drum roll, please...

And the winner of the Monkey Pics giveaway is:

NIKKO!

So I'll be sending your little goody sometime this week. 

(I was kinda hoping you'd win, just so that I could send you the sweatshirt that your little cutie has probably outgrown by now....)

October Fest(s)

Not the Octoberfest, but here is an accounting for all of the Autumnal Festing that we did this year....

The Annual Trip to the Pumpkin Patch

We went with Chick's preschool class.  Moose wasn't very happy, but otherwise it was fun.  Cold but pretty day.

Misc

I made spiders for Chick to take to preschool.  The bodies are peanut butter & honey candy with pretzel legs and raisin eyes.

Halloween Parties

Chick was BoPeep, Monkey was a sheep, and Moose was a wolf in sheep's clothing (enough animals there to really get confused, but I think I typed it right....). 

The first party was a carnival at our church, with trunk-or-treating in the parking lot.  Then the next week we went to my sister's church party, as well as the trick-or-treating in the historic downtown of her city.  The most exciting part about going to that was the costume contest.  The girls got to go up on the stage of the theater with all of the other kids, and then we WON!  First prize for ages 0-4 went to "The Bo Peep Family" (there were about 30 little kids)

My nephew won for the adults.  He deserved it--seriously awesome samurai costume made from Duct tape!



Supergirl. 
Looks like an ordinary costume, but completely homemade. 
Even the boots were cut and painted
(they were originally black rubber boots)



I disapprove of facepainting at Halloween parties
(usually conflicts with the costume, you know)
but Chick got the butterfly at the end.



Professor Trelawney, Divination.



 

Monkey Pics

I've had a rough* week so far, but there have been some good moments. (*I initially wrote rough in all caps, but thought of all the people that I know who have REAL problems and hardships, and mine pale in comparison...so I had to change it to lowercase.  So that's good news.)

One of the good moments yesterday: while Chick was at preschool I ran a couple of errands.  I finished early and didn't know what to do with the time (not really enough to go home), so I took advantage of the nice weather and the GORGEOUS leaves outside of our church and did a photoshoot with Monkey.  Moose stayed sleeping in the car (despite me turning up the music so that Monkey would be comfortable & dancy), so I got a few minutes with just Monk.  We both had a good time.

Here are the results:

1

 2

 3

 4

 5

 6

 7

8

 9

 10

Leave a comment telling me your favorite and I'll pick a winner and send a little goodie! (why, no, I'm not above bribing for comments)

UPDATE: I forgot, the end date will be Thursday, 11-11-10 (the date that Washington became a state).

At the Butterfly Garden in Victoria



photo taken by Chick : )



Victoria

I'm back.  Did you miss me?  I've been busy.  I'll have pictures about the random stuff that I've been busy with...but today is Victoria.  Time to catch up, since I've been back from vacation for, oh, 2 months!

Anyhow, we loved Victoria.

I loved the architecture and general style of the city.  Truly beautiful and charming.

Chick's favorite was the castle.  She asked to see it everytime we went out for a drive.

We loved the fisherman's wharf, which was literally next door to our condo. 

We ate there a couple of times, and loved seeing the seals.  The girls loved the playground.  And they loved dancing to the street musician.  He was equally entertained by them, and gave Chick a free cd of his music.

We loved Beacon Hill Park & the Beacon Hill Drive-In (we ate there a couple of times too).  We went to the petting zoo, the playground (a couple of times.  This trip featured LOTS of playgrounds), and saw part of "The Last Starfighter" there (part of the B Movie Series.  I don't know how my Dad feels about one of his favorite movies being classified as "B"...).

We giggled at the "goatee club"

and TRIED to get a good family picture in the awesome tree. 

[Note to self: don't trust random little girls who wander by and SAY that they took the picture and that it turned out well.  Only the self timer ones will turn out, and 10 seconds ISN'T long enough to climb the tree]

We took a lot of walks. 

Around the inner harbor, where we admired the street performers.

around the beautiful Empress Hotel

and around the touristy spots...because we were tourists. [I took this picture of HH on our honeymoon (the last time that I was in Canada, 7 years ago).  He was equally as cooperative then as now.]

And because we have kids with naptimes, etc etc etc, we spent a fair amount of time in the apartment ("appointment" as Chick called it). 
I watched as much HGTV as I could get away with. 
We marvelled at all of the commercial products being the same but different (for example: "FibreOne" instead of "FiberOne"). 
HH read a short story by Mark Twain to me...not sure of the title but it's about BlueJays.  My favorite line, that I made him repeat several times because I love to hear him say it (and read to me in general):
"You think a cat can swear? Well, a cat can."

We enjoyed our view.  Day...

and night. 

We were right next to where the hydroplanes take off & land.  They were noisy if we had the door open, but pretty fun to watch.

We enjoyed our 9th story deck

our barbecued kebabs

the pool

and our living room textiles (I really loved the combination).

And I don't have any pictures of it, I totally loved going to the local Value Village!  Seriously, if the trip there wasn't so expensive, I'd totally go for a daytrip.  It was a huge store with nice stuff and great prices!  And I got to go all.by.myself.  The only downside was that it was timed parking so I had to just breeze through.  But that's where I got the souvenier t-shirts and a teacup set for me.

The End.  (but not really because we also went to the Butterfly Garden and I have so many pictures to share that it'll need it's own post.)