Tonight's project

No, they're not really naked, it just looks that way. It started off as shirts being removed to keep the pumpkin off them, then it just went crazy. Thanks to Uncle S. and Aunt H. for the Halloween stuff! It was very well received. We were supposed to go to the town parade tomorrow am, but with 40 degrees and rain, my new plan is to stay home, snuggle under blankets, and watch the Princess Bride.
Don hit a deer with the old van yesterday. Busted out the front passenger lights and put a pretty good dent in the door. Took out the deer too. But at least Don's okay! Stupid Bambi.

For Melissa

Dorrie the Little Witch is a whole series of books by Patricia Coombs
There are about 20 in all, published from 1962-1992
I've read a couple to Scooby, and they're still great!

I remember that plastic-y mask smell too. You had a princess one, and Steve had a devil. (No irony there, huh?)

Laundry and Halloween

They were actually sleeping! And to think I was wasting that potential nap time by surfing the computer! Oh, well.

Today is catch-up on housework day. Change the sheets, do multiple loads of laundry, sort, fold, and put away, vacuum the stairs (somehow they catch as many dust balls as Don's bellybutton! Sorry, probably too much information...), encourage Scooby to finish his book report book...

And then I have a show tonight. Thursday's went well - Don's friends were late because of traffic, so that stressed him out a little, but I think he enjoyed the show, and it went well. On the way to tonight's show, I'm going to try to stop at Red White and Blue Thrift store and find a white button-up shirt for Scooby's magician costume (the only one he has is the one he wore to Steve and Heather's wedding, so it's a little small!) and a pair of "pedal-pushers" and a gray 1950's suit for myself, for the Christmas show. It's supposed to be a 1950's variety show, and I play the wry, side-kick writer. Kind of like a 50's Tina Fey. I'll also be looking for cats'eye glasses. Mom, you don't still have yours, do you?

So Halloween's coming up fast. As I mentioned, Scooby wants to be a magician, so sometime this week I need get out to Party City and get him a black hat. We've got the cape, pants, bow tie, gloves, and wand already. Even some tricks that he wants to carry around with him and do at EVERY HOUSE. I'm trying to figure out how to discourage that idea, without discouraging HIM. Tarzan wants to be a skeleton, wearing the same skeleton PJ's that Scooby did a couple of years ago. The bones are pretty worn by this time, but he says it looks like someone hit them with a hammer and they crumpled, so he likes them that way. Cinderella wants to be Tinkerbell, and I think I can get her to wear one of the many ballerina type dresses we already have. I told Tarzan I'll paint his face like a skeleton, and Cinderella that I'll paint fairy designs on hers. She wanted to try it out today, but I think we'll wait. We have a neighborhood parade on the 28th, in the morning, then Granny's going to take them to a costume pumpkin patch at her church that afternoon. On the 31st, Scooby has a costume parade at school, and then there's trick-or-treating that night.

What are some of your favorite Halloween costumes/memories? My three most memorable were the years I dressed up as a Dutch doll, and wore the authentic wooden shoes trick-or-treating. (Ouch!) The year I made a "Missing Link" costume out of a cardboard box...not the genetic missing link, the puzzle that was popular the same time as the Rubik's Cube, with the colored links that you'd have to slide into place. While making the costume, I cut out the head hole first, and then tried it on, without thinking to cut the arm-holes first. Of course, I fell flat on my face. And finally, the year I was Snoopy chasing the Red Baron, wearing a ten pound airplane on my shoulders that my Dad made out of an old barrel, and a paper mache mask on my face with limited visibility. I'm lucky I survived the night. I have to say, I was kind of relieved when I grew too old to trick or treat. So how about you all? Any fun memories?

Life update

I'm an Aunt again! Don's sister delivered a baby girl last night, 3 weeks early. She's tiny - 5 lbs. 7 oz., but healthy and cute as a bug. It's always good to pass on good news, I believe.

I have a show at Rock Bottom tonight and Don and a couple of his friends are coming. I hope I don't mess up in front of them! I'm going over right from teaching the 4-7 year olds, so I also hope traffic isn't too bad.

