A Funny

One of the exciting things about getting a new house is getting to choose the paint colors.  We still need to add another bedroom so for now Taylor and Olivia chose to paint their room bright yellow and blinding orange.  Luckily the room is in the basement so I don't think this combination will result in retinal damage. 

I've been dreading painting because the kids are so excited about getting to help out.  Since the floor in Taylor and Olivia's new room needs to be replaced I decided to start there.  I just knew they would get bored with the whole thing quickly and no longer want to help me.  But alas, those kids really love to paint.  Lucas did finally decide he didn't want to do it any more but the rest of them really hung in there. 

One of the new toys I bought for the new house was the Black & Decker paint stick.  Chris got to use it first, but then I went to town with it.

It worked really well and after about an hour this is what the room looked like.

Which is where the funny part enters into the equation:)

Your Invisible Friend Did What??

Invisible friends... a right of passage for many younger kids, sometimes the bane of a parent's existence.

When Olivia was about 3 she had an invisible friend named Hotolita. Hotolita didn't talk much, do much, but she did have a book that Olivia needed to keep around at all times. The book was an old leather bound day planner that was given to me by my old job. At the beginning of each year we were given new ones and I kept the old ones to compare sales and promotions from one year to the next. Olivia found one of the older planners and liked to draw in it, so I let her keep it. One day she started to talk about her "Hotolita book" and was devastated she couldn't find it.  I asked a bunch of questions... hot book? hot to where book? what?... luckily Taylor was there to translate for me and from that point on that is what we called that particular book, The Hotolita Book. Taylor never had an invisible friend, she just translated for Olivia's invisible friend.

Actually neither Chris nor I had invisible friends, although Chris told me he used to wish he had one.  His complaint is that he was never cool enough to have an invisible friend.  I didn't have invisible friends, but then I had a healthy social life with my very real stuffed animals.  Each one had it's own personality and all of them had to sleep with me at night.  The animals used to fight over who got to sleep next to me, so I would rotate them so no one would get jealous.  Don't tell, but I did have a couple of favorites shhh... 

Fast forward and now Dee Dee has an invisible friend named Nicholas. She has had this friend for a couple of years and Nicholas is much more developed as a personality compared to Hotolita.  Nicholas, Dee Dee's friend is a little girl, just a bit older than Dee Dee and Nicholas gets to do and have everything Dee Dee doesn't. If Dee Dee wants a toy and we say no, Nicholas will be sure to have the coveted toy at her house. If Dee Dee complains we need a new car and we laugh, Nicholas' family gets a new car... you get the picture.  Taylor and Olivia love to talk to Dee Dee about her invisible friend, even going so far as to help make things up about what Nicholas does, lives and even how she looks.

Lucas realized he needed to make up invisible friends to combat Nicholas, Nicholas was just one too many girls in the house for him.  He first decided he wanted to be friends with the firemen down the street... he didn't have a really good grasp on "invisible" at that point. When I wouldn't drop him off for a sleep over at the fire station, Lucas threw a big fit and then he made up Boy.  Boy isn't really well developed in personality, he mostly just wants to go to all the parties that Nicholas has. Occasionally Boy gets a cool toy, but for the most part Boy is only around when Nicholas is mentioned. 

Nicholas lives in a big house and moves around a lot.  Dee Dee lives in a small home, shares a room with her brother and doesn't get to travel past the state line all that often. Not only does Nicholas often live in nice neighborhoods we drive by (usually in a McMansion), but she also sometimes lives in Africa, India and occasionally China.  Lately, Nicholas has been moving farther and farther away... I'm hoping she moves to the moon and stops talking to Dee Dee soon. As it turns out, Nicholas is a little bit evil, sometimes she draws on the walls and signs Dee Dee's name.  Or she encourages Dee Dee to brain her brother with a doll.   Nicholas  is a trouble maker, an instigator and has caused some big arguments in the family. 

For example, a couple of months ago, I'm driving down the road, listening to the radio and I hear some screeching coming from the back seat. Being the awesome mom I am, I turned up the volume to drown out the screeching. Then the screeching turns into arguing and I hear the names, "Boy" and "Nicholas" an awful lot. Realizing that I wouldn't be able to solve the problem by drowning Dee Dee and Lucas out, I turn down the volume of the radio, stare at them in the rear view mirror, swerve into on coming traffic, swerve back, stop staring at them and ask, "what the HELL is going on back there?" At this point I'm regaled with the tearful story from Lucas about how Boy can't go to the Halloween party Nicholas is having that night.  OK, first, this happened in January which makes me wonder what Nicholas' mom is thinking having a Halloween party in January.  Second, my thoughts were... "Seriously, how the hell am I supposed to mediate an argument between invisible, unreasonable people?"  Since the screeching was about to start again I picked a plan that involved me playing along with the whole Nicholas debacle.  I tell Dee Dee she can't be friends with Nicholas anymore if Nicholas isn't going to invite Boy to the party.  I then wonder if that is the most insane thing I have ever said, or if "Don't put your finger in your sister's butt!" edges it out as being a wee bit more crazy. 

