Meow! A Tale of Three Kitties

Our neighbors across the street host an annual Halloween neighborhood block party. Last year, we were moving in that weekend and weren't able to join them. This year, we donned our costumes and headed across the lawns. Our costumes were pretty retro which I loved. I kind of felt like a pinup girl in my Betty Paige hair. Lola will be Tinkerbell for the actual Halloween festivities but she had seen a Dora episode in which Dora dressed as a black kitty for the holiday. She has been asking to be a kitty so we thought it was a great idea to go to the party as a family of black kitty cats.

Lola had a blast with the kids. She especially made friends with one of the neighbor girls Sophie who is about two years older than her. She woke up the next morning talking about going to the party again. Then she would go to the door and look out and ask if Sophie was inside. She only did that about five times, but I can imagine my days may get pretty full of requests to play with Sophie. I'm actually grateful. I've been praying for little girls for Lola to befriend. All her friends here are boys.

We had a good time but I think the most fun was had getting ready. I forgot how fun it was to wear a costume. Ours were simple and retro but you should have seen the other costumes at the party. These people are serious about their costume contest. I better start thinking about next year's costumes.

She's a Foodie

On Friday, I served Lola her lunch. I'm ashamed to say that I gave her SpaghettiOs or Chef Boyardee (I can't recall which) Shapes & Meatballs. She picked at it for a few minutes and then asked for more meatballs. I obliged and gave her the rest of the meatballs and told her she should eat everything, pasta too. Lola sweetly gave her response, "But Mom, they're not very TASty!"

It makes me think about the time we went to Deep Fork Grill, a very nice upscale restaurant here in OKC. We ordered fries for Lola. Their fries come with a white truffle cream. The waiter was attentive to her age and brought a bottle of ketchup for her instead. We requested he bring the truffle cream because I wanted to taste it. At the time, Lola detested ketchup but she was scarfing the truffle cream. When the waiter came back around and noticed he remarked, "Gosh, that kid has great taste. Super expensive, the truffles are locked in the safe; but great taste."

That's my girl!

The Hair Wars Continue

A couple of days ago, Lola kept asking for Raffi all day. I persisted in telling her that Raffi was probably in her bed and she could go get him. Because she was too lazy to go look for herself, she continued to whine about it and because I was trying to be a good mommy and teach her some responsibility, I continued to stick to my line. For the past couple of weeks, she will state that she wants something but can't find it even before she has looked. She just wants me to be her slave, hence my tough stance. Honestly, she thinks I'm being so mean.

Fast forward to late afternoon. I was working on a big project involving time on the computer. Lola was bored and had decided to climb up beside me and comb my hair. As she was jerking the comb through my hair, I kept at my work trying to meet my self-imposed deadline. We were leaving for Stroud soon and I needed to finish the first round of my project, so I suffered through the hair-pulling and her constant repositioning of my head - much like she must endure from me. She went towards the kitchen and came back carrying something underneath her shirt. I thought it may be Raffi. She carries him like that sometimes and often puts him in her shirt as she is going to sleep at night. She climbed back up beside me. Wanting to prove my point that she was very capable of finding Raffi, I asked her what was in her shirt. She refused to answer and started grabbing the comb to go after my hair again. I noticed her being a bit sneaky and again I asked what was in her shirt. With no answer, I turned and faced her and forced her to show me what she was hiding. She pulled out the craft scissors that cousin Christina had bought her for her birthday. She was going to cut my hair!!! And she knew enough to be sneaky. I lectured her about not cutting hair, about only using scissors on paper that mommy approves and about not climbing on things. I had put the scissors in a plastic box, inside a basket, on top of a chest in the laundry room. I have no idea how she actually climbed up to get them or how she even knew where I had put them.

Disaster avoided this time. Battles won in the Hair Wars: Lola - 1, Mommy-1. Please pray for me. You have probably figured out by now that I really need it!

To The Moon & Back

Since Lola was very little I've always said to her, "Lola, I love you to the moon and back and as big as all the stars in the sky."

This morning I woke up and she was laying beside me looking at me. She said, "Mommy, I love you to the moon and back." This was accompanied by the most beautiful grin I've ever seen.

Yes, Lola. You can come crawl in our bed in the wee hours of every night, crowding me to 10 inches of space in that huge king-size bed. It's worth it.

This says it all...

As much as I would like to credit whoever created this, all I know is that he/she is a graphic design senior at Oklahoma State University. Go Pokes!

The Way The Other Half Lives

We live next to Casady School. Behind its iron gates, lies a pretty little pond and a playground that caught Lola's eye. Driving down the road, she exclaimed to us, "I want to play there." Randy explained that we could not play there because it was locked up.

"Why?"
"Because they don't want us in there," he said.
"Why not?"
"Because they don't like to share. They're kind of mean."

At which point, I said, "I'm totally blogging that."

Will The Real Birthday Please Step Forward?

It was a boot scootin' birthday. Lola semi-cooperated with a third birthday photo shoot. During our painful photo opp, she got a phone call from Nana, Poppy, Dana, Dustin & Jaxson. After they finished their round of Happy Birthday, she cried, "Sing it again!" and they obliged.

When asked what she wanted to eat for her birthday lunch, she said, "Pasta!" Like father, like daughter. We went to Spaghetti Warehouse and they arranged for all around us to sing to her. She slid down in her seat and stayed there for about five minutes. We asked her what was wrong, knowing full well she was embarrassed and she told Randy, "I'm shy, Daddy."

After lunch, we went to the Oklahoma City Museum of Art to see the Roman Art Exhibit from the Louvre. It was the last day of the exhibit and since I'm not sure I'll ever make it to Paris, I insisted that we see it. It was extremely fascinating. I mentioned to Randy that I wondered if Paul, the disciples, or even Jesus had looked upon some of the pieces. There were public mosaics and statues that definitely were throughout the Roman empire during that time.