We started rehearsals for It's a Wonderful Life - the musical. They're going really well - although it's a big cast so there will always be people missing from rehearsals up until the show, probably. But the leads are fabulous, and I'm having fun so far.

We discovered during the deluge on Tuesday that our windshield has started leaking again. I got to sit in a wet spot all day. We need to take care of that before it gets too much colder. But it's so hard to be without a car and have to cart around 3 little ones!!

It's suspiciously quiet upstairs right now - either Tarzan and Cinderella are sleeping, or there will be some sort of mess up there when I go check. I've managed to waste the past 20 minutes or so flipping around to different web pages and accomplishing nothing. I'm almost afraid to go look, but I'd better...

Zoos and stuff

Everyone (except Don) had Monday off for Columbus Day, and it was a gorgeous day here, so we decided to go to the zoo! It's been a couple of years since we've gone - I think Scooby way 5 and Tarzan was 2 - Cinderella was just a wee babe in the stroller. Tarzan and Cinderella were apprehensive about seeing lions and tigers before we went. I tried to explain the whole concept of them being in cages, but it didn't seem to be getting through. After we got there, though, they liked it just fine. The tiger came right up to the glass and laid down with his back to us. The daddy lion roared REALLY LOUDLY right before we got up to their enclosure. I thought it was a recording. Shows how dumb and jaded we are! I had no idea a real lion roar was so loud! Tarzan enjoyed the monkey house, although since lots of other people had the idea to go to the zoo on their day off too, it was pretty crowded. And smelly. The bat cave was a big hit, and so was the meerkat tunnel. It was pretty funny - the kids crawl underneath the cage and there's a plastic tube where they can stand up and look at the meerkats right up close. From the parent standpoint, the kids popping up looks just like the meerkats popping up! Then we went to the naked mole-rat crawling tubes and played for awhile (just like the ones in McDonald land, really) Then we ate some hotdogs, and Tarzan and Cinderella went into the 2-5 year old play area while Scooby finished up. About 3 minutes later, I go over to check on them, and Tarzan is gone. I retrace our steps back to the naked mole-rat tubes, and try to find him there. Nothing. Well, lots of other kids, but not him. I get Scooby and ask him to go into the tubes to look for him. It's been about three more minutes now. Not long, really, but long enough for all the news horror stories to flash through my head. But then I turned around and he was at the food counter, talking to two zoo employees. When I ran over to them, he was telling them his brother's name, and that he was 7. After giving me a few dirty looks, the zoo ladies released him to me. I hugged him and asked him where he'd been. He said he'd gone back to the tubes and then couldn't find me, so he found someone that worked there and said he couldn't find his mom. I was so proud of him!!! I hugged him and told him he'd done exactly the right thing. I then told Scooby what he'd done, and as the big brother, he congratulated him too. Scary for a few moments, but nice to know that the lessons have sunk in.
We've been keeping pretty busy here. I've been doing one or two shows per week with the murder mystery group, and preparing a message which I'll be speaking at church this weekend. We've also been trying to locate and destroy a bees nest somewhere outside the attic windows. That involved moving many boxes and vacuuming up lots of dead bees. We then had to bring up all the air conditioners, and Don decided to seal the attic windows with plastic for the winter. That involved moving more boxes, and discussing thoroughly the contents of each one, and did we really need to save all those baby clothes? Don also replaced our kitchen sink faucet, which had rusted completely through and squirted water in every direction when turned on, and the handle to our dishwasher, which broke off the other morning. He's been quite the mister fixit!
We're working on night training with Cinderella. Not a whole lot of success so far. Scooby made a chart for her though, with rewards listed for each level of success. He's getting frustrated that he can't check off boxes on the chart, but no more frustrated than I am with the changing of the sheets every night! Oh well, we're almost there.
Oh, and totally random - one of my new favorite shows is Studio 60. Check it out, if you haven't already. It's funny, smart (although sometimes a little too self-consciously smart) and it deals in a really healthy way with some tension between a Christian character and the rest of the characters. I recommend it. (The show, not necessarily the tension!)
Peace out!