::cupcakes::

When we went to the grocery store at the beginning of my parents visit, my mom and Max found themselves a project. They ran across a bottle of frosting that they just couldn't pass up. It was green, and had four different decorating tips. So they had to get some other cupcake making stuff to go along with it.

They got started by putting on our lovely aprons.

Kathy made these aprons for us last christmas. My mom used mine. Max's is so cute. It has a little giraffe on it. He really likes it.


Then they set to work mixing up the cakes.

Sorry my photos are kind of grainy. Seems like it's been really dim in my house for the last while. I probably need to get used to it--I'm guessing it's just that it's winter. Oh well.

Here's mom trying to explain the concept of two-thirds to Max, since the cupcake cups are supposed to be filled to 2/3.

I'm not sure he grasped it. But he did a good job filling the cups anyway.

I don't have any pictures of him filling, but my mom does! In fact she has a bunch of good pictures of the cooking process. Like Max cracking eggs and stirring and pouring water. They're very cute. Check them out if you're feeling like it.

Then after waiting as patiently as possible for things to cool down, they frosted.





I'm not sure why Max felt like he needed two spatulas, but it makes me a little nervous.

Then on to the fun stuff--the whole point of this project really.

Squeezing out the frosting was really hard for Max, but he did a great job. He stuck out his tongue the whole time in deep concentration.

They look great, don't they?
I'm very proud of him--the two of them really. This is the kind of project that a sweet small boy might always remember. He's lucky to have such a great Gram.

::some thoughts::

These are some of things swirling (or squirreling) around in my head right now.

I think that four year old boys, in bed, heavily sleeping with their arms above their heads are very very very cute.

My parents left today, it was so fun that they could come and visit.  I wanted to take care of them, but of course they ended up taking care of us.  I miss them already and they've only been gone for a few hours.  Poor Max really wishes he lived closer to all his grandparents, and I don't blame him.  He probably has the four best grandparents in the world.  Oh well, maybe someday we can get closer.

I miss the fall leaves!  They're mostly all gone now, and it's sad.

I can't believe how cold it is here suddenly.  It's freezing outside.  As I sit here my hands feel all cold and stiff from typing and my feet are frigid.  I wonder if it's just going to stay this way until spring.

Today when we got home from dropping Max off at school, Sultan had escaped the yard.  The back gate blew open in the wind last night I guess.

When I walked up the sidewalk I saw him there at the end of our driveway sitting right by the back of the car.  Poor guy.  He was all scared, and so was I.

I'm so glad he had the brains not to run away.  I'm so glad he didn't get hit.  Phew.

Kris is coming back from NYC right now.  He got to be involved in the interviews for next year's residents.  I'm very interested to hear all about it.  Thinking about the whole application and interview process sure brings back some stressful memories.  I'm just so glad we don't have to do that again anytime soon.  I have big-time sympathy for anybody that's doing it right now.

I can't believe we're seeing this around here:

It blows my mind.  I honestly thought it was a possibility that we'd never see gas below $2 again.  And it's quite the relief to my pocketbook right now.  I know it's not a great sign for the economy that gas keeps dropping, but I can't help but like it.  Between the lower prices and our new smaller car hopefully our gas bill is going to be quite a bit lower.  We'll see.

Happy wednesday everybody.  I hope you had a good one.

::bike man::

Kris has been trying to teach Max to ride his bike without training wheels. At first it was a huge ordeal. Max cried and cried. He just wanted his training wheels back!
But then Kris somehow convinced him that it was super duper cool to ride like dad. And so Max gave it a try. Before this trip he's practiced twice, and he's started to really get the hang of it.

There he goes!

Yikes! He's getting good at swerving, that's for sure.

At our dog park they have this long strip of softish pavement that I think is used for long jump or something. It's perfect for Max to practice riding on. Especially since this day we forgot his helmet, jeeps creeps! That's not a mistake we like to make.

Kris is like "Don't forget to USE YOUR BRAKES!" That's Max's biggest challenge. He forgets about his brakes, takes his feet off the pedals and drags them along the ground to stop. It's not very efficient, and makes for some rather spectacular wipe-outs.

Sultan likes to run alongside--or more usually in front.  See him there just barely in the left of the above photo?  That's made for some pretty good wipe-outs too. He likes to make sure Max is ok, but I don't think he understands that he stresses Max out more than otherwise. But that's ok. He's just a nice and silly dog.

But sometimes it's hard to stick with the practicing.

"Um, Max? We're not here to ride up and down this strip by ourselves!"

And whoever else is there usually feels the need to run alongside too--just like Sul. The other day when we had Max out practicing I raced the boy up and down that strip for what felt like hours. Finally I got tired and Max said that I ran out of "juice."
Luckily as Max says, Grandpa NEVER runs out of juice.





