Halloween 2021

Smidge freaky.

Best Halloween picture ever.  This is Bobby and Quinney.  He runs a Chihuahua sanctuary in the USA that I follow.  

I stayed home with Kai. Isabel is a bit bothered by the fireworks but the tinies could care less. 

Candy is fun.  Guys...I resisted...all day.  Ate only what fit in my calories. One little chocolate, 3 candy corns, 1 jelly pumpkin and two jelly beans.  I definitely would have rather sat down and joined the candy feast!!  Eric and I sorted and culled and got a loaded zip lock of little candies for gingerbread decorating.  

Saturday T or T in Chemainus

Lili was home so got this picture of us heading out to trick or treat in Chemainus.

What a great little event.  Happy kids, so fun seeing all the costumes. Music in the courtyard overlooking the water and games set up for the kids.  

Kai didn't hate it this time!  He said the words and remembered his thank yous. 

Kai had to open his bag and look in to see what he got so was often tripping out the door and then loudly and excitedly telling me what each thing was. 

I got a candy too :)  

The best treat was old time comics from the comic store.  

Keeping it real.  Lest ya'll start thinking life is perfect in Nelsonville. We went for lunch at Haida Way for curry.  Where our perfect day went south. Kai didn't order curry.  The food arrived.  A curry got put in front of him and he started to dig in.  I got it away before his fork struck.  Then he cried.  Sigh.  His fries and coleslaw were delivered last so he cried for a while.  His coleslaw was in a bowl placed on a plate.  He couldn't get his fork in the bowl  and wanted to eat on the plate so he dumped the bowl out onto the plate.  Which was fine but then the pesky bowl was in his space and he didn't want it so he threw it towards Luk. Luckily it just made scary noises clanking into glasses but didn't break. Then in an effort to reduce calories I scrapped off some sauce and pushed fries to the side.  planning to eat less.  Luk was picking like a mouse and had lots left but Jia had devoured and was almost done so I offered her my extra.  And then Luk lost his composure. The jealousy of that was too much.  He couldn't get the anger and crying under control.  People were looking.  I eventually told him he had to leave.  So he went out with the car keys but didn't know how to unlock the car.  So I sent Jia out, she grabbed her garlic bread and ran.  I rushed Kai to finish and paid the bill and left. Then Luk got louder and louder ALL the way home. Oy. He claims he's tired.  So his bed time got moved back again.  Bedtimes have been a major issue for him lately.  I had been thinking after such a perfect day that we would stop in to see Joanie and play with puppies but we just scooted on by and got ourselves home.  But...perfect day up until lunch.  

Kai's 6th flood.

Not kidding. Boy for sale. Kidding.

Seriously.  Luk woke Eric up this morning to tell him the house was flooding.  The drywall has not yet been replaced downstairs from the 5th flood.  So that's good.  Icky clean up.  It's just beyond gross.  Poor Eric.  He needs more love sent his way.  And Luk left a door open upstairs so Coco pooped in there.  And Walter brought in a bird and feathers were everywhere.  And Finn peed the bed last night.  Sigh.  Special needs kids and dogs, this is what some days look like.  Pretty sucky start for sure.

I don't know how we will EVER finish the basement.  It's all prepped.  Totally ready for the finishing work but how do we go forward knowing Kai is likely to flood us again?!  I still vote that Kai needs his own potty built outside the house.  He simply can not learn, is not capable of using a toilet properly.  

So, it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood.  Messes are cleaned up for now.  Laundry is underway.  We have an hour to relax before we have to feed the troops again.  Update ... while sitting in silence at the table with tea the washing machine went out of balance and made horrendous noises.  We just glanced at each other and didn't react.  Haha. 2nd update, Eric just found a bunch of towels in the laundry hamper that are drenched.  Which started a whole questioning of why?  where? when? Fear being it's Kai's poop on them, contaminating the towels, the hamper and anything else in there.  Eric was wanting to throw it all away.  Turned out it was Luk who had enough water out of the tub during his shower that he needed four full size towels to mop it up and then another one to get them to the hamper because they were drippy.  Cry.  Eric is downstairs checking for more water and I've told Luk he's not ready for showers and is demoted back to baths.  Rough weekend for Luk. And Eric.  Maybe we need to hire a bathroom attendant? Or lock the boys out and force them to have supervision. 