That wasn't the first argument Nicholas has caused and it wasn't to be the last or even the best! Just the other day Nicholas turned out to be a huge problem when she turned Boy into a girl... Oh yeah, the one invisible friend gave the other invisible friend a sex change, out of the blue and while we were in the car. That time I deliberately swerved into oncoming traffic.

Sometimes Nicholas likes to cause trouble with the older girls too. After school the girls like to tell me about their day on the way home. In second grade Taylor had a teacher named Mrs. Bohm. At about this point in time Nicholas started going to school and her teacher was named Mrs Bones.  It was amazing, every day Nicholas did all the same things in school that Taylor did during her day. Boy also went to school, but Boy just did all the stuff in school that Lucas did at home. Unless Taylor or Olivia had a really funny story to tell and then both Boy and Nicholas had the same funny story to tell. This would sometimes cause the girls to argue with Dee Dee and Lucas about what Boy and Nicholas did during the day and Dee Dee and Lucas would then have to defend their friends... oh look oncoming traffic.

So at this point I'm thinking of developing some sort of 12 step program for invisible friends... some sort of IFA (invisible friends anon).  The meetings? A planning session for how to ummm... eliminate those pesky personalities.   The twelve steps? For the invisible friend... off a short pier.  Perhaps there could be some sort of "Strangers on a Train" scenario.  One person backs over another child's invisible friend with their mini van,  someone else flushes the other kid's friend down the toilet to sleep with the fishes... all accidental like.  I'm not sure if killing off the invisible is a legal issue or not, but I'm keeping the alleged scenarios general, just in case.   There might be moral issues about killing off nonexistent friends, but its gotta' beat the immorality of driving into oncoming traffic.  Or the health issues involved with keeping your sanity by drinking copious amounts of vodka.   Speaking of which, I seem to be out of vodka... I wonder if Nicholas' mom has been visiting...

Earth Day (picture heavy)

For Earth Day Dee Dee, Lucas and I made our annual pilgrimage to the Denver Botanic Gardens. DBG has hosted a free day to celebrate the Earth for the last few years.  This year the day dawned rather cold, wet and blustery, it looked like we were going to have to spend all of our time in the conservatory just to stay warm and dry.

Since I was worried about the weather we left a little late and stopped by the dollar store to buy umbrellas and magnifying glasses for some extra fun. We didn't arrive at the gardens until about 11AM and at that point the rain cleared up, the sun came out and everyone and their kid arrived at the parking garage at the same time, like some sort of Earth Day miracle.

The gardens were beautiful, it had rained just enough to wash everything clean and leave sparkly drops on all the leaves and flower petals.  The kids enjoyed the puddles and muddy trails that were left behind.   The drops I liked, the playing in the mud and stomping through puddles I could have done without.
Dee Dee and Lucas were a little disappointed about the weather... new umbrellas beg for a good rainstorm. But then Dee Dee pointed out that umbrellas could be used to, "keep the sun off of us!" and everyone was happy.  Dee Dee used hers quite a bit on the trip, Lucas just wanted to swing his around, so he ended up putting it away so I would stop giving him the evil eye. 

It was hard for Lucas to decide if he was a "sthecret sthpy or a sthcientist", he finally decided on scientist rather than secret spy and immediately got to work observing things just like a scientist would.

This year was especially nice because the gardens are hosting sculptures by Henry Moore. I always enjoy when they have art in the gardens... it's like going to an art show without having the stress of taking my kids to an actual "don't touch that, OMG we can't afford that if you break it" art show  Although, in fairness the kids would really have to try to damage some of these sculptures.  I'm not saying they couldn't do it, it would just take a little more effort. 

The Day was fill with flowers, fun and even a little art.   When we left Dee Dee said her favorite part was the umbrellas.  Lucas said his favorite part was parking in the garage.  My favorite part....... well, all of it!

