Almost November

Happy Halloween and All Saints' Day! I am just winding down from eating a bunch of Ezra's candy. No not a bunch. Just a couple of those little mini chocolate bars. Yes we went trick or treating. He never did manage to say "trick or treat" but he did say thank you very well. We went to about 12 houses, and got some pretty good loot. Two houses were giving out whole candy bars! I can feel a pimple on my chin forming. We went out with a group of kids and adults, including kids Usiah, Ruby, Maya and Marcel (and Ezra) and a slew of parents and friends. There's a video of the get together post tricking and treating at the end. Just so you know the lay out.
The above photos were taken on Friday on the way to Ezra's day care Halloween Party. He was wearing a gorilla jacket with monster hat. I didn't want to deal with carrying him on the bus in his big butted bear suit, along with the cupcakes I made and the jug of apple cider. He had a fun party, and my cupcakes were a hit.

Here's some random pictures of Ezra sucking on a lemon (note the cute cat sticker on hand), putting it in the cup, reaching for the camera:



Back to Halloween. So we had a little get together and I think Tom might have had the best costume, as a cowgirl: (He borrowed a purse and some lip gloss from me)

And the moment you've all been waiting for: Ezra in his costume! An unhappy little bear drinking juice with chocolate on his chin: (That's Usiah with the red and blue hat)

Look at those hips! Freaking adorable. I think he's coming down from a sugar high in this one.

And here's the brief video of our Halloween get together. We see Cayce, Maya, Megan the Unicorn and Ezra the globe spinning bear:

We're going to try to check out an All Saint's Day parade tomorrow. Hopefully more photos soon!
Happy Day Light Savings!

Quietly Reading, Pillow Mayhem

I need to go to sleep!

Ezra recently got his very own toddler bed! It is very exciting, and he is really fond of it. Today he just laid in it singing to himself (and pulling that quilt off the wall) for like half an hour. I didn't realize until I saw this picture how much red we have everywhere. By the by, the quilt is from Honduras, it was given to me at my baby shower by my co-workers at the school. It was made in a village that is only accessible by basket over a river. So there.

So, as I might have mentioned he had his first gymnastics class this past weekend, Gym Dandies. It's for 18-30 month kiddos, and it was pretty much a free for all the first class. Those kids aren't listening to instruction! We did some fun parachute play and two of the 12 kids ran under it (not including my bunny boy). Ezra was more interested once we put some balls on top of the parachute and did some "popcorn" action. There was a balance beam that he wasn't too interested in, but we've got 8 more sessions so I expect him to master that and the uneven bars.

It's baby social hour basically. Here Ezra and neighbor Ruby (who has the exact same birthday as Ezra) play on the mats.

They had the pink and blue, girl and boy thing going on. Ezra looks pretty big next to the petite Roo Roo.

Bare feet are happy feet! (What's with the frown?)

Ezra got bucked off the whale squishy toy.

Huge nobby ball, sorry other kids, none of you get to play with this one. Ezra and his runny nose have claimed it.

He's getting to be a really fast runner!

The only real beef that I have about the class is that it's only a half hour long and there's another class immediately afterwards so we have to vacate the gym pretty quick. They don't want to leave. Luckily this past Saturday was sunny and warmish, so we were able to channel the play energy to the playground outside.

Here Ezra shows off his new hat, while looking super pale and very gringo.

He's going down big, curvy slides by himself now. It was hard to know when I was no longer needed. I see parents of children older than him still crawling around play structures, but I accept that it is not necessary. Although I'm not just going to talk on my cell phone the whole time either like some people. That seems very rude to me. There was one dad at the park with his daughter (who had a "pretend" cell phone too) and he was jabbering the whole time. Then when he was finally off the phone she was taking "too long" to come down the slide and he told her that she was "dirt in the wheels of progress". I wanted to smack him! This daughter was like 4 still with a pacifier in her mouth. I don't need to say anymore, do I? Not that I'm the best mom either, but you know what I'm saying.

Teeter totter down.

And up.

Somebody got into the Halloween candy stash of Butterfingers (me).

Ewwww! But look at the French on his hat! Gifted from Cayce, so nice.

And finally a little video of Ezra and Dovie eating yogurt like it's juice.
Dovie hung out with us almost all day today, which was pretty fun. She doesn't like playing with Ezra as much as he would like her too (the first girl to resist his charms!) but overall they managed some sort of "play". You will see what I mean about her lack of fondness when he is trying desperately to sit next to her. Oh my little sweetness.
Enjoy!

An Excerpt from an Email to Grandpa

Sorry, no photos, but I was writing an email to grandpa earlier and realized that maybe some of you my faithful readers would be interested in these little tid bits about the darling boy too! If not, just wait, more photos soon...

(context: discussing Halloween)
Ezra already really likes to hang out on other people's porches, so I fear the trick or treating will send him over the edge. He not only gets to trespass all night, but knock and receive candy. He will never stay on the side walk again!

