Halloween is my favorite

OH MY GOD I LOVE HALLOWEEN.

I am drunk, have had TONS of candy, and have eaten a pound (conservative estimate) of yesterday's buffalo chicken dip in addition to leftover pizza from our party yesterday and delicious party food from the twin party our friends had today.  Calories are not a thing on Halloween.  I mean, duh.

She decided to beat the cold by layering her beloved "purple dress" over the monkey suit that used to be Harry's, creating a human Build-a-Bear effect.

 Also, she and Cooper ate candy today starting at like 8 when they loaded up the trick or treat bowl.

 OMG CANDY and Bailey's

 Skeleton and monkey ready to roll

 They were just so cute ringing doorbells.

 So many adorable kids

 And then they came home to see their sweet little cousin.

 Halloween 2015:  pretty awesome  Cooper kept stopping tonight saying "Mommy, I just love trick or treating so much."  I totally feel the same way.

Trunk or Treat

The Facebook assures me that I have spent many October 30ths making dumb foods to take to the kids' classes, and this one was certainly no exception:

 These two dressed up for school this morning, only Dorothy had to bring her costume to put on at school because she starts her day on the playground.  Cooper, though, thinks he looks really scary in this costume, but really he looks snuggly.

 Dorothy has been waiting to be a purple ballerina forEVER, and TODAY WAS THE DAY!  She was also delighted to see her brothers in the costumes she knew they'd be FINALLY wearing.

 You guys.  This hat.  I thought it was just going to be a normal witch hat, but then it arrived in a fridge box, and I realized it was HUGE.  It was basically the sorting hat from Harry Potter.

 Shaggy.

 Maybe I should wear it to the beach.  SHADE FOR DAYS.

 Shaggy and the Wicked Witch of the East

 We had a pre-party before our school's annual trunk or treat event, and Jack cracked me up in just about every kid shot.

 We came home and put the kids to bed and grappled with the leftovers.

 The delicious, delicious leftovers.

Phoning it in

Like, literally. I am in bed, dressed in workout gear, dreading my 4:52 alarm. 

I just could not get my work done before this second. Ugh. And I have so much to do tomorrow morning and we are always late on Friday morning anyway. Gah. 

Ok, seriously. This is her yesterday:

She KILLS me and she's always talking. And she's always very serious about what she's saying. 

Cooper's first night of hockey. 

My view from my workout dungeon this morning

Salami and wine

Today I broke my no-drinking-on-weekdays rule AND I ate a bunch of salami because FUCK,

Okay, first of all, remember how yesterday I was all "Oh I need to go to sleep?"  WELL, Dorothy could not fall asleep until 11:30 because she took a nap yesterday.  You guys, the nap is officially DEAD TO US.  Cooper happily napped for 2 hours and then scampered off to bed at 7.  And then he woke up at 5 and woke up the boys by jumping in Harry's bed, and everyone had been a crabby asshole all day.  There is no more napping.  I will not get another nap until Dorothy goes to kindergarten.  This is terrible news.  Also, Dorothy and Cooper were SO TIRED ALL DAY.

Second, I had to take Dorothy, Cooper, and Harry to the doctor for Harry today, and it was terrible.  SO TERRIBLE.  There was much waiting in an 8X8 box while Dorothy and Cooper battled over a gallon Ziploc bag of Halloween crafts and Harry shredded the paper on the exam table and banged his feet against the metal table legs so hard I had to bite my tongue to keep from snapping at him.  I ended up talking to the doctor (and her resident because OF COURSE) while sitting on the floor with Cooper on my lap and Dorothy trying to sit on my shoulder like a parrot.  At one point, Dorothy could not tear her washi tape where she wanted to, and she let out an ear splitting scream and did a death drop into tantrum position face down on the filthy floor.  "She's recently stopping napping," i explained as she hit Cooper in the mouth with her Paw Patrol garbage truck.  (That poor resident will probably never have kids and not just because she ignored the ticking of her biological clock to go to med school.  Kidding. Not about the not having kids part).

