Brianna’s friend William had his 4th birthday party this past weekend - a BUG themed party! Luckily Brianna is all about bugs lately, so she was good with this. She even said it was her favorite birthday party ever! So happy…
First they made bug hats (see later pictures - she put as much orange on there as possible). Then, after following their link on the spider web (ribbon), they each found their own bug catchers - quite useful to have when you need to go outside to find and catch some bugs!
Of course, then they were famished and had to have some bug snacks (ants on a log, worms in mud cake, antennae, cocoons, beetle juice, etc.). Check out one of her favorites - her spider ring!
With the birthday boy!
Last year, B was very shy and would only go up to each door if we carried her, and would only say trick-or-treat and thank you if we prompted her. Fast forward to this year - she marched up to each door, rang the door bell, said her “lines” and quickly moved onto the next house. She loved everything about trick-or-treating! While I could have done without the rain, I am not sure she even noticed. The next morning, she told me she wanted to do it again, and was quite disappointed when I told her she had to wait a whole year. She thinks each season should have trick-or-treating… 
Here are some pics from her big day. The day started with lots of fun at school, including games, a Halloween party, and a Halloween parade.
Getting ready to go…The sweet witch…
The scary witch…
With Grandma and Grandpa…
With Mommy and Daddy…
Can we go yet???
Yay, Hawke (the great white shark) is here!
We only stayed out about an hour (I think she could have gone for at least another hour), but she got a pretty good take. As she kept commenting, “my candy is heavy!”
So, as part of Brianna’s membership to the local kid’s museum (thanks Nana and Poppa!), she was invited to their annual pumpkin carving party. So, we picked out a pumpkin and off we went. Along the way she realized “carving” meant cutting. “I don’t want to cut my pumpkin!” Perhaps she has seen a bit too much of the Great Pumpkin…
Anyway, when we got there we discovered there were lots of options, including just using other things to make faces on the pumpkin. She was thrilled!
Getting ready to “carve.”
Jason and I helped her secure all the items to the pumpkin, but she picked everything out, and told us where to put them. Side A (named “Jason”):
Hiding from the camera…
Side B (named “Brianna”):
She had a great time, and was even more thrilled to have time to play at the museum before and after the party!
We recently took B to our local fair. Last year she was too small for most rides, and quite frankly, not interested in much other than the merry-go-round (though after some encouragement she did try and seem to enjoy a few others). This year was a whole different story. She pretty much wanted to ride everything, and if possible, she wanted to do it by herself. No encouragement required.
We started with the merry-go-round (which she rode twice). As you can see, she is already looking ahead to the next ride…
Next she wanted to do the little boat ride (”all by myself!”).
After that, she moved on to the jalopy ride (again, “all by myself!”). In the first picture, she is objecting to all the pictures I am taking…
Then came the slide…the gigantic slide (~50′ in the air) that I was convinced she would not go down. She wanted to do this one by herself too, but she is not yet big enough. She almost pitched a fit, but finally acquiesced. Three times!! She went down this huge slide three times, and would have gone more if we had let her!
Then came the interesting part. Her next ride of choice was the Kraft Macaroni & Cheese equivalent of the teacups (or the strawberries) - aka a roundy-round ride. Jason refuses to ride on anything that goes round and round, especially with me (admittedly, I’ll spin that thing like a crazy person). But, B insisted on riding it, I am not allowed on that ride right now, and B was not big enough to go by herself. What is a Daddy to do? Why ride the ride of course (although he did not tell her that the “steering wheel” in the middle would make the cup spin…)!
Then she headed off to another one - a fire engine that rotates high up into the air. I was shocked she wanted to do that one too, but she loved it!
By this point, we only had enough tickets left to ride one more ride (much to her dismay). She chose a worm ride that she had to ride by herself - both Jason and I are considered to be too tall to ride it.
To distract her from her disappointment about the end of the rides, we took her over to the games and told her to pick one. She picked fishing, and won two fish. She was so proud!
She did GREAT (and that includes walking at least 15 minutes to and from the car), and had a great time! Best fair experience ever!
We have kicked off autumn with several trips to the local corn maze/farm. We went the first time the first weekend in October with lots of B’s buddies from school. The kids had lots of fun - sometimes playing with each other, but more often than not, playing around each other. Brianna’s favorite seemed to be the bouncy houses.
Playing the “fall down game” with her buddies.
Hayride with Sam
The tractors were also a big hit! The kids are allowed to climb all over them.
That first Saturday, a firetruck with some firemen were there to visit. Brianna was very excited to get a new hat…
…and of course, a pumpkin.
She was a little less excited about me taking her picture next to the pumpkin scale…
The second weekend in October, we went on Saturday and Sunday to do some things we missed the first time, and just because B loves it so much.
