A Halloween Post (that's not about Halloween)

Of course it's not, because in order for the post on Halloween to be about Halloween, I would have to be up to date with my blogging. Which we all know is just not the case. At least this post is about events that happened in the month of October.

Or, as I have renamed it, the month that Sarah was wrong about everything. Allow me to explain.

1) I stated with authority that the San Francisco Giants would not make it to the World Series. Wrong.

2) My dad and I took Ethan to the zoo, sure of the fact that he would love the animals. Wrong. The morning was spent deflecting shouts of, "No [insert animal name here]! Bye bye, [seriously, insert ANY animal name here]!" He did love the petting zoo, so technically I was only half wrong.

3) I thought that Ethan would get a kick out of the planes during Fleet Week. Super wrong. He was terrified. Thankfully, Ethan did get a kick out of splashing in the frigid waters of the Pacific while Ryan and my dad watched the air show, which distracted him from crying every time a plane zoomed and sonic boomed overhead.


Despite being full of failed predictions, October was a really great month! My dad came to visit for a week, and stayed with us for the first time. Ethan was able to wake up to his Pa-Pa every morning and see him until the minute he went to bed. As usual when we have visitors in town, we packed the week full of activities. One of my favorites was a trip to the pumpkin patch. As my long time readers may remember, I've been waiting years for Ethan to be old enough to enjoy Halloween. From dressing him up when he was itty bitty, to taking him to a pumpkin patch when he wasn't even old enough to sit up on his own, and the trick or treating plans that were ruined by a nasty bout of H1N1, Halloween has always been filled with good intentions, most of which just didn't work out for us.

I don't want to jinx it, but this year may be different. The pumpkin patch trip started us off on the right foot. Ethan had a blast "splashing" in a pool full of beans
and running through the hay mazes and tunnels.



Ethan picked his own costume this year, and we're going trick or treating for the first time ever tonight. If we're lucky, all will go well and Ethan will have a fantastic time. If you're lucky, I'll have fodder for another post about Halloween mishaps. No matter how it shakes down, it's kind of a win-win situation.

And unlike the over/under on the Giants winning the World Series, I like those odds.

A Lot of Catching Up

Wow. It's been over a month since my last post. Bad blogger. Bad! Can a super cute photo of the boy put me back your good graces?


Excellent. Now that we're pals again, let's get to the catching up part of this post!

You may notice that Ethan is sporting a new, shorter 'do. We took him for his first cut since the hair pulling incident. We've been waiting for the hair to grow back enough to justify a trip to the salon. He hasn't pulled any hair since back in April, and I *think* we're in the clear and successfully broke the habit. Whew!

My new job has me out of the door before Ethan wakes up, and home about an hour before he goes to bed. Well, that is if I put him to bed on time... I've been letting him stay up past his bedtime quite frequently to steal a bit more time with him at night. It's made our weekend time together so precious, and we've been trying to have as many adventures as we can.

One recent adventure was taking Ethan camping for the first time. We went with our amazing friends, the Hokes, who had their little one in tow as well. After setting up camp we took a hike in the woods with the kiddos and the pups. Ethan loved running around in the woods playing with sticks and rocks and dirt and bugs. Though we intended to have him sleep in a tent on his own, we ended up setting up the Pack 'n Play in the back of the SUV due to 1) lots and lots of bedtime protest in a crowded campground, and 2) the fact that it was much warmer and safer in the car than it was in the tent.

The windows were cracked, don't worry.

All in all, it was a pretty fantastic and successful experiment! Exhausting and dirt-caked, but successful!

Another exciting event was Ryan's recent gallery exhibition. He showed pieces from his Tasteful Torment series to a crowd of more than 500 art enthusiasts! It was such a great night, and a wonderful opportunity to catch up with some friends that we haven't seen in way too long. You can read an interview about him and his work here, and check out the full series on his website here.

Coming up this week is a visit from Ethan's Pa-Pa. We've planned a lot of activities, which includes hitting Fleet Week in San Francisco, going to a pumpkin patch, and taking Ethan to the zoo. I'm off from work for the duration of my dad's visit, and am so excited that I'll get to join in on all of the weekday fun!

Now if I can just remember to post about the aforementioned adventures in a timely fashion...