Lots of Treats for Tigger and Pooh

HAPPY HALLOWEENIt is the second Halloween we have had kids to dress up and BOY IS IT FUN! Especially when you get to pick their costumes.
We have been reading a lot of Pooh Bear and so it is fitting to have sweet pea and little sprout dress up as someone they have come to love.

Sweet Pea is Pooh Bear

Little Sprout is Tigger

and Baby butterfly is in disguise as a Hot Pepper. I couldn't find a baby piglet costume, pooh!

They have been pulling their costumes out of their closet for the past month hugging , holding their costumes for story time, and getting them out while they play. We have had four occasions to wear Pooh,Tigger,and Hot pepper.

The first was at our church harvest party. I forgot my camera for the occasion, Darn It!!

All of the kids got to play games and earn candy prizes. pumpkin bowling, cake walk....at the end the received a pumpkin flashlight symbolizing Jesus as light of the world.

Next was down town trick or treating. The shops in our town open for the evening and give out candy to all of the kids dressed up. It is a packed event!Usually we stand in the long line wrapping through the main shops.

This time we took the back route and hit shops on the side streets. We kept moving for an hour collecting candy. Pooh and Tigger were eating it the whole time!

To kick off the weekend we went to the cider mill for a club event for my Mother of Multiples group. It was a blast seeing twins of all ages in their costumes, Two dragons, two bumble bees.... too cute!!
We decorated haunted houses with stickers, took a wagon ride, picked pumpkins, and ate cider and donuts.


Last but not least on Halloween,we had our friends come over for some trick or treating around the neighborhood.

We stopped at our neighbors houses collecting yummy candy in our spider candy bags.
Tigger and Pooh picked out some play dough cups from one nice neighbor.

Only Tigger picked out some GARLIC offered at one house to ward off vampires of course! Pooh passed on the garlic.

It was a night of FUN for all! Perhaps we can use all of this candy as a motivation for potty training ??? Just a thought!!

Brown Sugar, Sesame Oil, and Toothpaste

Your kids sure do teach you things. Two things I have learned which are now big red flags if they ever happen: If it is too quiet or there is hysterical laughter check it out immediately!!!!!

Here is how I learned my lessons...By the way, there are not many pictures, I was too mad at the time to snap any of the messes!!!

What would you do with a 3 pound bag of brown sugar at your disposal? Me ? I like to put a couple of teaspoons on my oatmeal and then put the bag away.

Now if you are two and one half years old, you have other uses for brown sugar, especially if your mom is nursing your baby sister.

Oh yes, this was just the case not long ago. The morning had gone oh so well with our little crew. I was just finishing nursing our baby butterfly when I hear hysterical laughing coming from the pantry area.

Sweet pea & little sprout had been playing so well together for ten to fifteen minutes, "wow" I thought, "they are really having fun together"! The laughter only became louder and more gleeful with each passing moment. HMMM, better check this out......

Well, good thing but I was a little too late. There the whole bag of brown sugar was, removed from the pantry drawer and dumped out on the floor.

That would not have been too bad. The thing is, these two little munchkins had taken the brown sugar and had been throwing it and eating it by the handfuls!!

It was EVERYWHERE. In hair, stuck on hands, clothes, down the air vent, all over the floor....... I had them stand in the end of the mud hall while I broomed it all up. Then marched them outside to the hose and sprayed them off. One sticky mess!!

Sesame seed oil, hmmm I use it to cook with for special recipes, it is after all SUPER EXPENSIVE!!

Well now if you are two and one half years old you have other ideas. Never mind that it is set up high on the counter top and unopened, just get a chair out and access that pretty amber liquid. Mrs. Busy bee was gone for three minutes tops setting up toys for individual play time on blankets.

When I came back in the kitchen, I was perplexed. What was that puddle on my kitchen table? Why was it dripping on the floor? Wait, are you kidding me??? There are puddles all over my floor!! Oh, no the toasted sesame seed oil, the bottle is EMPTY!! Arrrghhhh!!!!!

Two smiling,giggling, little lambs looked up at me as I stood there in utter disbelief. I need this oil to make scarecrows birthday dinner! He is due home in thirty minutes! I still have to make the salad, salmon and broiled asparagus. My hair is in a pony tail and I have yoga pants on, I still need to change my clothes and freshen up my makeup!!!

