Faces of a snow day

It’s day two of a winter storm. Too bad that it snows sideways here. We never get much accumulation. Oh well, less to shovel!

School was on a two-hour delay on Monday and canceled yesterday and today. The look on the Monkeys’ faces when we delivered the news were priceless. Also, check out the amazing bedhead.

Not sure why Monkey Do is excited about preschool cancellations…I thought you were supposed to like school at this age.

I braced myself for a day of bickering – especially when I got a touch of the flu and spent the day passed out on the couch. Instead, the Monkeys have been caught up in the epic struggle of Pirates vs. Transformers.

The battle has raged for the past 36 hours with no signs of letting up. On several occasions the Monkeys have braved the basement to call in reinforcements. Batman and a few Jedi Knights have joined the fight.

Personally, I’m pulling for the pirates. From what I’ve gathered they are the only thing standing between the peaceful inhabitants of the planet Earth and the evil forces that would destroy the world as we know it.

I like the inside of houses

Ok, so here’s a conversation I had with Monkey See after we dropped the babysitter off.

Monkey See: I wonder what the inside of her house looks like. Can I go in?

Mommy: No, let’s go home.

Monkey See: But I want to go inside everyone’s houses.

Mommy: Then you should grow up and be a Realtor – that’s someone who shows people houses before they decide to buy one.

Monkey See: Ok, when I grow up I want to go in every house in the whole world and I’ll travel to different countries and go in all their houses and I’ll make friends and stay with them in different countries and they will let me inside their houses. I’ll look in their houses and after I looked in all the houses in the whole world I will find one I like then I’ll by it.

Moral of the story: You’ve been fairly warned – get the guest room ready (or blow up mattress, he’s not picky), Monkey See is on his way over!

Fall Break

The monkeys are on fall break, which means I am too! I’ve been working as little as absolutely possible…so fun!

Today we went to Garden of the Gods where the monkeys like to climb the rocks. We got in a lot of knee scrapping and bum sliding and escaped serious bodily harm. Unfortunately I can’t say the same for my camera which started smelling like smoldering plastic. (Scary!) I decided not to take pictures after I discovered where the burning was coming from. But I did capture a few fun ones.

Here’s Monkey Do doing his best to stretch out his shirt:

Some of the rocks we conquered:

Monkey See’s shoes. I get such a kick from the massive amounts of verbiage on the shoes. I mean seriously, they are shoes, for walking and such, not newspapers. But anyway, he just LOVES them (plus they light up).

I’m wishing Monkey Do was completely in focus. But still, love his blue, blue eyes, they are just like his daddy’s.

The camera issue is very concerning. It’s not that old, and really at that, I don’t think a smoldering camera is a sign of a healthy camera at any age. It may need to visit the camera doctor before I snap any new pics. On the bright side (I’m really, really straining to see a bright side of this situation) I may be able to catch up on a few older pics….we’ll see.

Rainbow Magic

We started a tradition of going on dates with the kids. Tonight I went out with Monkey Do. Well, actually we stayed in because every time I do a long run I’m toast for the rest of the day.

Daddy and Monkey See went to Wal Mart (yes, it is the happening-est place in town) and tried on Halloween masks.

Monkey Do and I made rainbows.

It’s just a plate covered in frosting and Skittles. So easy and fun! Plus, Monkey Do was really turning on the charm for the camera!

And – viola – the finished project.

And in case we get the munchies later on – it’s completely edible

Creepy guy in the front yard

It got a little cold this weekend. It’s hard to believe that just a few weeks ago we took a pleasant drive to look at fall leaves. Ok, so Monkey See would say not as pleasant since he experienced his first serious bout with car sickness. But we did have barrels of fun up until we had to pull over every 20 minutes to let him out.

See, here we are standing completely in the way of the fall leaves…

…and here are the actual leaves.

But like I said, this weekend fall was officially over.

Hello, winter!

The cold, mixed with freezing rain did a number on the traction you could get on just about any surface. I slipped on mulch, Joseph slipped in the driveway wearing socks. Crazy!

It also did a number on the creepy guy hanging out in our front yard.

He should have stayed in prison, he’d be much warmer.