Third, we went to the doctor because schools suck and we finally decided to try meds for Harry's ADHD.  It just seems like lately, Harry is spending all of his time using the skills he has learned during the past 2 years of cognitive behavior therapy, and he's having less and less success with his friends.  He's doing OK academically, but the social piece is starting to suck for him, and we're worried about co-morbidities like self esteem issues.  But still.  He had an awesome summer, and it's gross that the formal structure of school affects him adversely.  I kind of hate school and am considering homeschool as the next plan of attack.  But!  He has to exist in society eventually.  So.  ADHD meds.  I feel so conflicted because everyday I see thousands of anti-ADHD diagnosis articles on Facebook and in the popular press, and it's true that part of me hates that schools want kids to be tranquilized zombie test taking monkeys.  The resident asked if Harrison has trouble sitting still and I was like well, I mean, we don't like him to have be in situations where sitting still is the expectation, BUT WHY DO FUCKING SCHOOLS?  Anyway, I get that he is having trouble with friends on sports teams, at home on play dates, and in class, and all the ADHD books say kids need to affected in 3 different environments for it to really be ADHD (and he's been evaluated in lots of different ways over the past 4 years), and I understand it's not his school's fault exactly that he's having trouble, but I have some issues with the way the structures he encounters everyday affect his life.  This is a thing we're trying, a new tool in the box.  But yuck.

If you add all these things up, you obviously get wine and salami, am I right?

Looooong day. Real long. Making me rethink this no drinking on week days thing.

This day has been INTERMINABLE.

Ben had a conference today, and I was home the whooooooole day, from 5:45 am when he left until 6:15 when he got home just in time for me to take Jack to Cub Scouts.  Usually, I try to shirk Cub Scout duty, but NOT TODAY.  I am happily sitting at a table in a community room at the local police station enjoying super fast city wi-fi and getting ready to read my book.  Aaaaah.

Rocking the holiday socks again:

 These two started their day off right with some after-breakfast Play-Doh

 And spelling homework.

 Dorothy and Cooper and I went to Michaels, ostensibly for Halloween party supplies, but all we bought was paint supplies and cupcake pan liners.  FAIL.  But painting killed a good hour until lunch, giving me time to vacuum, do laundry, make banana muffins, etc.

 After school, the big boys joined in on the painting fun to paint pumpkins.

 I pretty much love them.

 Tomorrow, I have bonus office hours while the babies are at preschool, because my students have a paper coming in on Thursday.  Then Harry has a doctor's appointment to which I have to bring both little kids.  Then Cooper and Harry both have hockey.  Thursday, Ben an I have to do Halloween party shopping.  Friday, I am bringing non food treats to preschool and healthy Halloween snacks to 4th grade and 2nd grade.  Then, we are hosting  party and the school has a trunk-or-treat event.  Not to mention teaching and being buried under a million research papers.  Gah!  The Halloween spirit around here, though, makes it easy to be enthusiastic.  These kids are SO EXCITED to wear their costumes-- Halloween is like the best day ever to be a little kid.

Sleep tight

Ben texted me this picture of a napping (at 4:30 in the afternoon) Dorothy, and it was so sweet:

Also annoying because she told me very seriously that she did not want to take a nap after lunch, and I am so sick of dealing wit the nap drama and then the corresponding bedtime drama that I was all OK dude.  Just give me 15 minutes to clean up the kitchen and go play quietly.  She did, and I did, and she and Cooper entertained themselves while I got dressed for work.  But then Harry and Jack came home and needed help with homework, etc, and the wheels fell off the no-nap bus.  Luckily for me, right when things get crazy on Monday, Ben comes home and tags me out, and I skip off to work.

Tonight, though, I stayed late to attend a lecture, and I just got home and ate what I swear for real this time is going to be my last salami sandwich ever since the WHO was pretty clear about the dangers of delicious, delicious processed meats.  And since it was my last ever, I had American cheese, mustard, and tortilla chips on it-- the world's perfect sandwich.  And now I have to go pack lunches and go to sleep.  I am SO TIRED because yesterday at Target, I realized that I had not had lunch (THAT NEVER HAPPENS TO ME) (DO YOU THINK THAT'S WHY I WAS CRABBY?) yet, and it was like 2:30.  So I ordered a pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks because I have not had one yet this season because they are also toxic swill.  And I forgot to order it decaf (you know, since I haven't had caffeine since the day before Cooper was born).  I didn't realize my mistake until halfway through the store/drink. Last night, I fell asleep reading around 10:45 like usual, and I bolted awake at 11:40 totally refreshed and ready to start my day.  It took FOREVER to go back to sleep.

So, I will just say that Cooper's class playdate was super fun.  Including mine, we had 7 kids running around making pumpkin crafts and playing with all of the things.