That is when the fury kicked in. How can I accomplish all of this in the time I have left? I had just spent thirty minutes before this comforting little sprout who came down from his two hour nap crying.

Finally I had detected , as he would not tell me with words what the problem was, a diaper half on his tushie and soaking wet pajamas. I had changed him, rocked him, sang him songs and now THIS.!!

Oh I don't ever recall being so furious in my life. They were going to get it! At this point I realized I needed to chill. So, one was sent to sit on the time out bench and one sent to sit on top of their potty chair in the bathroom. I cleaned up the mess amid many tears and expletives. Blanket time ensued and I was off making the birthday dinner.

O.K. good, five minutes to spare, the asparagus was broiling. I am off to change and freshen up (with sweet pea and little sprout in tow as I cannot trust them as far as I can throw them!!). I take my time applying eyeliner, mascara, perfume....is that SMOKE I smell? What in the heck??

Oh no, the asparagus in the broiler!!!! I rush downstairs to find my kitchen filled with smoke and one minute later all of the fire alarms go off! The noise is deafening. Sweet pea and little sprout are scarred spitless, covering their ears, crying, cowering... Can this get any worse? I was about to laugh at the craziness of it all when sweet pea slips on the kitchen floor she helped oil. Much crying ensued. Just at that time, scarecrow walked in the door to his smoke filled house, fire alarms blaring, slippery kitchen floor, crying children.... At least I got the hair, makeup, clothes change done and his dinner ready!!

Now for the toothpaste. Yes, this just happened yesterday, great timing for this post I guess, that is the positive spin on it!

Sweet pea and little sprout woke from their nap as I was nursing their little sister. I heard their door open and some talking, laughing. I expected them to come downstairs where I was as is the usual fashion.

It got quiet after two minutes. UH OH! I took off upstairs to find out where they were, probably playing in their room for a little bit? Oh how wrong I was. They had headed to our room.

As I walked into the master bath I found them. A little too late mind you. In just under two minutes they had emptied a tube of toothpaste and spread it all over the floor, their hair, faces, hands, pajamas, vanity (including into the grooves cut out in the wood), and vacuum that happened to be in the bathroom.

Oh, did I mention it is WHITENING toothpaste, yeah, bleaching out the wood on our NEW cherry vanity was a grave concern!!!!!! I grabbed for the nearest towel, wet it down and got to work scrubbing toothpaste off everything. The two culprits had to sit with their hands full of toothpaste folded in their lap and watch. Thirty minutes later, job done. No bleach marks on the floor or vanity. Boy were they lucky!!

So remember if it is too quiet or there is hysterical laughter take off running, something is likely amiss!!

KIDS SAY THE DARNDEST THINGS....

SO, as you know scarecrow and I have two 2 1/2 year olds. It is like he says "imagine having a toddler who has a friend over every single day!!!" That sums it up.

Some days it is mayhem and fighting. Other days they are the best of friends. I sometimes have to separate them at nap time into different rooms so that they will sleep and not play. More recently since the addition of our baby butterfly I have had to separate them in the morning, errr shall we say middle of the night. See, the little butterfly cries and wakes one of the twins, they then turn on their bedroom light whether it is 2 am or 5am. Lo and behold I find them awake jumping off the nightstands or wrestling on the floor. I brought sweet pea into our bedroom and had her sleep on the floor at the foot of our bed until the "sun came up". As soon as she saw little sprout it was "hi" and hugs, like they had not seen one another in days rather only 1 1/2 hours. Oh we need a noise machine in a bad way!

Now mind you I do not understand all that they say. Yes, they have conversations with each other at times and I am just left in the dark. They however prattle on, understanding one another completely!! It is nice once in a while when I cannot get what one is saying, just ask the other one and they will help interpret.

One rule in our house is no gum until you are three years old. Nana brought a sucker with gum in the middle. I read the wrapper as she was eating her sucker. Nana quickly explained the gum was in the center of the sucker and sweet pea says "I cant see it" she chomped that sucker so fast it would make your head spin and shouted out "I see it" when she got to the gum! I did let her have this one, yep she swallowed the gum.

