugger just showed up on our front porch ringing the doorbell and just sitting there all haughty.  You can tell the elf meant business, and Alessandra was intrigued when she opened the door.

We sat down and read the book which tells you to name him right away.  Ali named him "Brother" (prep her for a new baby much?), so he is now affectionately known as "Brother Elf".

The next day he showed up on the mantle.

I'm waaatttccchhiiinnngg  yoooouuuu...

Since Brother Elf arrived, he has been responsible for clean plates, timely bedtimes, pleases and thank yous, and even some external good behavior, which results in her own version of reporting just to make sure it gets back to Santa.  (Upon arriving home one day from an errand, Ali marched right up to him and said "I didn't kick the back of mama's seat in the car, ok?")  Brother Elf may be a little uncomfortable for certain little people in our house since she feels like (pardon the pun) Big Brother is watching all the time, but hey, there is no place like home for the holidays, especially when it is run by an elf dictator.  Such a pleasant environment with no effort on our part!

With good behavior in place, we were ready to move forward with the rest of the hall-bedecking.  Cue Johnny Mathis!!!

Notice this year's theme of having a helper everywhere we go?  No ornaments broken...Yet.

Hooray for a real house to light up!

It should be mentioned that a day or two later, all that snow melted, so we are back to winter square one again, which is fine with me.  No more 60 degree days in our future, but for the first week of December, I'll take it!


All diatribes aside, Baby T is eagerly anticipated and doing very well.  Based on movement and heartbeat, he is healthy as a horse and I did end up getting the lecture this week that I was so dreading.  "Don't restrict, but maybe don't help yourself to extra servings.  You are definitely at where we would want you to gain through the total pregnancy."  Dang!  And the holidays aren't even over yet!

So, these are my ups and downs for the moment.  Enjoy that.  Hope you all have a wonderful week!!!

30 Week Throwdown

Did you know that next week is Thanksgiving?  Yeah, it's a fact.  And how it happened to come to be so quickly I'll never know.  But what I do know is that we Minnesotans have lucked out in the weather department thus far.  Seriously, last weekend was ONE degree away from beating the all-time record for temperature!  It was 64 degrees of full-octane golden sunshine as opposed to our usual serving of snow any other year.  And thus, fall yardwork = Done.  Christmas light-stringing = Done.  (And NO, we are not those people that light them up before Thanksgiving.  November 25th...It's Clark Griswald all up in our house.)  And speaking of the nasty white precipitation, they are saying that we are supposed to get an inch of the stuff tomorrow.  But, they have been saying that for three weeks now and keep pushing it back a week, so I'm holding out hope for tomorrow too.  Contrary to last weekend, however, it has been getting miiiggghty chilly outdoors, so it's entirely plausible this time around moreso than others.  You'll be able to tell by the mood of next week's post whether we got dumped on or not.

In prenatal news, all is peachy keen with a side of internal beatdowns.  Baby is moving now more than ever and I feel his jabs especially in the ribs, crotch, and this one section of my abdomen where I am convinced he constantly rests his knees.  There is always a sharp point there that I can feel from the outside, and just yesterday when I told Jen at work to feel the offending area on the belly, she was quite literally assaulted as payback for her pushing on the spot.  Take that, you outside alien, you!  How dare you cave in my comfort sac?

My visit with Dr. West was quite status quo and may I say a little boring this week, but in the business of bringing healthy babies into the world, boring is good!  She did marvel a bit at how the pregnancy started out so dramatic in the beginning (twins, surgery), and now I am healthy as an ox.  (Or perhaps a hippo in this version).  Anywhoo, I've gained 22 pounds which is right where they need me (another month of medically-sanctioned food binging...YES!), blood pressure and baby's heartbeat are all good, and I'm measuring right on at 30.5 weeks, and life is grand.  For real.

30 weeks

We are still tentative as to our Thanksgiving Day plans, but so long as whatever it is that we do involves food and lots of it, I'm a happy camper.  More to come on that next week.