A Frozen Walk by Clear Creek

Whenever we drive my husband to work we always pass this certain stretch of I70 that goes over Clear Creek. On bitterly cold days the water is always steamy and the trees and brush along the banks are covered in frost. This has intrigued me for a couple of years and I finally decided to stop and check it out. Dee Dee, Lucas and I dropped Chris off at work and then on our way back home, stopped and I took these shots before my camera froze up a bit from the cold. The temp that day was something like 23°F. We only walked for a short distance because none of us had gloves (bad mommy) but the scenery was breathtaking. My theory is the water is warmer from being released from the Coors Brewing Company which is just a couple miles up river. I'm sure it has all kinds of environmental implications, but it still made for some pretty pictures.

The 7 days of Halloween.... or something like that.

This year Halloween was a lot of fun and lasted for several crazy days and a couple of insane nights as well!

Every year the big decision is what to be for Halloween. We usually start discussing it a couple of months ahead of time in case they want to be something really intricate. This year was pretty straight forward. We had a vampire, a witch (the mean kind), Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz and a pirate.

Taylor decided she wanted to be a vampire pretty early on, so I whipped up a silky red vampire cape. Having the big stand up collar was an important part of the costume and the only thing she really requested. But she was also pretty happy to wear her fancy red dress since we don't go to a lot of occasions that require wearing a fancy red dress. We made the spiffy necklace out of an old brooch I have and a silver chain we had lying around. She made up lore about the necklace and how it was the reason she could go out in the daytime even though she was a vampire. Its just not Halloween without a little made up lore to go along with your costume!

Taylor practiced this scary stare for a long time, don't look too deeply into her eyes!

Olivia at first wanted to be a pirate, but then she saw a cute Dorothy costume in the Spirit store and decided that would be the ticket. Of course what sold it was for an accessory you could buy a basket complete with Toto. She almost changed her mind when I told her that we weren't getting the Toto basket...I'm not paying 15 dollars for a stuffed rat dog in a tiny little basket! After discussing it she decided she could use one of the animals we had at home and borrow a basket from Diane. I made the dress for her so it would be adjustable and fit over her coat if it was a cold Halloween. (It wasn't)

Dee Dee wanted to be a princess because she is always a princess, but then decided to be a witch... "a Scaywee witch!" So I reworked the dress I made last year for Olivia, bought a new hat and daddy painted her green so she could be a super terrifying witch.

Lucas was the hardest... he wanted to be a fireman, no- a policeman, no -a delivery man, no -a UPS guy. We finally found a pirate hat for cheap and told him he was going to be a pirate. At first he wasn't too sure about it, but he got on board the pirate ship after I bought him a pirate tattoo.... I hope he's always so easy to bribe:)

For the week before Halloween they wore whatever part of their costume that they wanted, but the first day of Halloween was on Oct 25th when we visited the:

Haunted Sorority House...

It was a dark and snowy day in the city of Boulder when the children ascended the steps to the haunted sorority house. Inside they found a chamber or horrors filled with pretty girls, games, crafts and worst of all... CANDY!

Every year the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority house hosts a party for the kids that benefits a local charity. The kids always have a good time and this year was no exception. They had fun winning cupcakes, making bats and hammering golf tees into a pumpkin.

The second chance to dress up and have some Halloween fun occurred on Fri. October 30th. We attended the trick or treat street in Olde Town Arvada. This is one of my favorite events, all the kids are so cute dressed up in costume and the shops always have a lot of candy to hand out to all the ghouls and goblins who are out wandering around in the dark. Its a fun night for the parents, the kids and I think that most of the merchants enjoy it as well.

That same night we went to a Halloween party and enjoyed snacks, games, (including doughnut bobbing)(pirates really are cheaters), a haunted house and participated in a costume contest (we didn't win)

The next day was THE DAY.... Halloween! We went to another trick or treat Street in Denver at Highland's Square and showed off the costumes to friends in the neighborhood. Had we mustered up the stamina we probably could have easily visited a dozen different venues on Saturday. Lucky for the kids Chris and I were pretty much wiped out at that point! So we went home and took the traditional Halloween nap...its an important part of getting ready for Halloween night.

FINALLY we went trick or treating for real in our favorite neighborhood as soon as it got dark. It was a little cloudy, a little creepy and a whole lot of fun was had by all. The kids collected so much candy they complained about carrying their pumpkins and we were out long enough that the kids were begging to go home. At that point Chris felt like he had won a small but important victory in parenting:) It's always nice when you can end a fun evening with the kids being grateful to get in the car and go home.

I think I'm still a little exhausted from all the celebrating and I'm glad it's over but I can't help but wonder what costumes I'll be making next year...