Little sprout is also obsessed with the gum he cannot have. He climbed up on his kid size chair and said "I bigger now, gum?" We were in hysterics. Sweat pea wondered if it would work, hey what the heck, if I can get some gum out of it.... so she did the same thing.

Oh let me not forget to mention, just 3 days ago at nana and papas house, the little dears raided nanas purse and went through a whole PACK of gum. I found them in the living room on the floor with her purse contents sprawled out, each had 4-6 pieces of gum in their mouths chewing frantically. I did gather a messy pink gob from each of their mouths, before anyone tried to swallow and choke, whew!

We have of course been enjoying fall. Little sprout has noticed the trees changing colors and declared "God painted those trees", yes He did indeed!!

We do enjoy meals at our house together, often it is scarecrow and I talking over the two little ones noise. But last week the two wee ones had a very cute conversation, keep in mind we have just ended a remodeling project (upcoming post) ongoing for two years and their daddy has been doing a lot of work on the house. Little sprout " This is mine house, this is sissys house" Sweet pea "yeah, it pretty" Little sprout "daddy fix it".

Other times the conversations that I over hear make me chuckle as one tries to get the other to do something. Another rule in our house is you do not get out of bed at bedtime. It seem sweet pea is not so sweet at times but quite crafty in getting things done. She routinely asks her brother when they are in bed, with the lights out, to get out of bed and open the shades, turn the light on, get her a book (which is out in the hall way!) or a toy ( in the toy box in their room with a lid so heavy they usually cannot lift it!). He often complies and then gets in trouble. Just the first lesson of many that girls can be trouble!

Cholate and carbs what could be better?

I have a family favorite recipe that my mom made

for my sister and I while growing up. It involves

chocolate and bread, two of my favorite things. It is

a recipe that my mom made every fall, chocolate

zucchini bread. I remember having a thick warm

slice for breakfast with a pat of butter on it.

A great way to use up the abundance of zucchini

we get from the garden at the end of the season

Perfect for those cool fall mornings, if it lasts in your house that long

MAKE THIS YUMMY BREAD, YOU AND YOURS WILL LOVE IT!!

CHOCOLATE ZUCCHINI BREAD:






3 EGGS 3 TSP VANILLA 3 CUPS FLOUR 2 CUPS SUGAR




1/2 CUP NUTS 1 CUP OIL 2 CUPS GRATED ZUCCHINI (PEALED)




1 TSP SALT 3 TSP CINNAMON 1 TSP BAKING SODA




2-4 Tbsp COCOA POWDER 1 BAG OF CHOCOLATE CHIPS 1/2 CUP MARASCHINO CHERRIES

Mix all ingredients together, fill two loaf pans and bake at 325 for one hour. Enjoy!

Summer, no wait it's fall

Oh summer, it is now gone. We enjoyed our last day of summer at the pool.

Okay, the kiddie pool that is. Well it is not actually ours it is our cousins who generously lent it to us for the summer while they were up at the cottage on lake Huron.

It hit 89 sunny hot degrees. I just changed out summer clothes for fall/winter clothes so the hot fleece pajamas had to come off, down to the diapers, out to the pool, YEAH. My girlfriend and I turned on the sprinkler and everyone enjoyed the water and the pool!!

It gave fighting, screaming toddlers something to enjoy and us moms a chance to chat and chill.

Oh, of course, the very next day it was fall and the weather showed it. Brrrr, a cool evening. So cool in fact that we made a fire in our fire pit and sat outside for dessert bundled up in our coats and of course our beloved rain boots.

Mrs. Busy Bee had a much needed glass of merlot while scarecrow tended a toasty inviting fire.

With the cool weather kicking in we had a hankering for apples and cider. We took a trip to the cider mill. Sweet pea & little sprout were giddy about riding behind the tractor. They loved picking apples off of the tree and eating them. YUM! We saw farm animals and tried our best ot get our mugs in the cutouts, we'll do better next year when we are taller! Dinner that night was donuts hot off the press and cider!! OHHHH I can still taste them.

Baby butterfly slept the entire time in the carrier attached to scarecrow. We were able to pick four varities of apples and have enjoyed making applesauce together.

Mrs. busy bee will tackle making the apple pie when she is not so BUSY! We are enjoying eating our 17 pounds of apples in the meantime.