Alessandra and I enjoyed a fun photo session the other night involving way-too-big-for-the-face wayfarers and a hot pink sweatband.  She was begging for me to take more and more shots as she conjured up silly faces, each one more hilarious than the last. Below, a montage of the wackiness that is my daughter:


 We even talked daddy into the festivities.  He's thrilled about it, no?

Big shout-out to Gianna Grace who turned SIX yesterday!!!

It's been a huge year for our niece!  She started at a brand new school with all new friends, became a by-invitation-only soccer All-Star for the Chickadees and rumor has it that she is exceling at all of her studies.  Like, top 5 student in the class.  (Ahem, more like top 2, but who wants to brag?!?)

Happy, happy birthday Gianna!  We love you so much!

Other accomplishments of the week:  Christmas cards ordered and received, labels created and printed, and healthier home-cooked meals every night of the week (a new goal of ours...Bye-bye creepy Hamburger Helper glove boy!) served.  Also served:  A fresh side of guilt for not also squeezing in cleaning my house or getting some major project done.  My days are numbered, man!  We shall see what things I can tackle this weekend, and hooray for short work weeks next week!

We'll catch up then.  If I don't happen to get a post in prior to Turkey Day, have a very happy, cozy, and scrumptious Thanksgiving!!

 

Hugs!

Those First Few Days...A Confession

I have a heavy duty confession to make. 

I didn't love Ali when she was born.

I mean, I knew I wanted her, and that I was excited about her, and that I really liked her a lot, but I never really felt that deep-seated bond that all movies, blogs, magazines, and telanovelas will have you believe is the only way.  The whole pregnancy with Alessandra was kind of like a really cool science experiment for me, like growing and fostering a giant sea monkey or something.  And on the afternoon of September 7th after that final money push, I distinctly remember them throwing onto my chest this crying, flesh-colored, sorta blob of a human, and it was more like finally getting a really adorable puppy that I've wanted for a long time. I still didn't feel that emotional connection.  You know, where they always show the mom all crying and whimpering and kissing the baby's head, not even worried about all that blood and vernix getting on her lips.  I for sure hugged and kissed Ali, but just on a spot on her head that looked like it was the most clean.  I'm pretty sure I talked to her and told her hi and did all the obligatory cooing and stuff, but what do you really talk with about a baby who has no desire to be there in the first place?

In spite of all of this, it really is amazing how quickly the maternal mode kicks in.  I remember after they whisked her away to do their thing, all I could do was stare over at her, wanting to take in what she looked like.  All these crazy thoughts running through my head:  Who did she resemble most?  (Weirdly enough, my very first thought was my brother when he was a baby), and also trying to take a mental snapshot so that if anyone would take her from me I would remember how to describe her.  After the first hours of her birth and throughout our entire stay at Abbott Northwestern, I also remember feeling a little guilty because I knew that there was a very good chance that I couldn't pick my baby out of a nursery lineup.

She looks like...A baby!

I think this is what I'm supposed to do with her...

As the days and weeks passed, I went through all of the motions; feeding, holding, changing, comforting.  And somewhere along the line her little tree roots grew right into me.  I can't recall the first time my heart swelled with complete and utter adoration, or when I knew without a doubt that my lips were a freakish magnet to this certain part of her nose right between her eyes, but what I can tell you is that these things happen at least once a day for usually the most trivial reasons nowadays.  I still stare at her with unequivocal fascination like she's that interesting science project I once saw her as, only now it's slightly hilarious because she'll call me out on it because, let's be honest, no one just likes to be stared at for no good reason.  (At least to the person being stared at...To me, it's the best reason in the world.)  I asked her the other day "Do you think mama kisses you too much?" to which she simply replied "yeah" with a giggle.  Of course, the only response to that is to kiss her more. 