We rushed home from the museum to put chili on for our Sunday night gathering. Our friends brought Lola gifts and lots of love. This little girl has really been celebrated!

To POPS and Beyond

On Saturday we had the most amazing time with MiMi & ProPro! It was the day before Lola's actual birthday and we were in celebratory mode. We met in Arcadia at POPS which is an ultra cool gas station/diner/convenience store which specializes in pop. They have over 500 varieties. As you can tell from the photos above, there's some cool design involved and I think it is a unique experience that you should definitely make happen. I couldn't believe how busy the joint was. We waited outside in the hot sun for about a half hour only to get a seat on the patio. There was a huge yard where Lola played and got considerably muddy. For some reason they didn't have the umbrellas out and we baked while we ate our food but it still tasted great. Lola actually wanted and ate her first cheeseburger. For some reason, this kid has rejected all kinds of sandwiches. Very rarely, you can get her to eat a bit of a grilled cheese. But since POPS, I think we've entered a new era. I had a cheeseburger for lunch a couple of days ago and she grabbed it out of my hand for a couple of bites. Anyhow, back to Saturday's story...

After POPS we headed down the road to the Parkhurst Pumpkin Patch. We waited in line and lamented how this would be the last time Lola would get in somewhere free for being 2 or under. But we quickly turned to excitement again as we headed towards all the animals with our bag of feed. Lola swayed from timid with the animals to aggressively demanding to ride the pony. It amazes me how she can be scared of the mechanical car outside of Walmart but not at all frightened by the pony. However, I was horse crazy as a young girl, so I'm relieved to know there's some of me in her after all. She and ProPro animatedly ran us through the corn maze and she picked up all the hidden pumpkins with arrows and threw them. We tried to stop her and return what we could be she was a girl on a mission. No one will probably find their way through there again! Right at the end she led us out the side instead of finishing because she heard the tractor. She was not about to miss another turn on the hayride. She also had fun in the tire swing and the hammocks, climbing on hay bales, and picking out pumpkins. Lola & I were oblivious (or pretended to be) to the other's mourning for OU's loss to Texas. Eventually, we convinced Lola it was time to leave, load up our pumpkins and part ways with MiMi & ProPro.

As we were pulling out on Route 66, we decided to see if one of our old haunts and favorite BBQ places had ever reopened. Praise the Lord, it had. It was yummy food, but ended up a strange experience since I ran into someone I had went to high school with and not seen in 15+ years - a crazy suprise and a long way from Warner.

We hustled back to The Village and threw a spread together for noshing with the Nemcoks and Eric while we cheered the Oklahoma State Cowboys to victory over Missouri. GO POKES!!! By the time we hit the hay, metaphorically speaking, we had no trouble falling asleep.

Family Time

Last week we had a special treat. Randy's family came to visit. His brother Steven just finished tech school for the Air Force and was home on leave before heading to his new station in Denver. Grandma Carol, Grandpa Wilmer, Kaylie, Steven, Eric, Randy, Lola & I shared dinner, stories, laughs, and hugs. We don't get to see each other nearly enough. Lola had Grandma down in the floor and everywhere else she asked. She made sure to tell Grandma when she could and could not take her picture. Lola also took some photos herself. Several from the show below are her shots. The black & white had some coloring issues but actually turned out to be a great pic of Grandma & Grandpa. We may have a budding photographer on our hands.

I know, I know. I'm queen of the slide shows today. But I need to do some catching up with posting and I want to share these photos with everyone!

2008 Hayride Birthday Bash

I firmly believe in celebrating birthdays. And I absolutely believe in celebrating birthday months. Lola has had two solid weeks of celebration, I think it is waning. But costume and candy fun is around the corner so October definitely won't fizzle out.

We kicked this celebration off with a birthday bash for Ariel, Nicole, and Lola. We needed to do something special since this will be Ariel's 16th birthday; and because all three girls are October babies and getting family together is difficult, we had a triple birthday celebration. After the kids rode the Gator around the front yard, we moved inside for some food. We started out with a HUGE pot of chili, hot dogs, bratwurst, sauerkraut, chips and dips. Then we veered from the usual birthday cake and had brownie cupcakes. Then the girls opened their loot and boy, did they walk away with some treasure. Afterward, Uncle Dustin drove our rather large crew on a hayride where we played games, sang songs, told stories, and blinded people with flashlights and camera flashes. We came back to s'mores and hot apple cider. Randy is an expert s'more maker. He should patent his s'more contraption.

Unfortunately, the slide show above doesn't have any pictures of the actual hayride. Those are on Mom's camera and I neglected to download them. I'm betting most of them were pretty bad since the lighting was obviously atrocious, it being night and all.

I do however want you to pay special attention to this photo:



MeMe: "What are you doing, Linda?"

Mom: "I'm screwing the scarecrow."

Really.

These Are Some GRAND Kids!!!

We recently celebrated all of the girls' birthdays which happen to be in October. I'll post more about that soon. But I wanted to share this slide show of some of the photos we captured during our weekend together. Enjoy!

Hair Wars

Yesterday, I cut Lola's hair. After we got out of the shower I told her we should blow dry her hair and make it pretty for Daddy. She refused a couple of times and finally said, "I don't want to talk about it." So I proceeded to dry my own hair. She walked in and I asked her again to which she replied, "I can do it." So I told her to hold the brush and I would dry her hair, she wasn't going for it and ran out of the bathroom. I shouted, "Lola, please. Let's make your hair pretty for Daddy." Her reply? "No, Mom, I don't want to. PLEASE, don't make me sad," in the most sing-song pleading voice she could muster.