Blast. Off!,,

Waiting in line

At the crayola factory

To make our own crayons. It was prett fun, but with the school break and below freezing temps, there were soooo many other people there, it was cuh-razy

Did anyone order ham?

because the monkey is serving it up...

“I have 100 wiggles...”

“...and I got most of them out, but I only 4 left”

Getting ready for thanksgiving

Monkey: “I’d like to color each placemat for our guests before they arrive.”

Or “the customers”as she keeps calling them. 

Wearing some hand me downs from my cool cousin

and looking like she’s off to paint in her art studio in Maui or something...

“And who are you going to send this picture to?”

Nerf gun battle

She is prepared...

Happy Halloween

Cutest ladybug!

The Pluto controversy continued

Monkey: “Dada, did you call the scientists and yell at them about Pluto?”
Chris: “I called but they didn't answer.”
Monkey: “why not”
Chris: “maybe they didn’t want to get yelled at.”
Monkey: “we should write them a letter and put a yelly thing in there...’DEAR SCIENTISTS. PLUTO IS A PLANET!!!’”

Rainy Sunday afternoons

Chris: “what should we do today? We can color, play games...”
Monkey: “okay”
Chris: “watch football”
Monkey: “uh, that’s your thing”

Some “words” from our pre-schooler

Monkey: “dada, can I tell you a plan. And you tell only mama and nana.

Chris: “sure, what is the plan?”

Monkey: “get the phone numbers of all scientists and yell at them. Tell them I said Pluto is a planet.”

——————————

Monkey: “mama, did you know I go to school in Tinton Falls?”

Me: “I did know that.”

Monkey: “and in the winter it will be called Tinton winter. And in the spring it will be Tinton spring. And in summer it will be Tinton summer. Then it will start over again with Tinton Falls.”

And another

Scary bat pumpkin

Getting into the spirit

of Halloween with a bejeweled pumpkin

Because that’s how we roll...

It’s bed time for everyone

Including her bath toys. Their blanket is a wet wash cloth of course.

New hair cut

Same attitude

Though it’s in a braid so I guess you can’t see the cut

Fall festivals all around!

Seriously. We live around farms so they're everywhere!

Our "yoga" mats

Have to be folded up and be next to each other.

Her "yoga" mat is one of her old baby blankets of course.

Johnny Appleseed

Wearing a pot on her head I guess?

Gotta have a sword for a walk in the woods

Sad little monkey who stubbed her toe

retro 80s style...side pony tail and fluffy skirt

Doing some chalk art on a beautiful day

Things the monkey says before going to sleep

me: I love you. Have good dreams
Monkey: I love ya and I hardly knew ya

First day of pre-K

Monkey at the door

She approves of the new color

Look at what the monkey and I made!

You know it's a good cupcake when this happens

Where's the best place to relax and read a story?

Not one of our many beds, or one of our many couches, or even one of our many chairs...

Petting zoo at school

She tries to tell us that it's more fun at home - but I do not believe that for a second...

Sometimes the second time works better

Our first trip to the shore this year didn't turn out so well.  It was the first real hot day of the summer, we got a late start and ended up sitting in traffic for probably over 90 minutes.  For about a 10 mile drive.  Crazy.

This time around, we left around 7:30, got our breakfast for the ride over, hit zero traffic, and there were barely any "bennys" to be seen.

The waves weren't too big...

The monkey turned into a mermaid:

And we had a very faint view of NYC in the distance:

Night time

I forgot why I thought this would be a funny picture...

Ham bone

Look what I found...

After going on a treasure hunt.  A golf ball with Dopey on it!!  Thought Granddad would appreciate that.

The poses are what Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles would do, apparently.

Before and after master bedroom and bath

Again...orange bedroom...WHAT???  The bathroom was fine, yellow again, but just in terrible shape.  And my dear, dear husband took the time to paint over the awful, oak vanity.  We'll have to deal with the sink at another time.  It's also awful, and chipped and stained all over, but a little more costly and time consuming than we want to commit to right now.

Master bedroom before:

And after Chris spent like 40 hours painting all 13 walls and all the trim:

Master bathroom before:

And after.  One of the first rooms he painted and I couldn't be happier with both rooms!

I'll have to get the before and after for the "mother-in-law" suite at another time.  I have not taken any "after" pictures yet. It's an awesome transformation so I'll have to post it soon...

Before and after...first floor bedrooms and bathroom

The two bedrooms on the first floor were actually a nice color blue and the bathroom was a great color, but the walls were just in such bad shape.  The bedrooms were definitely all Americana decor...the middle picture below is the Monkey's room and the third/bottom one is Sonya's room.

We painted the bathroom a very similar color, we happened to have a sample and it looked good.  We did paint the Monkey's room a green at first, but I never liked it so we painted it the pink below.  Sonya's room is another type of taupe/grey.  No memory of the name of course...

Before and after TV room

This was their living room.  Yellow, which we found GALLONS of in the basement.

So everything that was yellow, we painted Smokey Taupe.  And we took out the french doors into the dining room, moved the TV to another wall.  Other than that, we'll probably just paint the trim white at some point.