Girl on the go

Still thankful...

Last week, Tess' child care class put on a little Thanksgiving play.

Tess and Miss. Dawn

Happy Thankgiving!

Meena's party

On November 5, we had a little surprise party for Meena's 60th birthday. We had to be careful not to let the cat out of the bag, especially with all of the "preparations" that we had going on here at our house. Basically, there were about 457 old pictures of Meena floating around here, being blown up, cut up or glued in one way or another. On the morning of Meena's birthday, I let Tess talk to Meena just long enough for her to say "Happy Birthday!" before tearing the phone away before she could say anything else.

Mini-Meena

Meena's friends awaiting her arrival...

She was pretty surprised!

Happy Birthday, Kadie!

Tess' BFF, Kadie, turns 5 today!  Happy Birthday, sweet girl! 

Today was Kadie's Alice in Wonderland un-birthday party.  Stay tuned for more pictures of all the fun!

Basketball, the movies, and Willie Horton?

Last week, Tess started basketball at the Y.  This is our first basketball go-round.  I signed up to be a parent volunteer... and when I got to the parent meeting, I found Tess' name on the roster for Coach Tillman's team. Um, that's me?  Sweet.  Now what to do?  I am coaching 4 and 5 year old boys and girls... make that 7 boys (5 of  which I have personally diagnosed with ADHD) and two angelic girls, one being Tess (of course).  I also have an assistant coach... a dad who thinks he's The Man because he helped out last year.  Oh, and also probably because he is helping "a mom" coach basketball.  Yes, this may be what goes down next Monday at practice. (click the text to see what I mean)

What really matters though is that Tess looked damn good for her first day of practice.  Yes, I said damn because this is basketball, dammit, and we mean business.

Practice ended up going really well, so much that Tess even wanted to go back the next night - which means a lot if you know how well Tess and soccer got along.

Today, we went to the movies - Nora's very first movie, in fact.

 No, Nora is not loving this hug from her big sister.

Little did we know that we picked the absolute best day ever to go to the movie theater.  It was family day at the Birmingham Palladium and we got in free.  And they had free popcorn, free cupcakes, free hot dogs and free drinks!  Did I mention that we didn't pay a dime?!  AND Paws, Roary (the Lions' mascot) and Hooper (the Pistons' mascot) were there (and Little Caesar too, but does he count?).  Of course, the girls wouldn't get anywhere near them for a photo op.  But Tess did go stand next to Willie Horton to get her picture taken!  So cool!

Tess' first school picture

Preschool 2011

Our Shepherd Lutheran School

The Halloween Marathon

Why does it seem that Halloween gets longer and longer each year?  Not that I am complaining, but back-in-the-day, Halloween just consisted of a party at school followed by trick-or-treating, right?  Now, by the time trick-or-treating comes around, we're lucky if the costumes are still clean and in one piece after the many festivities leading up to the big day.

This year, our Halloween weekend was filled with lots of fun events including some major heart-stopping drama, which we'll get to below...

The weekend started with gifts in the mail from Uncle Mark!  Cool Halloween books and great Halloween cards made by Mark himself.  Thanks Uncle Mark!

Next, Grandma Muriel and Papa Art came for the weekend so that they could be here for all the fun!  They came along for swimming lessons, followed by our annual neighborhood Halloween parade.

Getting ready for the neighborhood parade

Tess with her preschool friend, Kaitlyn

Tess, Abby and Kaitlyn

 

Part of the high school band leading the parade

Later in the day, we went to Zoo Boo!

(No, Gus didn't go to Zoo Boo, but he was ready in case we made the call to the bull pen.)

So it was after Zoo Boo that all hell broke loose.  Shortly after we got home, Nora fell down our basement stairs.  Yes, that is what I said.  Please don't make me say it ever again.  I'll spare everyone the description of what it sounded like and how bloody the scene was, but it was bad.  We raced her to the ER (still in her Wonder Woman costume) and she had to have a CT scan and get a lot of stitches, both internally and on the surface.  Thankfully, she is fine.  We are so lucky.  Though I am still trying to determine whether I am fine after the ordeal.  Oh my.

My poor baby.

On a side note, do you see her snaggle tooth there on the top right?  We recently learned that she has an extra tooth in her head, which is pretty rare.  This girl is just full of surprises.

The next morning, Uncle Michael and I ran in a Halloween race in downtown Plymouth.  The girls and Gus came to watch (along with both sets of Papas and Grandmas!)

Oh, my poor baby! 

And now, FINALLY, we have arrived at HALLOWEEN!

Other highlights (and low lights) of the weekend included going to the Our Shepherd Fall Festival, Nora losing her beloved "baby" (blanket) in downtown Plymouth - which almost completely put me over the edge into nervous breakdown-land as it happened within the same 12 hour window as the stairs incident, but luckily Dad and Grandma Muriel found it on the sidewalk in Plymouth some four hours later (can you say miracle?!?),  AND going to Baby Ellen's first birthday party (to which we almost didn't make it because of the whole stairs/losing baby/mom's almost nervous breakdown debacle).  And there you have it!