Shoemakers L.A. Weekend

We had a fun weekend with the Shoemakers in town. Here are a few photos from the weekend:

The Getty Villa

Our little Padowan, Kieran, finally achieved his dream of lightsaber combat with Lord Vader

Enjoying an evening of baseball, Dodger dogs, and drunken fans

Easy to Please

Ryan read about an easy way to make your child's day on babycenter.com: add food coloring to their bath. It's true, it does make their day and, even though I was initially doubtful, it doesn't dye their skin or the bath tub. I'll be sad one day when simply chasing them around the house or dyeing their bathwater doesn't make the cut.

Haven recently discovered the "pinza" dress hanging up in her closet since Christmas. It was a gift from grandma and grandpa Shoemaker. This is Haven wearing the dress:

And this is Haven when she's told she cannot wear the dress:

Family Visitors Part I

We had a great time with Justin and Tiffany and family when they came to visit us over the Thanksigiving holiday. Here are a few pics from their trip:

Griffith Park Observatory

The cousins getting reacquainted at the Observatory

Justin and Tiffany before launch of California Screamin'

Justin & Tiffany 2 seconds into a 4 second 0 to 60 launch

Will's Disneyland blues

A quick family photo on Mickey's Fun Wheel

Anna riding a pony at Griffith Park

Kieran and Will riding ponies

In other news, Kieran is moving on from Spiderman and Batman and now wants to be Venom, Spiderman's nemesis. He tells me how, when we buy him the Venom costume, he'll wear it and go "like this" (he wags his tongue back and forth), and how people will say, "Oh my gosh! That's a scary Spiderman!" He actually thinks Venom is really just a black Spiderman. Ryan and I have never seen the new Spiderman trilogy, but we're coming up to speed quickly on the comic book world.

Though he doesn't particular enjoy the lesson part of pre-school, he's made major strides in writing and coloring over the past couple of months. He's coloring in the lines and can almost write his name legibly. He also doesn't like to sing very much, but I'll hear him singing "Here Comes Santa Claus" or "I'm Bringing Home a Baby Bumblebee" when he doesn't think I'm listening.

Haven had her belated 18-month check up at 20 months of age and we found out she's the size of an average 3 year old. We already knew that since she towers over the two-year olds at her school and in nursery. In the past couple of weeks she has begun speaking in phrases and sentences. Her first words to me this morning were "Kieran's mean to me." The funny thing is that she had not even seen Kieran at that point in the morning.

As you can see from the photo, she loves to wear necklaces. She also loves sunglasses and purses. She's broken at least two pair of sunglasses over the past month. Unlike Kieran, she loves to sing and hear us sing. Her medley of songs usually includes the Barney theme song, "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," and "I'm Bringing Home a Baby Bumblebee."

Two Thumbs Up

I have a few suggestions this week for some family entertainment this holiday season. The journalistic integrity of my blog (?!) requires that I disclose that I am not an unbiased source when it comes to these recommendations.

My first recommendation is The Princess and the Frog. Ryan and I attended the wrap party a couple weeks back, and I thought it was the most beautiful animated film I have ever seen. Ryan thought it was right up there with other classic Disney animated films, and that's after he responded to the trailer with "and they think this is going to do well?" Interesting story about this film is that it's from the same directors who did The Little Mermaid and Aladdin, who were eventually shown the door at Disney, and then brought back again when the Pixar leadership took over. If you want to see the trailer, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8N-kIiELUA.

My second recommedation is a half-hour Christmas special Disney Animation Studios did for ABC titled Prep and Landing. It premieres December 1 after the Charlie Brown special, so have some peppermint hot cocoa and make a night of it with the fam. I can't do the story justice, so check a little bit of it out for yourself at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etq-d8Ci7uI.

Hope you like it!

Halloween

Halloween has come and gone, but Kieran's Batman fetish is still going strong. His Batman costume is literally beginning to disintegrate. He was very disappointed when the Halloween decorations on the homes and business around here came down. Halloween is serious business in these parts. A house down the street even built a movie-set quality haunted house in their yard. Here are some photos of a few of my favorites:

Here are our first-time trick-or-treaters:

And of course...

We've been watching some of the old Batman and Robin cartoons from the 1960s on YouTube, and I finally understand the context for expressions like "The Dynamic Duo" and "The Boy Wonder" that my dad used all growing up.

Let the holiday season begin!

The Happiest Place on Earth

A friend of mine once had to conduct an experiment for a class, so she decided to test a hypothesis about where people were happiest/friendliest. She tested the hypothesis by tracking what proportion of people smiled or said hello to her at a grocery store, a college campus, and a recreation trail. The friendliest place was the recreation trail, and the grocery store was the least friendly place. I remembered that experiment yesterday as I was running on a trail near our house, when I couldn't help smiling despite the tortuous run. The sky was incredibly blue after a few days of rain, and the smell of fresh cut grass was in the air. Sometimes it doesn't get better than that.


I may have to go all Mythbusters on Disney's claim using that same experiment to see if it holds true. My guess is the recreation trail would still win out. However, Disney does provide some great backdrops for a photo. Here's the fam from our trip last week.

Batman and Pebbles

Kieran's in a Batman kind of mood these days. He wants to wear his Batman pajamas everywhere--pre-school, church, the playground, and, of course, bed. He's quite distraught when they actually have to be washed. I already bought him a green dragon costume for Halloween, but I'm thinking Batman might slay the dragon Halloween night. Some cute things he's been saying lately is "that's what happens," which is his very philosophic response to any unfortunate thing that happens, "polk-a-nuts" instead of "polk-a-dots" and "gee-cano" instead of volcano.

Haven is our blonde Pebbles Flintstone. She has a favorite stuffed toy, "Lambey," which she uses as a security blanket. She also loves to sing, especially to herself in her bed.