Grandpa didn't run out of juice.  He's tough.  Max is having a great time. He's very proud of himself when he can make it all the way down to the end.

It's about right here he starts to get worried. He's trying to remember how to stop.
By the time we left he was stopping pretty well. So well in fact that I didn't even get a picture of a crash. I'm glad he wasn't crashing anymore, but I'm seriously bummed I didn't get any good action shots.

To finish up Kris rode a couple of races against the bike man.

It was a good day for bike riding. Pretty soon he's going to be riding everywhere, all on his own! And we've found a few places around here that are actually conducive to a small cute boy riding around. It's hard, being in the middle of the city, but we're going to make it work.

::more new car::

So here are a couple of fun new car pictures from today. We're glad to be back in a set of wheels that we own.

It's cute. We still love and miss our awesome red land grover, but this subaru is going to do us very well I think. And it's going to save us money. And right now, saving money is really really good.
Sultan is really glad he can ride in the car again. He was sad the whole time we had the rental car because there was no room for him.

He's got his groove back now.

And it's about time we have a car with a good solid bike rack on top of it, right?

My mom took this picture today out in the "woods" which are in a beautiful old cemetery near our house.

Really the only thing I care about in a car is keeping my friends safe. And these little subarus are supposed to be nice and safe. That makes me happy.
Because this face is the most important.

::my mummy::

So my parents are here, as I mentioned below. I've been busy driving around and having fun and haven't had much time to blog. BUT my mom has been doing a good job. So if you want to see a little of our life here through my mom's eyes check out a few of the recent entries here.
Just be sure to ignore any pictures of me that might have turned out, how you say, ugly.
Enjoy. My mom has a way with words. And pictures.

::grandparents::

My parents flew in yesterday for a week long visit.
So far we've had a great time, doing lots of fun grandparenty type things.



I'll have more to report later.

::ballet class::

As some of you know, Max is in a ballet class right now. There's a ballet academy about 4 blocks down from our house. It's really close and easy to walk to, and so when I found out that they offered a class for 4 and 5 year olds we decided to try it.

The last class of each term is "observation week" where everybody can come and watch class and enjoy the compete silliness/chaos that is a class full of small children, mostly in tutus.

So of course I brought my camera!

Max was pretty excited that I was there to watch and didn't want to pay attention to the teacher.

Finally he got to stretching.



He's not the most flexible guy you'll ever meet, but he tries.



Watching his attempts to do these stretches was pretty hilarious and definitely entertaining. It wasn't just him though--check out the little girl in blue back by the teacher.

He calls this one the "sideways H." I think he's pretty good at it.

Not exactly sure what's going on here, but it's fun.


Then they lined up to do some skipping. Well it's a sort of a line anyway.

Max's skipping was as if he was pretending to be an elephant. The floor almost shook as he skipped by. You can see in the picture how flat his feet were as he went by. It was hilarious.

Then they did some sort of goofy thing like musical chairs but with hula hoops on the floor. They all ended up in one great big one. It was all happy until one little girl put her fingers under the hoop and another little girl stomped on the hoop for a while.
And yes, there is another little boy in his class. Somehow.

They ended up by pretending to be animals or something with little headbands. Luckily Max got to be a frog rather than a fairy princess. He did a great job leaping across the floor. I was proud of my little frog.

::a little light play::

The other day when we were taking pictures of our jack o lanterns we thought we could also have some fun playing with glowsticks and the camera.

I had some bracelets left over from our halloween party that I had saved just for this purpose.

So check it out. I think these are fun!





Yeah, these would've been better NOT in front of the outside door, but that's ok.
I like how Max has the sticks in his ears.

These are my favorites:



Fun, right?

::for rachel part 2::

Remember my friend Rachel who was in the hospital? Well she's out and at home and doing much better I hear! But she says she's been enjoying my fall foliage fotos, and since I can't stop myself from taking them, like ALL the time here are some more fun ones, just for her--and you too if you want to look.

Lately if I leave the house without the camera I really regret it. And if I have it I just can't stop taking pictures. It's fun. Soon enough the trees will be all bare and I'll really miss the leaves. So I'm enjoying them while I can.


The tree a couple of doors down.

The contrast of green and yellow is really fun.



Look familiar? It's the header right now. This is just some little bush. Who knew it was going to turn into a rainbow.

Here's that dark black trunk against gorgeous gold that I love again. I could look at it all day.

I love this one. That's about all I can say for it. Except that I walked by this tree today and realized most of the leaves were gone. Then I almost cried. I miss them.

This last one is a tree right by Max's school. I have no idea what the berries are, but they're beautiful. And the leaves, I love them for being so colorful.
Sending fall love to Rachel from the good old north east!