Max and Jia slept through all of today's mayhem.  Haha.  Eric is asking what are we doing today.  I have no ideas.  I just stared at him.  I'm sort of thinking we hide, lay low and survive until trick or treat time.

School Parade

Just a little costume trial before the school parade tomorrow. No weapons allowed so the tiny, light up sword that makes him laugh will stay home.

Admittedly, we're a bit scared that Kai will think it's his actual Birthday tomorrow.  It's in the realm of possibility that he'll be upset when he realizes there's no cake or presents.

He hates the school parade.  So loud and he doesn't enjoy seeing everyone in costume.  Too scary.  We're still not allowed in the school for events.  Fingers crossed. 1st year if willingly putting on a costume.

Jia worked hard on this costume.  It turned out great.  She doesn't like the wig so is skipping wearing it.  Now she wants to make her own clothes and is designing on paper.  She's asked if she can remodel her clothes.  I told her sure.  Then she went away muttering about clothes for our trip.  She's told me she won't be wearing any Disney gear...gasp. And no ears...double gasp.

Today's Facebook memory.  Feels like yesterday.  Soooo cute.

Revelations

So, I'm going to Disney for me because I can.  Because the trip was mostly paid for two years ago.  Because I miss my annual Disney trips.  Every trip is different.  This was the boys trip.  Planned pre covid.  I was extremely anxious to tell Luk Jia was coming.  She is vaccinated and the only one available to come with me. Although I do dream of a solo trip I'm not quite ready for days of being alone.  We knew Kai could care less.  But thought Luk might be sad.  He wasn't at all.  I thought that a bit odd but clearly we were good to go and plan openly.  Tonight he asked if we were flying, I said yes and he immediately said he is terrified of flying and was more than happy to wait for a Dad driving trip!  Huh.  Who knew.  Taking after Eric on avoiding flights if at all possible ;)

I did a thing!!

This girl and I are going to Disneyland!!  We have credits with Disney and Allegiant that need to be used by Dec.  So for the last couple days I've been trying to figure out logistics, reservations and how to use credit vouchers.  It finally fell together today.  Soooo exciting!!  We leave Nov 18.  Driving over the border.  Flying from Bellingham.  All other details left to work out.  She is as excited as I am!  The boys took the news like Champs.  Luk is already trying to figure out food to request he knows I don't like.  So red chowder to start. 

Another great work day ;)  Kids to school.  Dryer shopping, success at Rams with a serviced used one. Lili's passport application in. Got an electric thingy for the moho at Greg's. Visited our cows. Finally a walk on the fitness trail at Bright Angel.  The parking lot was full.  

Hero cookies for this guy.  He just gets it all done for us.  So thankful we didn't have to wait for stock, delivery or installations!  We're up and running like normal. 

You might be a red neck if...

A bit of kid torture.  Check out Luk's face. All three would have preferred to skip this fun.  Haha.  We call it homework since they have to bring gutted pumpkins to school every year for a whole school event.  

Is this the 3?

They say things break in 3's.  So hot water heater coil, the oven on Friday and today the dryer.  Oy.  The hot water tank coil was replaced but the same thing is slowly happening again. We found a used stove and picked it up tonight, Eric is sterilizing it now.  Tomorrow we'll try to pick up a dryer from Home Depot.  It's been weird here with no oven. It turns out we use it a LOT.

Lili and Fei were home on the weekend.  I caught this little cooking lesson going on.  Too cute.

Most perfect dog ever. 

