Our Son Has Watched Too Much 'The Walking Dead'

'The Walking Dead' is one of Nicholas and my favorite shows.  I'm not normally into that sort of thing but for some reason, when Season 1 was on Episode 3, someone told me how much they loved the show even though they aren't into zombies.  I decided to give it a try.  Season 1, Episode 1 and I was hooked.  After I watched the entire season (which was only 6 episodes), I convinced Nick to watch it.  I rewatched it with him and we've been obsessed ever since.  (We're also now loving 'Fear The Walking Dead').

They say children are sponges and they mimick what they see.  Well maybe Jaxon has seen too much 'The Walking Dead' because he's obsessed with trying to eat our faces and even more obsessed with trying to eat Vino.  She just has to walk by him and he reaches out for her, mouth open wide.

While taking their Halloween photos, (two different days) he was at it again.  He tried for Yadi but he much more prefers Vino.

I guess maybe we should have dressed him as zombie for Halloween.  It would have been much more fitting for these little photo sessions.


{NOTE:  We do not actually let our child watch this television show.  He has never seen it so please don't go all sanctimommy on me.}

Happy Halloween!!!

Happy Halloween from my three adorable children!!!

Sadly, Jaxon's first Halloween was spent in the comfort of our home.  I developed a very nasty cold and despite my best efforts and constant nursing to give him my antibodies, the poor guy caught it.

Instead, we hung out at home, taking our own photos, watching Charlie Brown's Great Pumpkin episode, and coughing in unison.  Thankfully little man is still super happy (as you can see in the photos), eating well, and sleeping like normal.  Such a little champ!  Thank goodness.   I don't think I could handle feeling as badly as I did AND dealing with a super cranky, sick baby.  I still breaks my heart to hear his mucousy breathing and knowing I gave it to him, but his smile and laughs make me feel less badly about it.

Jaxon also put himself into this model pose.  So I went with it haha

Despite being sick, he still dressed in his costume and let me take some photos of him.  I walked right past all the cutesy costumes and went for FrankenBaby!!!!  (All the costumes were so large on him but we made do.)

Let me tell you, getting pictures of two dogs and a baby is not easy.  The dogs just wanted to sleep on the blanket, Jaxon just wanted to play with his dogs, and I just wanted one photo with Jaxon smiling and the dogs not looking so sad/sleepy/pissed.  Oh well.  I'd say we did pretty good for the fact that I didn't even have any treats to entice the dogs.  Just good ol' fashioned "stay" and "watch me" commands over and over and over.

I was disappointed that this is how we spent Jaxon's first Halloween, but I'm just happy he happily wore his costume, I got some great photos of him, and that despite being sick, he was still a very happy boy all day.  He makes being his mama so easy.

Halloween Recap

I blogged on Halloween, but it wasn't about the actual day of Halloween.  {It was actually a fun link up party about the Seven Deadly Sins!}

So what did we do??

The day started out like a normal day.  We ran lots of errands, but we did so in black and orange attire.  Because we're festive like that.

Oh Home Depot and Lowe's.  I swear we make a trip to one of these stores at least every other day.  Welcome to homeownership!!!!  Sometimes I think we should just wire our paychecks straight to them.  

Nick spent a good 30 minutes debating the brand and type of garage sealer he'll be buying (probably not for another month or two).

We spent a few hundred dollars on blinds...and still have half the house to go.  We also picked up a two ceiling fans; one for the living room and...well we haven't decided what other room yet.  A fan we really liked was marked incorrectly.  It should have been $170 and it was marked as clearance at $40.  Of course we snatched it up.  Now it's just deciding what room will get it.  

And as no surprise, I made sure we made a stop at TJ Maxx.  I just absolutely love that store.  It's a new homes best friend!

Then we hit up the grocery store for Halloween candy.  I kid you not, Nick spent 20 minutes debating what candy "the kids" needed.  He came back to the cart with SIX bags of candy.  (Well really, nine but I made him put three back immediately).  And it was all candy he is obsessed with.  I tried reasoning with him that we did not need that much candy.  He kept insisting we did, but I know it was just because he's hoping to have a lot of each bag left over.  When I said we should go for the cheaper candy (because I'm a cheap ass), he looks at me, the most offended I've ever seen, and says, in 100% seriousness, "We're new to the 'hood.  We need to establish street cred."  I couldn't believe he was serious but I gave in and $40 later, we walked out with six bags of Halloween candy.  

Our neighborhood has designated trick-or-treating hours (6:30pm-8:30pm...after that, cops patrol the neighborhood and send the hooligans home).  We put the girls costumes on and sat outside awaiting the trick-or-treaters. 