So we did the only sensible thing you can do when faced with solid sheets of black ice blanketing every possible surface – we stayed home and watched movies and football. In the process a long-cherished philosophy dating back to my early childhood was destroyed.

My whole life I have believed that every musical, without exception, has a fast-forward song. But I now have faith that it is humanly possible to make a musical so good the remote doesn’t have to be within arms reach.

The Little Mermaid doesn’t have a fast-forward song. It’s amazing! The only potential candidate is “Kiss the Girl.” But it’s so good — the song and the animation — that I’ve never itched for the double arrows on the remote. I don’t think I’ve quantified how amazing this is — incredibly amazing! I truly am living in a whole new world. And wait, I don’t think Aladdin has one either! I’m not sure about Beauty and the Beast, it’s been too long since my last viewing…potentially the opening scene is fast-forward material.

But either way – there were several years of fast-forward free movies coming from the Disney studios. But then they lost their mojo with “Can you Feel the Love Tonight.” So sad.

Let’s move to Texas

Monkey Do keeps coming into me holding pieces from his US state puzzle.

Monkey Do: Let’s move here!

Mom: To Maine? That’s really far from Grandma.

Monkey Do: Oh (frown, he disappears and reappears with a new state). Let’s move to Texas (the only state he can recognize by shape).

Mom: When you’re grown up you can move anywhere you want.

Monkey Do: Let’s move now.

Mom: We can’t, mom and dad don’t have jobs in Texas. How will we buy food?

Monkey Do: We could go to the grocery store. (very matter of fact and a bit exasperated by my apparent ignorance) They have grocery stores in Texas.

Mom: True, but we’d run out of money without jobs. We’re not moving to Texas.

Monkey Do: Well, (big pause, wheels are churning) I have a ton of pennies. Yeah, I have a ton of pennies, some silver, and a token. So, let’s move to Texas.

Birthday Season

In our house we like to do everything at once.  Like birthdays – instead of spreading them around the calendar – we just pack them into 2 fun filled months.  Which means lots and lots of cake.  So much cake that we hardly have time to finish one cake before it’s time to make another one.

Here’s a few fun pics from Monkey Do’s Mickey Mouse themed bday party with friends.

Favorite gift – a stack of dollars bound together like a notepad.  Carried them around for days like this in his back pocket.

Monkey Do declined cake in favor of Mickey Mouse shaped cookies.  We all welcomed the reprieve from cake.

And no party is complete without the frenzied dash for pinata candy.

Can a family of 4 take a nice family photo?

This is a bit of old news, but we went to Rocky Mountain National Park where we were chided by some Texans for not spending every summer up here.  Yeah, sometimes we take this for granted…

We went for a hike around Bear Lake (still in Colorado, this is not the lake you Utah people are thinking about.)

We took a close at the crystal mountain water.

Saw a baby duck and wondered what happened to  its mommy.

Decided ducky was too  lonely and needed a swimming partner.  This resulted in the need for a change of clothes — thank goodness for a very prepared hiking companion who shared both polar fleece and head covering (b/c, as we learned, some insanely high percentage of body heat is lost through the head).

Then we thought we’d try for a family photo.  Try #1 – just half a  monkey head….

Try #2 – A full monkey with a nice smile – not bad, but still down a monkey.

Try #3 – Two full monkeys and almost got it, just need hands down….

Try #4 – Oops, no, we lost the monkeys…oh well!  We tried anyway…

An almost rhyming tribute to the end of summer

Goodbye summer.

Goodbye lazy days in the sun.

Goodbye bumps and bruises on everyone.

Goodbye Popsicles that keep us cool.

Hello preschool!

And bus stops,

friends, teachers, and first grade!

Camp Gowen

A few weeks ago we decided to go camping.  Our first ever Gowen family camp-out adventure.

We slept in a tent that was too small for our family…

Went for a little hike…

Enjoyed the view…

Pretended to be bears…

Burned the hot dogs…

Waded in the stream…

Got in the stream…(guess which monkey got the most wet?)

Drank far too much kool-aid, got really dirty…

And didn’t comb our hair.

All in all a very fun trip…next time though, we definately need a bigger tent!