The giant pumpkin (she can’t get enough of this thing)!
And this time, they had a little train ride! She got to ride this twice because the first time they broke down midway through the ride.
We also ventured into the corn maze (Brianna is good for about 20 minutes before the “I’m done” starts).
Leading the way!
Of course, we had to do another hay ride.
And she even let me get a cute picture amongst the pumpkins (no small feat, I assure you).
These are the words B keeps saying to us. She is just DONE with summer! She is ready for fall, and football, and pumpkins (especially the giant blowup pumpkin at the corn maze across the street), and Halloween. So, even if we can’t make the temperature drop any faster, we can certainly get in the fall spirit (so I am guilty of fall/Halloween “creep” - sue me). First I found this head band. I LOVED it, but wasn’t sure what she would do with it b/c it is so big. Let’s just say she wore it for something like 3 days straight…I think she would wear it all the time if it stayed on a little better.
Next, we headed to the library and got a stash of Halloween books. My little engrossed bookworm…
While shopping at a Kmart that is going out of business, we even stumbled upon Halloween costumes at half price. It was a tough choice (green skeleton? purple witch?), but she finally settled on the purple spider witch (mostly b/c she seems to love witch hats). Note her scary witch face.
I’m with B - is it fall yet??
Anyone who has spent any time at all with B knows she loves Finding Nemo, and as a result, has developed quite a fear regarding dentists (seriously, whose brilliant idea was it to put a stupid scary dentist in a kids movie?). Well, after much discussion about how that was a bad dentist and how we would never take her to see a bad dentist, she went with me to see my dentist. The most I hoped for was that she would sit in the chair and let the hygienist count her teeth, but she did so much better than that!
Getting ready - nervously sitting in the chair with kitty while watching cartoons.
Letting the dentist check her teeth while she sat in the chair all by herself (while her teeth were being counted and tickled (cleaned), she basically sat in the chair on top of me).
All done!
She did such a great job! She even let them floss her teeth, and she was very excited about the orange tootbrush the dentist gave her and the orange bracelet she got from the goody basket. We were so proud of her!
The weekend after our trip to the mountains, we headed to Tatie Kat’s house to visit with Tatie Kat and Mimi. One of Brianna’s birthday memory gifts was a trip to the Virginia Beach Zoo, so we headed over there on Sunday to “deliver” the gift. She had a great time, but generally would not allow me to take any pictures. Between the three cameras, we did manage to get a few.
One of her favorite exhibits was the orangutan exhibit. I think we saw it at least 3 times! Of course, we had to pretend to be orangutans…
Another favorite was the otter exhibit (though they did not swim nearly long enough to satisfy her!).
We concluded our zoo trip with a ride on the train (driven by a highly entertaining conductor). I have to post both of these pics because in one Brianna looks good, and in the other Mimi and Tatie Kat look good. Use your imagination and merge them…
Our trip was very short, but we had lots of fun!
At the beginning of August we headed to the mountains to surprise Poppa for his birthday. We had a lovely weekend hanging out and relaxing in the beautiful mountain home Nana found. On Saturday we all headed to the local pool to play and to show off Brianna’s new pool skills. She still doesn’t really want to put her face in the water, but she is quite comfortable paddling around on her own with her little swim ring.
And she has gotten quite good at floating on her back!
Of course, what is pool time without some diver attacks (think Finding Nemo…)!
While Brianna and Poppa napped that afternoon, the rest of us got everything ready for his surprise party - complete with most of his family driving up to the mountains to join us. Now that was a real surprise to him! Just like with her Daddy, Brianna had to help Poppa open his presents.
Hanging out with her Tia…
The next day we headed out for some putt-putt.
That was nice, but I think she really preferred the playground off to the side of the putt-putt area…
It was a long trip, but we had a wonderful time!!
I know it has been a while, but it has been a very busy few weeks! After the beach trip, Tatie Kat and Great Grandma came to visit us for the weekend before Great Grandma moved back to Michigan to move into her new home. It took a few takes to get a good picture (Brianna has gotten quite camera shy lately), but we eventually at least got a cheesy smile out of her:
The following weekend, we celebrated Jason’s birthday just the way he wanted - by basically doing nothing and just relaxing. On Saturday, we all went to the movies for Brianna’s first theater experience to see Winnie the Pooh - I know it is hard to tell in this picture, but she was VERY excited (here she is engrossed with the local band playing at the mall, and can’t be bothered with my desired to take a picture).
Sunday we went out to brunch and dinner to the places Jason chose, and then enjoyed some yummy cake (Brianna had to help blow out all those candles!).
All in all, it was a wonderful way to end the month.
