November 6, 2011

• I love the fall/winter season so much, I tend to get camera-happy ... so once again, a lot of photos!

  The last week of October brought Zachary's school jog-a-thon, where he ran 29 laps in 30 minutes. Only one other 2nd grader in his class beat him ... that kid was SO fast! I was seriously impressed! I took Friday afternoon off to volunteer at the jog-a-thon fund raiser, and then headed to Calie's preschool for their annual Harvest Festival. The kids dressed up and visited stations set up in the playground to play carnival games and make crafts.

  

  

  In the evening, Melissa and I took the kids to 'Night of 1000 Pumpkins'. The kids trick-or-treated in Old Town, and we had dinner at Chicago Fire. After dusk, we walked down the street to see all the carved jack-o-lanterns glowing in the dark.

   

   

  Saturday, Zachary had soccer game #8 ... the team lost, but Zachary scored his first goal! There was a big cluster of boys, but Zachary used his spinning skills and avoidance of eye contact to confuse everyone, move the ball to the side, and kick it into the goal between the goalie's legs.  After the game, we had lunch at Red Robin, his favorite restaurant.

  

  In the afternoon, I took Calie to FallFest in Old Town. We visited vendor booths. Calie got her face painted, bowled, and jumped in a bounce house.

  

  For dinner, we hosted a playdate with Alex and Nicole. I love the new Whole Foods, which opened this week. We grilled organic grass-fed filet mignon, tequila lime shrimp, and beer bratwurst for dinner. Sam found a recipe online, and baked broccoli with garlic (SO much better than steamed!) Dessert was a variety pack from Icing on the Cupcake. Good thing Sam and I jogged before dinner ... because that cancels out about uh, a bite of a cupcake, right?

  

  At night, I met up with Karen, Karen's mom, and Rachel at Color Me Mine to paint pottery.  They had a Midnight Madness event, where for $10, we could paint from 8pm to midnight. There were drinks and snacks set out, and games throughout the night. All pottery pieces were 25%, and I won a $10 gift card!

   

  I decided on painting a Christmas Sleigh, which I'll make into a candy holder for my desk at work. (Hm. Potentially dangerous since I have weak willpower. Perhaps I will make it a cough drop holder instead.)

   

  Sunday, we took the kids to a local 1 mile fun run. It was a free run, with the kids getting t-shirts, goodie bags, and snacks. However, it was rather disorganized - the kids had to loop around a field twice, and then go through a gate to complete the race. Zach got lost, which ruined his time. I think we're going to stick with official 5ks in the future. When we got home, the batteries for the kids new car were charged. So the kids washed the car and took it for a spin around the neighborhood. Thanks Ed and Lori for handing this down to us - the kids love it!

   

  In the afternoon, James and I took the kids to Disney on Ice. We won "Rock Star" suite tickets at work, which meant we got to sit on padded chairs with counter space to eat our overpriced popcorn (made less overpriced by sharing with our suitemates and taking advantage of the unlimited free refills ... 3x.) The kids were riveted. They loved the show, which included old favorites like Snow White and Peter Pan, as well as the recent ones, Tiana and Tangled. I thought the Lion King story was done especially well. The suite this year was front and center - Hurrah!

  

  Also this week, Zach got an award for his paper on diversity -  although I have to admit everyone got an award due to lack of entries! (Note: It was pajamas day at school. I fully admit to being a slacker parent, but I do make sure my kids are changed out of pajamas before driving them to school. At least most of the time.)

   

  On Halloween (Monday), Zachary's soccer friends John and Zihou came over for dinner before heading out to Trick-or-Treat together. I remembered our first year in this home and how long it took to go up and down our street with Zachary. Not anymore. He and his friends ran to all the houses in our neighborhood and then made their way into John's neighborhood. Two hours straight ... we didn't get home until after 9pm.

  

  Calie only went to a few houses, but Zach agreed to pool their candy together. They kept the M&Ms and Skittles - all other candies went to work with me/James. We had a lot of leftover candy. Partially because our house is after a turn to a busy street, but I think the real reason was our miserable rotting pumpkins. We had carved them too early and combined with the unseasonably warm weather, they were flat out decomposing. People probably associated crappy pumpkins with expired candy. (NOT true - we handed out a very respectable 2 fun size candy bars, purchased *this* month at Costco!)

  

  Wednesday, my college friend Paolo was on my campus for a meeting (his office is usually in Massachusetts), so we went out for lunch. Indian buffet - just like old times! Thursday, Zach's soccer team had their end-of-year party. The trophies literally came in the day before - whew! We kept it simple and just had a family pizza dinner at Mountain Mikes. The Coach spoke about each player and handed out trophies and certificates. I said a few words about the coach and gave him a card (plus a gift card) signed by the team. We still have 2 more games, but this date worked best - every single player was able to make it! I closed out the team finances this year at 40 cents under budget.

    

   

  Friday, we had Zachary's parent/teacher conference. She pretty much said what we knew already - no issues at all academically, but has trouble following social cues and challenges authority. She suggested we find ways to help him (i.e. have him parrot back what we asked him) instead using my more direct (infraction = discipline) approach. I'm definitely open to trying it, as the stern consequences are very tiring and aren't working as quickly as I want.

  After work, Kathy, Melissa, Dana, and I celebrated Sandy's 40th birthday at The Kitchen!

  

  It was probably my least favorite menu (not a fan of swordfish and the lamb was very fatty), but the company could not be beat! Plus, they had raw oysters and Sandy got to go up "on stage" to help Randall cook. No one from our group had ever been called up before, and Sandy made sure it was a good show - It was the biggest fire I (and from the look on his face maybe also Randall) had ever seen! Dana loved the soup and got *4* servings, as well as *3* servings of their homemade ice cream. Impressive! Happy 40th Birthday Sandy!

    

    

  Saturday, it was freezing cold during Zachary's 9th soccer game. They were ahead until the last quarter, when the other team scored 3 goals to win the game. (No that photo is not out of chronological order - I bought it for $5 after Halloween. And it comes with a hat and wand too!)

   

  After the game, Zachary went to teammate Christian's house for a playdate before coming home for a photo shoot playdate. My friend Tabitha's husband loves photography, and I offered my family as subjects if he ever wanted to practice. To my elation, they took me up on the offer! Sherry, Tabitha, and their families came over ... I served pesto tortellini, grilled garlic butter shrimp, and Korean barbecue marinated chicken for lunch. We pulled out a bunch of dress up clothes and took a gazillion photos. Calie absolutely loved it - she would get changed and run out to the backdrop announcing "Your best model is here!" So many expressions and poses! We ended up with over 500 photos - which I will post later in a separate entry. No doubt we have our holiday card photo in this stash. James is so happy that we won't have to go to Picture People to get family photos this year. Thank you Jigme! Calie loved playing with Evie, so we will have to invite them over again for a future playdate soon.

  

  In the evening, we went to Jessica's 7th birthday party. What a fun event - the kids decorated their own chef's hat and apron, and made mini pizzas for dinner. They also played musical chairs and 'draw-the-peperoni-on-the-pizza' (which seemed quite risky because it involved blindfolding a child and giving him/her a marker.)

  

  The best part was that instead of typical kids' party fare, the adults had homemade Chinese food. Beef noodle soup was the perfect dinner for a rainy evening. Happy 7th Birthday Jessica!

  

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