He's doing very well, he has a little cough with phlegm but is otherwise healthy. He is really into reading right now, and we spend at least an hour every night reading his books. His favorites include the Dog Book you gave him last Christmas (although now rather than being interested in the dogs he's interested in Elmo, ugh), The Runaway Bunny, a book that Marla gave him that's in English and Spanish about a cat and a dog and their adventures, Goodnight Moon, Jamberry (a poetic book about picking berries, quickberry quackberry pick me a blackberry, etc.) and a number of others. Oh and there's an alphabet book and he loves the Yak best. He flips through all the other letters to get to the Yak. I will have to take him to the Himalayas to see the yaks there. I like yaks too.

He's also learned all the people's names at his daycare (MJ, Max, Ella, Bella, Sammy, Jacob, Veda) as well as Kate, Usiah, and our cat Back Pack. He's learned to unzip his zipper which is making it hard to keep him adequately dressed. He finally likes pancakes, especially with sliced apples inside. His all time favorite is still rice and beans. He ate it yesterday for dinner and today, and when he was taking a bath there were little bubbles from his nether region. His latest words are trees, owl, and choo choo (for trains). He is obsessed with trains. His obsession with Big Bird has ended, and now he's really into Elmo (he can say Elmo). He's saying please and thank you now too. Oh and he learned to jump! He sort of did a somersault a few weeks ago too.

I signed him up for a gymnastics class that starts this Sunday. I have been having him balance on the brick wall by our house to gear up for the balance beam portion. Hopefully we can perfect his somersault as well. It should be a fun thing for us to do together at least.

Pumpkies

Tonight we carved our pumpkins! Pictured you see three of the four (Ezra wasn't done with his yet). My pumpkin is the biggest one on the bottom, Usiah's is the glowy one next to mine, and Kate's is the moon face above. Ezra's is now done, and I'll take a picture of all of them (perhaps with people in costume!) soon.

With flash, exposing the pants less man!
He does like to be free.

Here's some videos of the boys being silly willies.

We are Alive!

Hello so sorry for the delay! We have been scooting all around these past weeks, and not only that but my first term of four classes has begun. Chinese Literature and Theory is the hardest, Latino Popular Culture is the easiest, History of Native Americans is the most sobering, and Social Psychology is the one that I can't decide if it's legit or a bunch of crap. Can you really study people like that? Hmmm... anyways, back to our adventures. In the above photo you see Ezra scaling the rather large hill that he had just attempted to slide down on a piece of card board. We were hanging out on this hill waiting for the Swifts to arrive. Swifts are birds that migrate through Portland, and every September you can see then funneling into a huge chimney across town. It's pretty exciting. Here's more info if you're interested. So the following shots are of us entertaining ourselves while the birds had their last insects before calling it a night.

Tom, Usiah and Ezra at the bottom of the hill. It didn't really work to slide down on the cardboard, but they found other things to do with it...

Like make a Usiah burrito!

Usiah is unsure if he really needs his other shoe. Kate insists.

Ezra and Usiah think we have come to watch the women work out. Actually I think they just really wanted to pull on the bungy cord excersise thingys.

The birds are coming!

Ezra is pretty freaking stoked. Kate laughs. Usiah waves.

I brought some oreos, they were a hit.

Ezra likes the oreo himself. Mr. Black Lips.

* * *

Ok, on to the next adventure. This past weekend we went to Eugene to visit Rachel, my old neighbor and co-worker while I was living in Honduras. We went down with Koali, another previous co-worker. The teacher who took over my class and bought my motorcycle was there too, Sam, so it was a funny little reunion of folks. Lots of folks. Beyond those mentioned there were about eight to ten more people who coincidentally visited Rachel last weekend too. Meaning a full full full full full house. It was fun, don't get me wrong, but it's tricky navigating a toddler through a house of sleeping 22 year olds at 7 Am after they all went out to the ho down the night before. I'm not 22 anymore, it's official! I was so overwhelmed I forgot to drink water the whole weekend and now feel kinda sick. Acutally I have this weird rash too. Little red dots on my belly and upper chest. So! On to the photos from our trip...

We were supposed to be going to the Saturday Market but we got side tracked by this amazing play ground. In the above photo Ezra pumps some water, assisted by Rachel.

There was a little town that Ezra loved, complete with city hall, market, hotel, and school. It was called Fronteir Village and it reminded me of all the assimilation techniques used by the U.S. government in dealing with Native Americans. Fun stuff!

Eating with Rachel (vegetarians).

In the stage coach that had some sweet hydraulics.

This was the thing that caught our eye. A double layer play structure! Can you find Ezra?

Ezra was caught deficating in the park and was sentenced to jail.

But he escaped!

He got pretty dirty. You know what that means, he was having a ball.

Parting Eugene shot of Sam and Trevor (Rachel's boyfriend) on the bicycle built for two. It was pretty adorable.

* * *
Here are some random videos from the past weeks:

They love pulling Kate off the couch.

They love to dance with records on their heads.

Ok, I promise to (try) to post again sooner!
Take care.