Disneyland!

This year we all spent my dad's birthday at Disneyland.  It was the kids' first trip (well, technically Beatrice has been before but she was too young to remember it) and they had an incredible - and incredibly emotional - time.

Arthur wanted to wear his beloved Princess Anna dress to Disneyland so I told Beatrice she could choose a costume to wear, too.  She chose the Beast from Beauty and the Beast.  (She later took it off during the hottest part of the day, but she put it back on again in the evening.)

Anna and the Beast

Gillian and I went to Disneyland every year when we were kids, so it was especially fun for my parents to go with us again, and with their grandchildren, too.



Dad and Gillian on "Star Tours"



We introduced the kids to some classic rides, including Pirates of the Caribbean, The Haunted Mansion, The Tiki Room, Star Tours, Dumbo, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, and of course, the Alice in Wonderland spinning teacups.

 



 

 

 

William dozed for much of the time, or rode along on rides without understanding what he was doing, but he loved It's a Small World.

Poor Sam carried either Beatrice or Arthur almost the entire day.

 

 

My dad did some carrying, too.

My father was given a birthday pin, so he got special treatment wherever he went - and the kids all had "First Time Visitor" pins, as well.

 

 

We stayed about twelve hours without any tantrums or meltdowns the entire time - the kids were too immersed in what they were doing to act up.

William with the stuffed squirrel my parents gave him.

And after falling asleep during the parade.

Beatrice and Arthur were 100% convinced that everything they saw was real - real pirates, real princesses, a real haunted house - and so the experience was both totally thrilling and intensely terrifying.  Beatrice, in particular, was completely mesmerized. 

These pirates are not real.

Sam and Dad at Autotopia

Beatrice, Arthur, and I went on the submarine ride, where you sit in a submarine and appear to sink to the bottom of the ocean.  On the ride, you see realistic-looking sea life, but they also project film images from the movie Finding Nemo into the water so the animated characters appear to be swimming around you.  When Beatrice saw this she FREAKED OUT and started shrieking, "Am I in a movie? Are we in a movie right now? Are people watching us? Oh god, what is reality?!"

"Oh god, what is reality?!"

Despite her ontological angst, however, Beatrice loved Disneyland, and she and Arthur are already planning all the things they want to do when they go back again, just like I used to do every year when I was a kid.

School Pictures

It's that time again, time for fall school pictures.

Arthur's pictures didn't turn out as wonderfully as last spring's, but they weren't too bad.

 

 

Back row, left to right: Mr. Richard, Ayla, Miss Ana, ?, Maeve, ?, Arthur, Ivy, Michaela, Miss Cherie, Rev. Susie Fowler, Mr. Joshua

Middle row: Adam, Chase, Benjamin, James, Jaxon, Emmeline, Gracie, Logan

Front row: Giselle, Eleanor, Lily Kate, Ivy, Grace, Zoe, ?

 

Unfortunately, Arthur's best friend Henry Harper wasn't in the shot, but Arthur also enjoys playing with the twins James and Maeve.

Beatrice's individual photo wasn't too bad, but it hardly matters considered that in her group photo she looks just like the little girl from The Ring.

 

 

Back row, left to right: Mathilda, Chloe, Vanessa, Lucas, Sady, William, Amyah

Next row: Gagik, Emma, Lana, Madeline, Paige, Emmy

Next row: Donnie, Ronin, Elijah, Beatrice, Rudy, Trevor, Gavin

Front row: Kaden, Noah, Matthew, Xavier, Isabella, Carter, Allan, Mrs. Lombardo

Beatrice's best friend is Amyah, but she is also friends with Mathilda, Emma, Madeline ("Maddie"), Gavin, Lucas, and the twins Paige and William.

Beatrice as a Model

Here are some photos from Beatrice's brief stint as a catalog model for a company that makes little girls' dresses. 

 

I also wrote an article about the whole experience on Medium.

Balto Appreciation Day

Beatrice's cousin Rosemary gave Beatrice her copy of The Bravest Dog Ever: The True Story of Balto* when we were in Chile and it made a huge impression on Beatrice. So much so that she decided to create her own holiday, Balto Appreciation Day, on November 5 to honor Balto.

(We actually wound up celebrating Balto Appreciation Day Observed a few days late so that my family could join in during their recent visit.)

Beatrice wrote a six-act play (five plus an epilogue) that retold the story of Balto.   (Originally she had wanted to make the play five-and-a-half days long, to retell Balto's story in real time, but I managed to talk her out of that.)

Beatrice gave herself an A+ on this painting of the Northern Lights over an icy landscape.

Beatrice wrote, directed, and acted in the play as both Balto and the Narrator.  She also made the programs and designed the costumes and set.  Arthur was cast as Gunnar, Balto's sled team driver, a part he played somewhat reluctantly.  Gillian and I were both Stage Managers, which mostly meant we were in charge of making sure the painted backdrop didn't fall down.

Beatrice thought it was important that the Narrator be unseen, so she hid underneath the table while doing those parts.

Arthur did not enjoy wearing his Gunnar costume in the 85-degree weather.

 

We went apple picking last week, so we used the apples to bake a pie and then topped it with five and a half candles, one for every day of Balto's harrowing journey. Happy Balto Day, everyone!

