HalloBEEn 2014

In my younger years I don't ever recall being a fan of Halloween.  I'm not much for dressing up.  However, as an adult I've found that I love it because it means that I'm bombarded with pictures of people's adorable pets and kids.  Plus, hey, free candy!  Somehow this perk never fully resonated with me before- maybe it's the pregnancy?  Having a tiny minion to go out and do the dirty work that I benefit from is definitely something I've learned to get on board with.

Obviously, as with any Holiday, a one-use outfit was required.  As was a pre-7 am photo shoot to evidence the existence and use of said outfit.  What kind of mother would I be without these things?  The answer is probably one with a happier husband, but I digress.  So here is the best we could do with a wiggly toddler pre-school time.

I thought we were going?  You know they have cheerios waiting on me at school, don't you lady?

One smile.  That's all I'll give you.  Then it's seriously cheerio time.

Whoa, whoa.  How did this get here?

In case you were worried Baby B missed the costume boat.  She was a "pu-kin" as Emery kept pointing out.

As you may recall, last year Miss Em was a peacock.  This year we decided to keep things in the animal kingdom but we traded in a feathered tail for a stinger.  How did we select this costume, you may ask?  Mainly because at the time that I ordered the costume Emery was really into telling you what the bee says (bzzz for those of you who don't speak bee).  Since then, as is common with our diva, once she has mastered something she then quickly gets lazy with it.  Nowadays if you ask her what a bee says she will either look at you bored or say something to the effect of "bbbbb".  I suppose you might call her "efficient".

We had quite the jam-packed Halloween schedule of social events.  At 4:30 PM there was a costume parade at Emery's school.  My parents had decided to come out to the house on Halloween evening to get to witness our Queen Bee in her full glory so they decided to meet up early to take in her school parade as well.  Bless the dear souls who teach at her school who changed ALL these children into their costumes and somehow managed to get them to "parade" in some semblance of an organized manner.  Watching them in action made it very apparent to me that my calling in life was definitely color-coding spreadsheets.  I was pretty shocked at how well our little bee stayed with her class and strutted her stinger.

Hey Spiderman.  Want to race?

Just your average bee/lady bug/pig hand holding trio.

Working it.

She was legitimately confused to see people she knew.

Is everyone else decorating their pu-kin?  I was kind of digging just playing with this glue stick.  Yeah?  We're doing this?

Glue stick or ham & cheese sandwich?  Ohhhh, tough call.

 Nonnie and her little bee.

After this parade we headed home, met up with Daddio, and booked it over to a parade in our neighborhood that we had seen signs out for.  We really had absolutely no idea what it was but clearly we were into parades for Halloween.  We showed up and learned that a firetruck and cop car come, turn on their lights and all the kiddos follow them around for a lap of the neighborhood and then go trick or treating afterwards.  Our little insect had the time of her life chasing after lots of dogs, children and essentially anything else that moved while waiting for the firetruck and cop car to show up.  By the time the parade leaders organized themselves, this Mama's feet were the size of tree trunks and Em was rapidly losing interest in being detained in her stroller.  So we all headed home to eat some dinner and hand out candy.

Ryan somehow managed to procure, receive and hide this "Beekeeper" costume until right before we left for the neighborhood parade.  Little did he know it takes more than a costume to wrangle this one.

Checking out the fire truck.  Or some cowboys.  Hard to say which.

All in all, it was an awesome Halloween and I really look forward to doing it with TWO outfitted lovebugs next year.  (Remind me that I said this when I'm sweating before 7 am during our photoshoot).  I hope you all had just as be-witching of a time as we did!

Dewberry Farm with the Martins

Since when has one day of seasonal farm fun ever been sufficient for anyone?  I say never.  So on Saturday October 25th we headed out to Dewberry Farms with the Martin clan (Grandma, Pawpaw M, Aunt Tiff, Cousin Kylie & Joseph) to see what trouble we could get into.

This was the first time Ryan or I had been to Dewberry Farms and I have to say I was fairly impressed.  We got there right when it opened around 10 and it filled up faster than my shopping cart does at Target.  Apparently this place is no secret.  I think approximately 60% of the greater Houston area was there.  Luckily there was so much to see and do that the crowds really weren't an issue.