Kids slowly started coming by.  But one of our first guests was this family.  The cooler scooter family.  They had two coolers, filled with water and beer, on motorized scooters!  They'd fly down the street (not kidding, this thing went fast!), their two kids jumped off, ran up to get their candy, hopped back on, and rode off to the next house!  Nick and I decided we're totally stealing this idea if we're still here for our shore tour.  With a neighborhood as big as ours, you need something like this to hit even half the houses!

For the first time, living in a cul de sac was not in our favor.  We were the only house in our cul de sac handing out candy.  As people would come down the adjacent street, they'd look down our street and just pass us by.  It wasn't worth walking all the way down the street, for just one house.  And I don't blame them.  We had some sad, lonely pups.  And a really sad husband as well.  I mean, how can we establish street cred if no one comes down the street?!

Thankfully, Jenny text us saying how crazy it was and that she was almost out of candy.  We told her it sucked in our cul de sac and she told us to come over.  We turned off our lights, locked up the house, and walked the .8 miles to her house.  But it took much longer than normal.  Our neighborhood was INSANE!  You see, we live in the very back of the neighborhood.  Once we made it to one of the main roads....HOLY.CRAP.   The streets were PACKED!  I felt like I was walking through the streets of Six Flags or Disney World.  No joke.  I'd always seen packed streets of trick-or-treaters in movies and thought, "That's so fake!  No neighborhood really looks like that on Halloween." I was wrong.  Ours looks like that.  

We finally made it to Jenny's with our massive amounts of candy.  We stood in the driveway because NO ONE stands at their door.  The kids are just a constant stream so there's no point.  I gave out ONE piece of candy to each kid and within TEN MINUTES, I was completely out.  IN-SANE!  I am not exaggerating when I say there were probably over 400 children out trick-or-treating.  It's as if all of Northside Jax came to our neighborhood!

And I loved it!  I was shocked at how many houses go all out with Halloween decorations at the beginning of October.  I've never seen a neighborhood get so into the Halloween spirit.  And I know I realize why.  

Despite the ginormous crowds consisting of this day and age of kids, I was shocked by the politeness.  When I would offer the bowl of candy instead of handing it out myself, kids took one piece (without me saying to do so).  Never asking for more and never taking more.  And each kid (even the ones too old to be trick-or-treating or the ones to little to fully understand the holiday), said, with eye contact, "Thank you ma'am".  I love the south!!!!

They also would walk up to Nick and the dogs, and ask "May I please pet your dogs?" before just rushing up and petting them.  Granted, my dogs love people, especially children and have never growled at a human, so it wouldn't matter if they did.  But I just love that their parents have obviously taught them the proper way to approach a dog and that you don't just assume all dogs are nice and can be pet.

Since we were out of candy early, we just went inside and drank while the girls played with their boyfriends.  We made a plan for next year.  During our walk, we saw a few family's combined their Halloweens.  They set up a table and all sat there, drinking the evening away.  That's what we're doing next year.  Posting up at a table in the driveway, cold beer in the cooler, candy for dinner.  Plus, with our two candy stashes combined (and any other friends that might join us), we'll have enough to last the entire two hour time frame!

I would also like to note I love Halloween in the south.  You don't have to worry about bundling up!  Sure, some years in Missouri we'd get lucky and it wouldn't be teeth chattering cold.  But in the south, it's always warm.  I'm talking tank top warm at night.  It was great!!!
Although, I cannot imagine college parties in the south.  Girls barely cover their nipples and asses when it's below freezing temps, so I can only imagine what girls do in warm weather.

However, I don't see these "Slutty _____" costumes anymore {thank goodness}.  My News Feed has transitioned from whores in costumes to babies in costumes.  It's now nothing but adorable children in even more adorable costumes.  Definitely another perk of growing up!  I can't get enough of kids in costumes!!!!!  It makes me ovaries ache for my little Disney Princess or Batman!

Although, the insane crowds made it impossible for me to really take a look at the costumes, which makes me sad.  I love finding my favorites.  This year, I can't remember many of them.  What were your favorite costumes you saw?  Any family-themed costumes?  We saw Batman (Dad), Cat Woman (Mom), and Robin (small toddler).  What was the most creative or unique costume you saw??


 I hope you all had a great Halloween!  I'm already looking forward to decorating my house and yard next year.  And our handing out of candy, beer in hand with friends next year!

A Stoned Devil and Spastic Bee

Happy Halloween!!!
Yeah, I'm early, but I doubt I'll be doing anything blog worthy for Halloween and I just tortured my dogs so now seems like a good time for this post!