Crabby crabby crabby crabby crabby

I had the shittiest, crabbiest day today.  It totally took me by surprise, too, because we slept in until 7:30 (yes.  yes that is sleeping in.  yes, that sure does suck, huh?), had a nice breakfast and a pleasant morning.  Ben took Jack to hockey with Dorothy tagging along, and the other 2 kids played happily while I cleaned bedrooms and bathrooms in record time and was pretty excited because I had big plans to shop for a class playdate we're hosting for Cooper tomorrow  and let the kids spend their Halloween Target gift cards from Ben's parents and carve pumpkins and go grocery shopping and throw together a crockpot soup.  I even thought that I would send an emails to my friends asking for cleaning lady recommendations because it would be much easier to make it through the hockey season with a once (or maybe even twice depending on how good she is) a week cleaning person because our weekends are going to fill up.  This is a big admission for me because I genuinely like to clean my damn house my damn self, and we have tried a lot of different cleaning services and have basically hated them but it would be so nice not to have to clean all weekend (even though cleaning is my zen).  But then Ben came home in a shitty mood, which pissed me off because I was anti-hockey practice today but I played along and was a really good sport about it.  And then I got in a funk and have not really been able to climb out.  I HATE that.  When I know I am being a bitch but just can't help myself.  And then the whole rest of this beautiful day was crabby.

I am a sucker for a kid in hockey gear.

 He snagged this sucker out of a kitchen cabinet I was cleaning out and disappeared.  He played so well in his room today and didn't even mind that the bog boys wanted basically nothing to do with him.

 Beatrix wanted to come out front and watch the pumpkin carving happen.

 Dorothy decided she'd rather draw on hers.  Also, she is into rain boots even when it's not raining.

 Jack looked through this carving book forEVER, but in the end, he just chose between circle, square, or triangle features like usual.

 Harry wore holiday slipper socks all day long.  Because he is Buddy the Elf.

 That's the happiest face I could muster.

 They didn't even mind being elbow deep in guts. (I, however, did).

 Mine's the frown-y one, obvs.

ETA:  The final pics from today FINALLY uploaded.  I have been having trouble with my Phot app on my computer syncing with my phone over wi-fi, and there isn't a pattern to the malfunctions, and it's driving me nuts.  Ugh.

The kids and I are reading this book which was a childhood favorite of mine and of my mom's and they LOVE it!!

 I think I over-bought for a playdate craft.

See, you guys?!  I am so crabby that uploading these two pics was really important to me, but WHY??  I need to go to bed and wake up in a better mood.  Fingers crossed.

Wicked reprise

Jack has been jealous that I took Harry to see Wicked in 2013 SINCE 2013.  So, when the show came back to town, I knew we had to see it.  AND TODAY WAS THE BIG DAY.

(So, I have seen Wicked 3 times-- once before I was pregnant with harry-- about exactly 10 years today, once with Harry in 2013, and once today.  I gotta say, Ana Gasteyer was the best Elphaba I have seen, but Carrie St. Louis, today's Glinda, was my fave, even though she was a caricature.  And today's Fiero was the least good  Yeesh.  But the staging this time was great-- awesome dancing.  Oh!  And the wizard and Madame Morrible were both excellent.)

We headed downtown for lunch at Noodles (Jack wanted to go somewhere he likes) and stopped on our way from the parking garage to the restaurant at a huge candy store where we spent $18 on $2/pound candy.  Erm.  I guess we bought a lot of candy?

We had a leisurely, chatty lunch (buff bowls at Noddles are AMAZING) and then walked a few quick blocks to Jamba Juice, which might be Jack's favorite place in the universe.  We made it to the theater early, with plenty of time to find our seats (dead center which was awesome, mezzanine level which was meh) and position our candy bags so as not to be rude during the show (I chewed SO MUCH GUM).

Jack LOVED the play. He was totally adorable and transfixed and leapt to his to give a standing ovation at the end.

Winter is coming. Gulp.

 Winter is coming, you guys.

I mean, it was still warm enough for me to take a walk and let my hair dry on the way to volunteer in Jack's class (as you can tell from that line, I looked AWESOME today.  It will probably come as no surprise that I wore my exercise clothes all day long), but the little kids had to really bundle up to go to the park.

Spidey could barely see around his face mask to climb up the jungle gym.

 It was so cold that Dorothy took off her sparkly pink crown headband to wear a hat, even.

 Cutest moment of the day:  SHE READ A BOOK TO BEATRIX.  (Dorothy's class has book time evreyday where they sit on the blue rug and have silent reading time while their teacher sets the snack table, and now Dorothy;s favorite thing to do is read books by telling us all about the pictures.  She uses "And then" as a transition between pages; she always starts with "Once upon a time" and ends with a definite "The end.")

 The boys and I capped off our day with Goosebumps.  It totally sucked, but the theater is all leather recliners instead of shitty movie seats, so there's that.