Unfortunately for documentation purposes, our little nugget was prettttttty worn out from the previous day's activity (hey, herding goats is exhausting guys) and thus wasn't so smiley.  The fact that we saved the main attraction- the pumpkin patch photos- for the end of our stint, which happened to coincide with her nap time, definitely didn't aid in us capturing any fabulous photos.  Ah well, such is life with a toddler, right?  Despite her lack of smile in most of the pictures below, trust me when I say that we all had a wonderful time and would do it again in a heartbeat.

Thanks to Aunt Tiff and Grandma for inviting us- we love you all!

Mom, do you think I can catch it?

Hey.  Quack, quack- over here!

What's up with this gate separating me from chasing this chicken?  I swear today I could catch it.

Pawpaw and Aunt Tiff taking the ladies on a little obstacle course.

Slide, slide slippety sliding with Aunt Tiffany.

Cousin Kylie and her Mama showing us how it's done.

I would say that this succinctly summarizes any and all efforts this day to capture a cute cousin picture.

What's that?  Pu-kins, you say?  Nah, I'm good right here with this lemonade that I stole from my Mama.

I'm obsessed with Kylie Pie's hair.  Perfect amount of natural curl.  So jealz.

This, my friends, is how you frolick.

My child watching the frolicking from a far- death grip on lemonade still firmly in place.  See what we mean by saying she's got the art of managing/supervising down?

Alright Pawpaw.  I'll take a few steps into this sea of pumpkins if it will make you happy.  The buck stops here though.

I'm sorry.  You want me to what now?  Take more pictures?  No.  Put the lemonade down?  Still no.

Different day.  Same lack of success with a family photo attempt.

Joseph, Aunt Tiffany and Kylie showing us up.

Okay Paw paw- take me away.   That's a wrap.

Oil Ranching with the McMarthouses

On Friday October 24th, we decided to continue our grand McMartin tradition** of heading to the Oil Ranch to properly pay homage to the season of pumpkins.  This year the Shannonhouses, Natalie and baby Zan joined us in the festivities making it the McMarthouse + Friends day o' fun.  Also in the grand tradition of McMartin family outings, we left slightly later than anticipated which left us in completely random traffic on 290 which nearly resulted in 2 divorces and much laughter prior to the fun getting started.

By the time we arrived, we were left with only about an hour of time to maximize our family farm fun.  Luckily when you have 5 kids under the age of 4, this is MORE than enough time to completely wear out all parties involved.  Horses were ridden, cows were fed, poor pumpkin photography took place and Ryan probably wound up on a CPS watch list somewhere for bringing our large camera to a children's location.  Basically you could call the day a complete success, as you'll see below.

Thanks to all who organized the event (read: Mama Mel- where would we be without her?!) and all who participated.  I look forward to a three-peat next year!

How adorbs are these little cow-kids-in-training?!  This bodes well for the future compound.

Emery was really excited about the pony... until we got too close to it.  Please note this is the only time our child is cuddly- when she's unsure and/or manipulating.  In this photo she might be multi-tasking.

Jake pointing out some bunnies.  I think.

That smirk only means one thing- she has an idea...

... looks like Jake had the same one.  "You down to terrorize some chickens?  Great, me too.  We have so much in common!"

Seeing how happy they were chasing these poor barnyard animals made the entire day absolutely worth it.

Seriously, is there anything greater than this unfettered excitement from little ones?  Provided they didn't get lucky and catch any chickens, obviously.

Okay... what victims do we have in this area?

Goats?!  Shut up.  They're bigger and faster.  I love a challenge.

Should I dive for one?  I'm thinking about it.

C'mon big Mama- this way for more animal heckling!

Sweet Patrick and his hot Mama.

Jake, Em & Av feeding a cow.  A cow who subsequently huffed hay all over Emery.  Moo moos are soooo funny.

Dad.  Did you see that cow snort hay on me?  Is that how you feel when I spit my full mouth of yogurt all over you?

The other half of the double date we were chaperoning.  I think Patrick was playing hard-to-get.

Mama and her girls just taking a little waddle stroll around the farm.

