the real benefits of living in a technologically savvy world

looking for that perfectly unique christmas gift that'll scream "this came from me?" and don't worry, it's only slightly less creepy than how angelina jolie used to wear a vial of billy bob thornton's blood around her neck to show how much she loved him. (is it funny that i subconsciously used the spelling "vile" initially? i think not)

picture this: a LARGE artistic portrait of your very own dna or fingerprint hanging over the fireplace in your loved one's family room. cozy. what, not sexy enough for you? looking for something a little more santa baby-ish? how about your lip print, yes lip print, as artwork?

it's probably a good idea to ask yourself before giving this gift: "do i ever plan on committing a crime where they might find my dna/fingerprint/lip print? if so, maybe i shouldn't have a giant picture of it hanging up somewhere..."

and if you're really considering this gift, you might also want to ask yourself: "have i lost my marbles?"

halloweeng highlights. mwuah hah hah

throughout meghan's entire childhood, she called halloween "halloweeng." i'm not sure why and i'm not sure what that has to do with anything except that it's funny.

our halloweeng started off with a little banjo billy haunted house tour with red idea. now, if you've been a fence sitter about visiting boulder, banjo billy is definitely a reason to start looking into flights.


yes, it really is an old school bus with the top ripped off and replaced with a pitched roof, then covered in a fence to look like a log cabin.

and yes, the seats were really ripped out and replaced with recliners, love seats and saddles.

and yes, it takes people on daily historical (or sometimes ghost) tours around boulder. i can't believe you're still reading this and not buying an airline ticket already.

we weren't really supposed to dress up for this ghost tour and we might have been the only ones dressed up, but like that's gonna stop us. introducing:

pretty sure we look even better than the original

halloweeng continued with a morning of "family yoga" at yo mama yoga. "family yoga" on halloweeng morning means "dress up in costumes with your babies and sit them in the middle of the room to climb on top of each other while you do as much yoga as you can in your costume and while peeling your kid off the other kids." while we aren't quite in that stage yet, we were invited to come if we brought our popcorn machine. amazing the friends that come from owning that thing. i think the best part was when the baby lobster crawled on top of the baby spider and starting chewing on her head.

they also had belly painting there for those of us with bellies. here's the baby's first halloweeng costume!

and don't worry, we didn't forget our other babies. introducing yoda. do or do not. there is no try


and darth vader. the force is strong with this one.



and finally, introducing our jack-o-laterns, which we liked so much we kept inside so we could enjoy them... is that wrong? le ghost (don't judge. he's a little blurry. you try taking a picture of a ghost!)


and le cat

and instead of facing the thousands of drunkards in costumes wandering around Pearl Street, we journeyed down to hang out with the fam (err.. i mean, the ghostbusters, a posh golf club dude and g.i. jane...) to play some sweet sweet rock band. ahh. the perfect halloweeng.

caution: elves at work

(our new walkie talkie spy pens, thanks to wend and karl)

we knew the holidays were started off right when our first night of hanukah (how cool is it that i get to celebrate hanukah now??) gifts included a family of tape measures as a gentle hint from the boy that either: a) he was tired of having to go out to my car or dig through my purse anytime he wanted the tape measure, or b) he was tired of all of our pictures being hung unevenly on the walls

in honor of our recent mexico trip, i got him an electric wall-e toothbrush, complete with berry blast toothpaste.
(it was the "blast" part of the toothpaste that made the boy's hair look like he'd been electrocuted)

it only got better as we travelled down to the new mexico to spent christmas with the rents and sibs. maybe we didn't think it was getting better when we ran out of gas... i'd rather not talk about it...

at the homestead, we made, and delivered, our traditional christmas cookies (does anybody else still do door-to-door christmas caroling?? oh wait - we do!) then, off to see the luminaries, which is an awesome new mexican feature. it was even more awesome when my dad was sure he knew where this great lighted neighborhood was, got us lost a couple of times, then we got stuck in the middle of this completely blocked-off neighborhood - jammed between hundreds...maybe thousands of other cars, including this unmarked white van doused in blue christmas lights...?

then, in pure indiana jones style, my dad totally hoped a median right in front of a cop to get us outta there. i'm sure the brother's reading this right now thinking "it was not even a median. it was a curb. and the cop was all the way up the street." to which my response as the author of this post is, "creative liberty."

and then home to put on our elves hats and make the nephews some toys! (okay fine, i didn't put on an elf hat. i just took the picture)

and in the morning, the expected response was achieved

the boy and i had a good idea what we were getting from each other. i KNEW (at least hoped i KNEW) that the boy was getting me ddr. for those of you not hip enough to know the lingo, that stands for dance dance revolution. for those of you still lost.... well, i can't help you. anyway, let's just say that now i can - and probably will - dance my life away on a 3ft square pad.

the boy KNEW (at least he thought he did) what i was getting him. so i think he was a little shocked when he opened up his brand new mortel and pestle (which is actually a very cool little item). it's not what he thought i was getting him though. he kept looking in the box, trying to seem excited with his gift, but hoping that a sign of something more would magically appear.