Balto Appreciation Day pie

* In 1925, in Alaska, the lead sled dog Balto and his owner Gunnar were part of a dog team relay that carried medicine from Anchorage to Nome in time to stop a diphtheria outbreak.  This relay later inspired the Iditarod.

Happy Halloween!

(Yes, this will be a very long post!)

 

 

We started on October 1 decorating the house inside and out.  As usual, we covered pretty much every surface, but my two favorite decorations this year were the bar over the mirror and the fruit bowl centerpiece.

 

I carefully wrote out Pliny's Book 7, Letter 27 in Latin in dry erase marker on the surface of the round mirror above the bar, then hot-glued on some dark-colored butterflies.  I also draped black feather boas over the deer antlers above the mirror.

  

 

 

For the fruit bowl, I just picked up some fake fruit at the dollar store, spray painted it matte black, and then put it in a suitably Gothic-looking bowl along with black rubber snakes and black velvet spiders.

 

Beatrice was a vampire this year.  Last Halloween, after a run-in with an animatronic pirate on a neighbor's porch, Beatrice decided she wanted to be something scary this Halloween, so that the pirate would be afraid of her.  She also got really into character and refused to eat food with garlic in it on Halloween night.*

 

Arthur insisted he wanted to be a ghost, but as soon as he put the costume on he hated how it covered his face (I warned him!) - he then considered a mermaid, a witch, and "a cat who is a scientist" before settling on a wizard.

 

 

William was a very excited baby bat.

 

And of course, my awesome space girl costume:

 

On October 17 we had a little pumpkin decorating party for the kids (though it quickly turned into a dirt digging party in our unfinished back yard).  In addition to the usual crowd, Beatrice's new school friends Amyah and Emmy joined the party.

Henry and Callan decorating their pumpkins

Adrienne and Cylas

Lesley and baby Rhys

All month long we did Halloween crafts and activities.  One of the best new ones we did this year was having the kids build a "haunted fort" under the dining room table and then tell ghost stories and watch a scary movie down there.  They built the fort out of black plastic table cloths, cobwebs, plastic spiders, and white pillowcase ghosts, plus a few odds and ends from the dollar store.

 

 

Lilli helped the kids carve apple head witches and make bodies for them out of empty wine bottles.

 

Baking Halloween cookies

Building a giant rope spider web in the backyard

Vampire paper dolls

We went to an outdoor showing of the Winnie the Pooh Halloween special at the library with our friends Kaitlin, Paul, Callan, and Rhys.

 

We also took the family to the very impressive Rise of the Jack o' Lanterns show at Descanso Gardens.  Pictures don't really do it justice, but there were thousands of expertly carved pumpkins on display, including these life-size dinosaurs made entirely out of pumpkins:

 



On October 24, Beatrice's elementary school had a big school-wide party and fundraiser, the Halloween Hullabaloo, complete with a giant inflatable slide, a maze, a haunted house, and carnival games.  I was the chairperson in charge of the bake sale, which wound up being a pretty big job.  Luckily, Lilli was in town that week visiting me and she was a tremendous help with everything from baking this gorgeous cake the night before as a prize for the cake walk, to setting up the booth and selling hundreds and hundreds of baked goods the night of the event.

 

Lilli's gorgeous cake

The following night was our big Halloween party. Then we recovered with some more low-key events the following week, including watching the original Friday the 13th at a drive-in movie theater downtown. William and his friends wore their costumes to baby music class, and they had a special Halloween edition of library story time - they even gave each child their own pumpkin to take home.

Scarf dancing while dressed as a bat

Library story time pumpkins

Arthur working on his craft at the library

On Wednesday night we carved pumpkins - Beatrice designed the face for the giant pumpkin she and Arthur picked together at Underwood Family Farm and Dev carved it.

 

 

 

I did some scientific-illustration-themed pumpkins, a spider and a moth (I also did a bat but it didn't turn out as well). 

 

Then, at last, it was Halloween! Both Beatrice and Arthur had costume parades at school.  Dev and I went to St. Mark's to help out - our fourth Halloween costume parade at St. Mark's.

 

Arthur holding Mr. Richard's hand



Arthur with Ivy Harris and Ivy Robb



Arthur and his best friend, Henry Harper

Beatrice got out of school an hour early so we took her out to lunch - here we are in our matching vampire costumes.  I also went to get a flu shot while dressed as a vampire, which cracked me up.

 

That night Dev took the kids out trick-or-treating while William and I stayed home and handed out full-size candy bars.**

 

Heading out

We also took the lights and fog machine from our party in the backyard and set them up front for the trick-or-treaters.

 

William is amazed by the strobe lights and the fog machine.

 

Sorting through their haul***

 Later we also dropped by two parties - one at my friend Amy's, the other at our next door neighbors' - and only then did we bid farewell to the very best time of the year.  I can't wait until 2015 . . .

 

* Beatrice usually picks her costume 9-12 months in advance, but once she chooses it, she never waivers.  She has already decided that next year she wants to be Jack Skellington from The Nightmare Before Christmas.

 

** I still remember the full-size candy bar house in my neighborhood when I was a kid - being the neighborhood full-size candy bar house is my bid for immortality.

 

*** Every year the kids excitedly collect a ton of candy, eat a few pieces right away, and then totally forget about the entire thing by the following day and never mention the candy again.