Hands down this kid nailed most photogenic of the day.  We have about 10 more like this that are equally adorable.

Natalie, baby Zan, Lynda & Patrick showing us how rural modeling is done.

I can't stop laughing at his facial expression.  How could I not post this?  Pumpkins did not impress him.

This is as good as it gets for a family photo with this crew.  Sorry Charlie.

36. Latin for Now's the time to FREAK OUT. The Sequel.

On Monday October 20th I hit the big 3-6.  Weeks of course.  Obviously in years I'm holding strong at the 2-1.  (Here's the same post for Emykins.)

My, oh my, what a whirlwind of activity this 4 week time frame was!  As I alluded to in my last pregnancy update post, right after 32 weeks I think I realized that things were starting to get real and it spurred my behind into action.  We'll get to that though.  First, how was I feeling?  I was feeling tired and generally like smacking people should be considered acceptable (see here), but really in the grand scheme of pregnancy life, that is really nothin'.  I was (and still am) a very, very blessed girl to have had the pregnancy that I have and despite my frequent sarcasm, I certainly realize this.  Oh, also, I was (and again, still am) very tired of almonds and eggs.  Can't wait to get some carbs and/or wine into this belly!

33 weeks.  Obviously I find my own image shocking.

34 weeks.  Look at me straightening my hair!  I must have had a meeting this day.

35 weeks.  Baby girl is looking like a hood ornament.

36 weeks.  Yikes.

Okay, and now for the but-what-do-you-have-to-show-for-it portion of this post.  As I previously discussed, I decided that in lieu of finishing out Baby Bucket's room as originally envisioned for Emery, I was going to try to do a little snazzing up to make it her own.  I thought to myself - well, this room is already painted.  What can I do to make it a little different?  I know- I'll paint a stencil.  Amped up on nesting horomones the Friday right before I hit 33 weeks, I dropped my sweet Princess off at school and set off for Home Depot thinking I would knock out this stencil on my day off.  Ha.  Ha.  Hahahahahahaa.  Anyone who has ever done a stencil is rolling right now and I don't blame you.

By the end of the afternoon I had about 1/2 of 1 wall done.  Out of 4.  I was so engrossed in what I was doing that I asked Ryan to pick Emery up from school which allowed me to get a whopping maybe one more move of the stencil done.  This kicked off a 2 week stint of my stenciling each evening after Emery went to bed, on the weekends during her nap and one more FULL Friday off.  I poured well over 24 hours into this endeavor.  At the end of the day though, I have to say that I am pretty pleased with the result.  I'm sure it's also single-handedly raised the value of our home at least $100k (completely unbiased remark).  Word to the wise- if you're going to tap into your inner stenciling guru, don't choose to do so when you have a basketball-sized belly to hunch over in a month when you also have 57 hours of CPE to complete.  

This is definitely not a progress shot after day 1.  This is probably more like after day 41.

After the stencil was finally finito, we were able to schedule delivery of Bucket's furniture and things really started coming together.  Shortly thereafter Nonnie the resident Queen Seamstress finished her bedding and curtains which look FABULOUS.  If only I had inherited some type of talent in this arena!  I also finished spray painting some bird cages, painting the letters for above her crib, etc.  

Not pictured: the pink bumper ties.  You get the idea though.  Three cheers for Nonnie!

When it's officially finished (read: there are things on the walls) I'll do a Baby B's room post.  Fingers crossed this happens prior to her arrival.

I also managed to transfer Emery's clothes from her old closet into her new closet AND to do LOTS and LOTS and LOTS of laundry so that I could fill baby Bucket's closet.  Phew.  Just reading all that makes me exhausted.  Basically by the time we hit 36 weeks, if our newest lady bug had decided to pull an Amy and make a 4 week early appearance, we would have survived it.  We didn't have every single item on our list crossed off, but we definitely could have managed.  

Small mountains of pink laundry is my new life's work.

I am outrageously thankful for all the items we collectively got checked off the to-do list during this chunk o' time.  It has definitely helped to keep this mama's blood pressure stable.  Now that things are mostly done we just need the most important element of this equation- our sweet bebe!  Annnnny day now Princess, annnnny day.  :c)