and it DID appear when we all marched into the dining room! the boy looked like he was two! and i thought gibson was excited when he saw his space train

so, we had popcorn for our christmas breakfast...and lunch... and dinner... and every day since (ps, thanks for the scarf grandma and grandpa! it completes the perfect charles dickens image of a street popcorn vendor)

and here's mr. milo - all tuckered out after such an exhausting christmas morning

look how long he is. seriously. where did he come from?? he's got to be at least the same size as three subway $5 footlongs

turkey lurkey day

sometimes thanksgiving brings mayflowers and other times it brings walkers. i can't really attest to how much people liked when it brought mayflowers, but i CAN say that we very much liked it when it brought walkers because the mom makes a dreamy stuffing and the brother made a killer yam/orange combination. i can just picture him in the kitchen thinking, "hmmm...yams are orange. and oranges are orange. and this crayon is orange." only i'm glad he left the crayon out. 

one time, i knew a girl who went on a color diet. she matched up days with colors and only ate certain colors on their designated days. i feel like i've shared this story before...no? 

anyway, bug didn't bring any food, but she brought herself, which is always more than enough entertainment for any holiday occasion. 

the boy made his first ever turkey and, are you ready for this, maxine - he even put onions in it! (this is a big deal because the boy is "sensitive to onions")

we ate a grandiouso feast on our new plates, a very generous house/wedding gift from the soon-to-be-parents-in-law (yes, the very same ones i got a speeding ticket with...i'm surprised they didn't instead get me a "how to drive slower" guide book)

look how lovely, but don't look too close or get too attached because that might seal our fate to host thanksgiving every year, in which case i might start threatening to make tofurkey for everyone. 

after dinner and a little i'm-full-of-turkey-and-stuffing-and-orange-yams-and-maybe-crayons walk around the block, the festivities continued with a celebration of gibson's fourth birthday! a present for the boy and the brother was conveniently planted amongst the others. as soon as gibson opened it, they snatched it away and started making ramps and obstacles for it. 

crew didn't need any toys. he just needed a cubby. 

this is halloween

my grandma and grandpa are so cute. every year, they send little goodie boxes for some of the holidays. i have no idea how they decide which holidays to send stuff for, but this year brought us some fun halloween stuff. example: nose flutes. 

the boy picked his up right away. what a talented guy. can you tell what song he's playing? 

and of course, me - the natural flutist and amazing musician i am - couldn't even make a freakin noise out of the thing. maybe my nose isn't built right for nose fluting. here's me playing the same song*

and, of course, what's halloween without getting excited for the trick or treaters? we were so (overly) excited for the hundreds of kids we were surely going to get. we prepared by buying at least twenty thousand bags of candy and dressing the dogs up

the first doorbell ring was like music to my ears. three cute little kids to start putting a dent in our mt. kilamanjaro sized stack of candy. then it happened...the costumed dogs darted (they love a) being outside and b) kids) they seriously mauled those poor kids - one of the kids ran off crying without even getting candy! what a devastating way to start off our trick or treating. so, the baby gate went up to barricade the dogs from whatever other disasters they were planning. about 8 kids later, the trick or treating was done. that was it - 8 kids. twenty thousand bags of candy and 8 kids. now we don't have pantry space because we have created our life food supply out of reeses peanut butter cups. 

luckily, we had a halloween party the next night and successfully got rid of 1/4 of one bag of candy. go us. 

our costume party was muppet-themed...we didn't really expect other people to dress up like muppets (and not many did), but the boy is obsessed with this: 

and has had dreams of us dressing up like the mahna mahna guys probably since the day he met me. so, we did. 

and this is how great the world of blogging is - i found my charming little headpiece on some stranger's blog in minnesota (no...i don't know if he has an accent). he had a picture of his wife wearing it last year - she made it! so, i emailed him and asked if i could "rent" it for this year. 2 days later, i had a mahna mahna cow costume! i love life. and people in minnesota. and people who can make their own halloween costumes and then share them with others. 

to top it all off, meghan came as her look-alike

* why, it's john jacob jingle heimer schmidt, of course!

this is my new favorite picture

we had big birthday shoes to fill:

left foot

right foot

here’s how we set out to accomplish such a lofty goal:

1. rockies tickets right behind home plate thanks to bill. they had up a “no autographs” sign on the dugout, but i’m guessing after we were there, they’ll start putting up a “no screaming, ‘hey domagata, can we have a ball? it’s her birthday!’ over and over again so that other people in the crowd are even begging the ball boy to give the screamers a ball just so they’ll shut up.” they’ll also probably implement the rule “no ball boys will have their names printed on their jerseys from here on out.” the good part is, domagata gave meghan a ball. the bad part is, saxon immediately dropped it down the bleachers. the other good part is, the people in front of us gave it back because, as they were well aware, it was meghan’s birthday.