I hate missing out on the Halloween costume fun. But I don't have {human} children to torment and dress up in ridiculous outfits and Nick won't let me choose our outfits anymore after last year (he's just being South Pole Elf.  Last year's costumes were the bee's knees!!!). So my adorable pups get the wrath of my Halloween costume madness. 

Actually, we were going to forego costumes for them this year. We just bought a house and need to purchase a lot of things for it (such as 16 blinds for our windows so I can walk around in my undies again. And ya know, those are cheap *eye roll*). 

But luckily for our dogs, when we walked into PetSmart to buy dog food, their costumes were marked down from $16.99 to $4.79. Certainly we could splurge $10 for our own entertainment. 

Costumes choices weren't great.  And they didn't have a Honey Badger, which is a true representation of Yadi's personality.  So we settled on the devil because it's as close as they had to something that "doesn't give a shit" and is a little badass. And that's Yadi. A sassy, back-talking, don't give a shit, button pushing, too smart for her own good dog. 

Vino was harder. She is just too sweet and dainty to be something like a pirate or inmate. And anything red was out (I don't like red dogs wearing red because the shades clash.) So the cute lady bug was out. That left us with a bumble bee or a dragon. Clearly the cute bee won. 

The girls don't mind the costumes as long as treats are involved. Once they see a treat, they stop biting at the costumes and spinning in circles. 

Because Yadi has an insane obsession with food and too much practice with focus and patience with her ball, she was easy to capture photos of (even if she did look stoned in 10 out of the 15 photos I took.)

Vino was damn near impossible to get photos of. She is so freaking antsy and such a spaz. She legit stands there tap dancing. Just tap tap tapping away. Beyond annoying. She's a blur in most photos. Her head piece wouldn't stay on because she violently flails about, dances around, etc. Even in her 'sit' and 'down' command, she's still antsy!! Clearly we work more with Yadi (sorry Vino, she just needs it more with her strong personality). She actually loves having clothes on (I think they remind her of her ThunderShirt she so dearly loves) so she's extra excited. So this is about as good as it gets with her:

Clearly she's not liking me holding this on her head and making her lay still 

Clearly my goal for next year is to work with Vino on not being so antsy. Yes, my priorities lie with making sure I get good Halloween photos next year.  I don't even know how to teach that. She can "sit" and "stay" but any tips on how to teach "calm the eff down" and "stop being a spaz" ??? I seriously need to take a video of Vino in all spazziness for you all. 

Oh well, they're both still adorable in their costumes. And now that we actually have a porch, we'll sit out there with our Stoned Devil and Spazstic Bee to hand out candy. 

 My cute new porch :)  ...where the Halloween candy goodness will take place.

Anyone else tormenting their dogs with costumes??  Please tell me I'm not the only one who has an impossible time getting a photo of their dog dressed up. 

Anyway, Happy Halloween from Yadi and Vino!!! 

Halloween

This Halloween was not very exciting.  We decided we weren't going to hand out candy.  Instead, we bought a bag of our favorite candy, turned off all the lights, pretended we weren't home, snuggled on the couch watching Hocus Pocus and ate our Halloween candy.

It's not that we don't like kids.  I actually really enjoy seeing all the children in their costumes.
But Yadi and Vino make Halloween very difficult.  Last year, they were still pretty small (Yadi only 50 pounds and Vino only 30 pounds) so it was easy for Nick to hold them as I handed out candy.  This year, at 85 and 55 pounds, they have a lot more strength.  They looooooove children so it'd be very difficult to hold them back each time the door bell rang.
Just locking them in a bedroom would have resulted in a busted down door or claw marks alllllll over the door.
Crating them would have resulted in lots and lots of whiney and howling and complete loss of sanity on Nick and my part.
We could have sat outside on the porch and handed it out, but last year, we didn't get many kids and we  went long periods between kids so we didn't want to sit outside all that time.
It just wasn't worth it so we had our own Halloween locked inside and we really enjoyed it!

Plus, this was the perfect excuse for me to finally see Hocus Pocus.  I have never seen the movie in its entirety.  I've caught the beginning, then the end, then parts of the middle.  But I've never seen the movie from start to finish.  I heard it's a Halloween classic so we opted for that.  I will admit, I think this is a movie you have to see when you're very little to appreciate it.  Seeing it for the first time at the age of almost 28, I didn't get the hype over it lol.  Don't hate me, but you have to recognize the horrible acting!  I didn't hate the movie but I was expecting the most spectacular Halloween movie ever!  Either way, I'm happy I've finally seen it and think I'll add it to your "Fall Bucket List" to watch each Halloween season.