I guess the reason I tell you all of this is because, as a person who enjoys observing raw human nature with myself usually as the center of the study, I find it interesting that it only took that one little child to act as the catalyst that opened the floodgates of my love.  I am already so in love with this little boy that I am trying to figure out how to contain it all without going berserk.  I am in no way concerned that I will not have enough love for both of my children, but I am a little worried about how I am going to effectively show Alessandra that I love her just as much as her brother when I will need to dedicate so much time to him in those first few weeks.  It actually breaks my heart a little to think about her hurting or being jealous of her new sibling.

I tell her all the time that she will always be my first baby, and my favorite girl.  (This is a lovely little loophole, as new baby will always be my favorite boy.)  I will praise her as my little helper once her brother is born, and I know she'll be very good at it and will tell her so every day.  She does have a special place in her heart for babies as I see her interact with them when I drop her off at daycare, so that part I'm not too concerned about.  It's just reminding her that she is still so important to me that gets me going.  I'll do my best, but please don't hesitate to pass along any suggestions you may have.

Aside from the aforementioned sappy stuff, not a ton to talk about this week and I haven't been awesome about taking pictures either which is why you find me here babbling on and on all mushy-like about how much I love my kids.  No belly shot either, so you are just going to have to make do with these adorable pictures I took of Ali on my camera phone this week.

Looking all cute and cozy in her sweater dress...Thanks Aunt Yole and Gianna!

Diego was at the zoo last weekend.  She loves him!

So, that is all.  Next week, I hit 30 weeks. (!!!)    Seriously, six more weeks and I'm full term.  Weird.

I'll report back to you regarding my progress following my 30 week appointment on Wednesday!  Have a great weekend.

 

All Hallows Week

I'll get you, my pretty!...

 Have I mentioned that Halloween is one of our faves?  Not only do we embrace it fully, but so does our child (natch) which makes it so much easier to get all into it.  No excuses needed for weird and what could be perceived as creepy adult celebration...We're doing it for the KID, mmmkay?!?? 

Not only was our house the first one on the block to get all bedecked in orange, we've also been counting down how many sleeps until Halloween for Alessandra since October 1st, and she's known she was going to be a witch since, oh...May.  And every time we go to Super Target (basically once every other day), it is an absolute obligation to walk through the Halloween section.  So, we're nerds.  Established.

...And your little dog too!!!

A'course, I like to coordinate with my little popkin on the actual day, so I was a witch while I passed out candy, but as usual I like to sprinkle my costumes with a bit o' humor when it comes to anything extra-curricular.  Like our little weekend jamboree, for instance.

I knew I wanted to work the pregnancy into the costume, and I'm sorry, the pregnant nun and priest is the obvious (and very played out) choice.  So, I looked up "fat celebrities", because why wouldn't I have?

I was so close to doing this:

But then while we were shopping over our lunchbreak one day, shortly after he grabbed to admire a super sexy mullet wig, Cardo mentioned that he might be interested in doing a couples costume.  So, naturally, these people came into mind that had also come up in the fat celebrities search:

Dog the Bounty Hunter and his gaudy sidekick and wife, Beth

Duh.  This is what we were meant to do all along!  So, I picked up another super-sexy non-returnable wig for $3,856.00 and we walked out with thousands of possibilities running through our platinum blond cornsilk-covered heads.  Alas, the day of the party came, and we were so concerned about cooking and cleaning in preparation that we still hadn't put much thought into our rad costumes.  I think we were both just planning on plopping the wigs on and gaining inspiration from there.  (The belly really is an excellent ready-made prop.)

Later, Ricardo announced that he would be heading out to run errands.  I announced that I would be lying down for a nap.  A half hour later, he still hadn't returned.  I'm wondering what in the hell is taking so long just to buy a few two liters of pop?  Finally, I get a text from him proclaiming "Dude, Michael's is awesome!" Like, do you a friend named Mike whose house you stopped by?  Because I KNOW you did not stop by the craft store.

Oh yes he did. 