2. a birthday scavenger hunt which took meghan around the apartment complex finding lots of goodies like this charm of a t-shirt (it says - i listen to bands that don't even exist yet). it's perfect for meghan because she gets so mad when "her" bands get radio time. plus one time we were playing balderdash and her defintion of a word was "a monkey that hasn't been discovered yet" ha ha - brilliant. we had to explain to her that maybe something that wasn't discovered wouldn't have a name...but you never know with scientists these days.

and, even though they can’t be used till later, roller derby tickets for friday and death cab for cutie tickets for may (what’s a good birthday if it doesn’t extend into the next month?)

3. breakfast at sams no. 3. meghan’s addicted to green chili. and breakfast burritos. and this place boasted both. and man did it deliver.

4. birthday gift from bill and reese. reese (noun): an 8-year-old kid sitting out in a park near the boulder farmers market selling his artwork for $5… it’s always depressing when 8-year olds paint better dragons than you can. then again, i’ve never tried painting a dragon – so neener neener - you haven’t won yet, reese!

5. dinner at watercourse. shameless plug: a tasty tasty veggie restaurant. once, bill and i came here and convinced a good part of the restaurant patrons to text message meghan just for fun. and they did it – that’s what kind of people you find at watercourse. you also find a completely vegan bakery (sounds gross, but isn’t). this came in handy because meghan is allergic to dairy. so she got to choose from an entire case of desserts – with no limitations. she almost started crying. and who doesn’t want to cry such tears of joy on their birthday of all days? so it was a good thing

6. then we came home and picked up the five pounds of confetti i threw all over the house

welcome to 24, meghan

take that, bunny

after our rockin’ easter eggs last year, we were a little disappointed that the best egg kit we could find this year was star wars. luckily, we also found a build-a-bunny-house kit, so at least there would be some variety during dye time.

we prepared everything just so – perfectly filled glasses of colored water, a pile of stacked bunny-house lumber ready for construction… the one factor we forgot to consider: boys.

bill was over for the easter party and our new friend saxon came over with his art skills. saxon coincidently also came with us on friday night to a flashlight easter egg hunt. what we didn’t know was that everyone there was under the age of 7… okay fine, maybe we did know that…

meghan and i were diligently creating the cutest bunny house known to man (minus the freaky bunny with red eyes and a gun meghan pasted on the roof) while the boys were working away with the star wars stickers. then it started. c3po made his way over to the bunny house to visit. then he climbed on the roof and attacked. he was soon followed by the whole star wars cast in egg version. the horror was unbearable. meghan and i excused ourselves to make dinner (cry). we’d check in every so often to scenes like this:

hard-boiled mice climbing up the roof

c3po, r2d2 and yoda (red eyes added for effect) watching guard from the roof (notice the insane amounts of frosting used to glue things down. that would be the workings of my craftsman boyfriend. yoda’s not going anywhere)

darth vadar decapitating a bunny (it shames me to admit that this was actually my idea)

once again notice the gobs of frosting

and saxon eating a frosting filled hardboiled egg (it also shames me to admit that i dared him to eat it)

we took a break for dinner with some happy stuffed artichokes.

and what’s easter if it doesn’t end with a friendly (?) game of monopoly. it’s very worth noting that meghan kicked bill’s trash, even though monopoly is the “game that defines” him.

easter rocks

st patrick's favorite color was actually blue

it’s funny because green is my favorite color and at least 80% (probably an underestimate) of my wardrobe is green, but every year i wake up on march 17 and something inside of me says “let’s wear not green today.” maybe my subconscious likes getting pinched. anyway, i caught myself yesterday. i was wearing pink and brown (and running late i’ll have you know). but i took the extra three minutes to throw on a green shirt instead. no pinches for me.

i have no problem eating green foods on march 17 though. nor does meghan. that’s why we decided to have a green dinner. in high school, i knew a couple of girls who decided to go on a color diet. every day they decided a color and throughout that day, they could only eat foods that were that color. not sure either of them lost weight or got healthier, but i’m sure their urine was interesting on blue day.

here’s the makeup of our deelish spread:

green juice. threw your tastebuds right off because it was actually mango juice. take that tastebuds!

veggie chips (we had to pick out the green ones) with what had potential to be the best green salsa ever. it sadly wasn’t.

green rolls with mint-apple jelly. we had to get the jelly. it was so slime looking. maybe you think it sounds like a good flavor combination but sorry to burst your bubble – it’s not.



we had bamboo rice (who knew that existed??) with the normal green veggies. oh yeah, and green sauce. another tastebud shocker – it was teriyaki. and dreamy.

we made pistachio pudding for dessert, but our stomachs and tongues were plenty green by the time we finished dinner. it’s still sitting in the fridge. sad lonely pudding.

i bet meghan $20 she wouldn’t eat all of the green jelly. (at least we weren’t in public, mom)



the best part was, i ate dinner in pink and brown and meghan was in black and brown. we’re so festive.