Yadi and Vino were lucky this year because they didn't get costumes.  It was difficult to find something to fit Yadi because she's so tall and long.  Even XL's were too small.  And we weren't going to torture Vino if Yadi wasn't going to be tortured as well.  So we opted for Halloween bandanas they wore all week and snapped a few photos of the girls in their Halloween headbands.

Halloween Party

Nick and I came back early from Alabama (my mom didn't leave until Sunday night) on Saturday afternoon to attend our Halloween Party.

We left much later than we expected so I was running short on time to prepare something to take to eat. I didn't want to show up empty-handed so I headed over to the ever so wonderful Pinterest and searched my "Appetizers and Snacks" board.  I scrolled through looking for something that would be quick and easy to make.  About halfway down in my board I saw a picture of a dip with a caption that said "Quick and Easy Recipe".  BAM! Done deal!  We stopped at a store and I ran inside and grabbed the 6 ingredients.

When we got home, I whipped up the dip, threw it in the oven, did my makeup (I showered and did my hair in Alabama so don't go thinking I'm gross and dirty) and put on my costume.  I was completely shocked that Nick and I were able to make a dish for the party as well as get ready in just 45 minutes!

We went as BUDDY AND JOVIE!!!!!

If you know me at all, then you know I love the movie "Elf".  Love is actually an understatement.  I'm obsessed with it.  As are my siblings and cousins and many other family members.  It's a movie I find perfectly acceptable to watch any day of the year.  I don't think you need to wait for Christmas season.  That being said, "Elf" is the movie we watch while we Dickens kids decorate our parents Christmas tree on Thanksgiving weekend.  And then I watch it about once a week until Christmas rolls around.
Yep, that obsessed.  Anytime I hear someone say "10am" I then say "10am tomorrow!"  I quote the movie all the time..."That's ridiculous"  "You sit on a throne of lies"  "You don't smell like Santa.  You smell like beef and cheese."  "SANTAAAAA!" and so on.  Call me crazy but it really is a fantastic movie!!!!!

I saw a Buddy the Elf costume a few years ago and have wanted to go as Buddy and Jovie ever since then.
Nick was totally not on board with this idea.  He wanted me to dress as a slutty...anything.  I was not on board with that.  But I batted my eye lashes and said "pleeeeeasseeee".  Didn't work.  He isn't a sucker for that =/    So then I said "What if instead of green leggings under my skirt with elf shoes, I wear thigh highs or fish nets and heels?"  That sealed the deal.  TMI but that's Nick's weakness....thigh highs or fish nets.

I found Nick's costume for more than half off store price on eBay so I ordered it just 5 minutes after he agreed.  They sell a Jovie costume but this is what they sell:

I didn't want this costume.  Jovie only wears this at the VERY end of the movie for all of maybe one minute.  I wanted to go with the green and red Gimbel's employee elf uniform.  She wears that for a good portion of the movie, much longer than the one minute clip at the end in the pink and red dress.  Plus I could put that together for much less than I could buy the red and pink dress for.

Unfortunately, the green thigh highs or green fish nets were a no go.  Finding just a normal kelly green color in any form of hosiery was impossible.  From the end of September until a week before the party I searched everywhere.....all the stores in the area, Halloween stores online, lingerie stores online, costume places online, etc.  Nothing.  I bought white thigh highs with Rit fabric dye.  Fail.  They soaked in the dye bath for 3 hours and never got darker than a light green.  Then after rinsing they were aqua.  Fail!  Nick found some that looked promising....until the arrived and they were hunter green.  Seriously.  This is what arrived.

The striped ones were the only ones in that kelly green color.  They were the only ones that were close enough.  I didn't want striped.  Mainly because I had no white on my costume but at least they looked elf-ish.

So, the costume wasn't what Nick or I originally wanted but I loved it and was pleased with it!!!

We snapped a few quick pictures before leaving for the party

The party was a lot of fun and for my super quick dip, everyone loved it!!!!!  I'll post the recipe tomorrow.  There's really not much to say other than I had a GREAT time so I'll just post pictures.  That's what most people care about anyway.

I was super happy with our costumes and I cannot thank my husband enough for giving in to my obsession and going as Buddy.  He was less than thrilled with the idea so I truly appreciate it.
This was our first Halloween ever spent together and it was my first time going in couple's costumes!  I would say it was definitely the perfect and BEST first Halloween costume we could have ever had!!!  (I'm sure Nick would disagree lol).  But I sure was one happy elf!!!


I hope you all enjoy your Halloween festivities and if you have little ones, I'm jealous that you have adorable kids to dress them up and trick-or-treat.  If any of my friends here want some company with their little ones, I'd love to join and live vicariously through you ;)  (Yes, my baby fever is still in full throttle.)

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!!