Eric and I got Lili a Halloween costume.  She likes it.  It looks good on her.

Michelle and Jenn were over.  Kai was totally delighted to see her then took off to play with Luk and Dagen.  Shannon and Ken were over too. I had planned a lemon bar for Shannon and vegan peach upside down cake for Michelle and Jenn. I called Mom for snack/tea ideas that don't use an oven.  She came up with macaroons and had coconut for me. Yay.  They were easy to make and yummy.  Jia was funny, she doesn't do baked treats but she came to investigate and wanted to know what was in them.  I told her they were basically sweet chocolate oatmeal with coconut.  She ran away horrified we'd see that as a treat. Haha.

Little mister was in trouble and had to endure a day of no screens.  He tackled a 100 piece puzzle.  It took two days and about three hours but he did it.  He had a rough day at school and chose to use his hands as guns AGAIN. Then denied it to us because I called it hand guns and he says it's laser guns.  Outcome is the same. Try to guess how much I despise semantics. He also was chasing Jia and her friends and spitting.  During covid.  So.  Ya.  Fun stuff.  

Oh Poppy. Full if beans one second and then crashed.  

Cowboy TikTok dancing. The kids practiced with Gramma but wouldn't let us take pictures.  So instead Luk took pictures of us.  

Dragrageous.

Well, I'm not totally sure what all my thoughts on this show are.  We did have fun.  The performance was great.  It was loud and I was surprised at how much audience participation there was.  It was fun singing along. I was genuinely surprised at the level of fun other people in the audience were having.  The people watching was top notch.

The first song and performer and he/she? literally bee lined it directly to Eric and sang to him.  I was so shocked I didn't even reach for a camera.  Haha.  And we sat near the back to avoid being in the show.

Look at us out super late, hours past my bedtime.  

We didn't get home until midnight.  Crazy. It was a great fundraiser.  They're hoping to do it again for Christmas.  Eric said he'd go again.  

Bomb Cyclone

Last week we were waiting for an atmospheric river.  Which sounded horrible.  Thankfully we didn't see any thing other than ordinary rain.  Just now the news reports we're waiting on bomb cyclones.  What on earth?  Are the news people making this up or should we be scared?

Work Days

We dropped the kids at school and the Jeep at Canadian Tire then took off to Chemainus for a walk.  I checked emails and banking.  So, work done.  Not being chained to the desk and office definitely has some perks.

We found a Chinese Lantern plant on sale down a side street.  Fun. Then lined up for the thrift store. 

Where we found a carrier for Finn.  One he can't leap out of.  He wasn't totally delighted getting zipped in but he's starting to nod off in it.  

Trapped.  He looks resigned.

Now we're in the school parking lot waiting for the kids so we can zoom across town for Kai's ultrasound.  Pro D day tomorrow so this is their Friday.

Look, no hands.  Finn was in the sack for two hours and never asked to get out. Our thrift store haul behind Eric on the table.  We even scored vans in a larger size to accommodate Luk's orthotics when they're built.

Mom trying out one of the puppy carriers here.

Kai adores Poppy. He once again asked me to take his picture.  The kid who used to think picture taking was pure torture.  

It's all about the little things.  A basket to hold meds.  It makes me so happy to get anything organized we can.

The costume project is still underway.  Excuse the mess.  It's good mess. Jia asked for some seaweed for rolling her own sushi.  This is her first try.  She wouldn't share with Luk so he's going to create after Eric finishes cooking dinner.  Chow mein tonight.  

They're all so busy.  Puppies are running all over.  Kai has his YouTube.  I've found Finn shaking on the couch so I'm doing the super serious job of comforting and warming the Finster. And...my big girls are coming home for a visit tomorrow. It's all pretty good around here tonight.  I should clarify, the big girls are actually coming home to babysit for us.  They are coming early for dinner and spending the night so visiting will occur as well ;)  Eric and I have tickets to a show, Dragrageous.  So that should be interesting.