I walked downstairs to find him sitting at our kitchen table full of beads and feathers (among other things), stringing them into various adornments.  I. Was. Impressed!!!  He actually transformed from being a lackadaisical Dog to an all out BOUNTY HUNTER!! Grrr...

I managed to improvise also and together we became one dynamic duo.  You are under arrest!

My favorite thing about this picture is Ali's face.  Like WTF are my parents so weird?!?

Let the celebration commence.

Neighbors Meredith, Bodie, Anna, and Steve

Elena-Bee

Burt Reynolds/Turd Ferguson (aka Aaron) and Bjork (Angie) in an awesome version of Celebrity Jeopardy from SNL.

The Anondson Coven: Sawyer, Joey, Andrew, and Liza

Two Berts in one night, how fortunate are we?!?  Ernie (Toto), and Bert (Nowell)

Neighbors Steve, Beth, Brad, and Meredith

Steve and Meredith win the contest for best costume change:  Wells Fargo security guard and innocuous vampiress BEFORE kids went to bed, scary zombie and blood-thirsty vampiress AFTER bedtime!

Later on, in another burst of initiative, Cardo (errr...Dog) turned on the Wii and got started with an impromptu dancing performance.  This, coupled with several other characters following suit, made me laugh harder than I have in awhile.

I don't know why, but he looks like he should be some lovelorn Native American on the cover of some cheesy 80's romance novel

My off-centered ass even gave it a try

Cowgirl and Don Johnson tore it up

Bert and Ernie have been practicing together for years

Bert and Scooby: Who knew they were such good pals?

Zombie Apocolypse

As you can imagine, the giant danceoff lasted through the wee hours of the night, and somehow I even stayed up through it all.  Guess the booze isn't required to have a good time after all, just good company.

We spent Sunday cleaning and resting up, and preparing for the big day, Monday.  Alessandra was looking very forward to "for real" trick or treating.  But in our house, you don't go anywhere without a round of photos first, don't ya know? 

Ali wanted us to be nice witches

I wanted us to be SCARY witches

On her way out the door with daddy

I opted to hold the dungeon down and pass out candy.  Daddy took her witchiness out with the rest of our neighbor clique.  As I'm told, the gang either split up or petered out, and our little festive one was not even close to being done.  Ricardo brought her back to the house a couple of times to give her the option of helping me pass out candy, and each time she chose to go back out (Good for me, she acquired more and has basically forgotten about it since...Cue Homer Simpson eating doughnuts sound.)   Did I mention the weather was absolutely perfect for the occasion?  It was a brisk fall evening, around 45 degrees.  Just right to throw a little insulation on underneath the actual costume without ruining it with bulkiness or (EEEK!) having to wear a winter coat over the thing.  'Cause, we didn't spend all our hard earned money on a costume for that business!

Over in Michigan, our nieces and nephews were doing pretty stellar themselves.  Would it be weird if I printed out these pictures and ate them?  Seriously, these kids are so cute, I would very much like to eat them for my 3:00 snack.

Marley the cheetah and Mac.  Raarrrr!!!

Gabriel and Gianna:  This ain't their first rodeo...Of cuteness.

The other little munchkin in our family didn't get much of a choice in his costume, and he's kicked me in the ribs and crotch enough to prove his disdain.  But I love him all the same anyway.  :)

28 weeks and 160 weeks

He is healthy and perfect in every way that we can tell from out here in our cold, bright and dry world.  He is measuring just right, and his heart is beating just right (146 bpms), and he is kicking just right too.  Did you know that if he were born right now he'd have an excellent chance of survival?  (Not that we'd want him so unripe just yet...We need this little watermelon plump!)  Oh yeah, and my weight gain staved off this month again, so even that's right where I needed to be.  No lecture from Dr. West, and I can still eat what I want!  YESSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!

So, I gotta go then.  Cuz there's a pink-frosted Lofthouse cookie calling my name.  Or is that two of them yelling it in harmony?  The whole box?????  Perhaps.