Halloween

Connor decided to be the Incredible Hulk this year for Halloween.  Check out those muscles!

 Lauren joined us for Trick or Treating!  As soon as she arrived we hit the pavement to collect some candy.  We walked up and down 4 blocks this year as Connor raced from house to house (skipping the houses with scary decorations).

 Every year Connor picks his costume and then Jason and I pick costumes to match his theme.  I had a hard time finding costumes to match his Hulk theme this year though so, Jason and I had planned on not dressing up.  When Connor realized we weren't going to dress up with him he was disappointed... so, I quickly threw something together for us to wear out of our old Halloween costume pile.  I wore my Cat Woman mask from last year and a cape my mom gave to me.  I found a gesture hat for Jason (and a black mask, which he didn't wear).  Connor of course had his Incredible Hulk costume on.

 Lauren came dressed in a cute cat outfit.  I was actually surprised to see how many parents in our neighborhood actually dressed up to take their kids trick or treating.  I think it makes the experience more fun for the kids.

 After about a hour of trick or treating we headed home to hand out candy.  Connor loves to man the door and hand out candy to the kids.  Actually I think it's his favorite part of Halloween.  He would rather hand out candy than go door to door and collect candy.  He even offered to dump half of the candy he collected into our trick or treat bowl to hand out to other kids.  Is this kid amazing or what?  I love this picture of him manning the door... waiting for the next group of trick or treaters to come knocking.  I was disappointed that 60% of the trick or treaters that knocked at our door were not little kids.  I think we missed a lot of the littler kids since we were out going door to door ourselves early on.  We had quiet a few kids that were in high school though.  What is up with that?   One group of boys had facial hair and jumped in a truck and drove off after collecting candy... um, if your old enough to drive and get a job BUY YOUR OWN CANDY!  I want to install one of those carnival signs and if your over a certain height your excluded from collecting candy!  We bought tons of chocolate candy bars too.  I think next year I'm buying the chocolate candy bars for the little kids (who can take a hand full) and some cheap hard candy for anyone taller than me (and they get 1 piece).  Mean?  maybe.. but I'm not spending $50 to supply candy bars to 18 year old kids, who barely even dress up.  Halloween is for children.

At 9:00 Connor decided to lay down on the bottom steps and call it quits.  So, we turned off the porch lights and went to bed.  His normal bed time is 8:00 (which means he actually goes to sleep around 8:30 once we're done brushing teeth, getting PJ's on and reading books).

belly shots

15 weeks pregnant...

So, far this pregnancy has been extremely easy.  I had some minor morning/afternoon queasiness occasionally throughout the first trimester.  I had a little bit of this with my last pregnancy too.  Last time I found if I drank soy milk and a piece of toast before bed I was fine.  This time around I've discovered that Tic Tacs are fantastic!  I bought some white fresh mint Tic Tac's for a joke Christmas gift for Jason last year and had some left over... which Jason and I have been addicted to every since.  Anyway I found that any time I feel queasy if I suck on a fresh mint Tic Tac the nausea goes away.   Jason was sweet and bought me a jumbo size container of them which I carry around.  I've also been eating a lot of yogurts and drinking lots of juice.

I also had a few hot flashes (from the increase in estrogen), which was a very strange feeling.  My friend, Shelly who is going through menopause always talks about getting hot flashes that come on so strong and fast that her glasses will literally steam up in seconds.  I now know exactly what she means.  I experienced two very intense hot flashes that almost made me pass out.  One happened to be the day I was observing in the operating room and my clinical instructor had me put on several layers of scrubs (in addition to my face mask, goggles and gloves).  After watching several operations that morning I was observing two doctors perform a very in depth colon cancer surgery (the entire colon, anus and part of the small intestine had to be removed).  Towards the end of the surgery I experienced one of the intense hot flashes and within seconds my face was literally dripping with sweat and I was blacking out.  Luckily there was a stool not to far from where I was standing and I quickly sat down and started pealing off layers of scrubs.  Within minutes of getting the extra layers off my body temperature returned to normal and I was able to watch the rest of the surgery.  I'm sure the doctors in the room thought I was getting nauseous from the gruesome surgery, which is funny since it could not have been farther from the truth.  I really enjoyed my time in surgery.  I'm fascinated with the human anatomy.  I actually thought about working in surgery when I'm done... until I found out the circulating nurse in the operating room really has nothing to do with the surgery itself.  The nurses main job is to gather supplies and verify needle, scissor, gauze counts.  Not real exciting.  The scrub tech on the other hand gets to assist the surgeon and dig their hands into the patient.  That sounds a lot more entertaining. 

 Nobody at my school even knows I'm pregnant yet.. well, except for my clinical instructor, adviser and best friend, Olesya.  I definitely have a baby bump, but so far I'm able to hide it pretty well in my scrubs.  I can't fit into my normal jeans anymore, but I have several lose fitting jeans that I wore the last time I was pregnant and I've been wearing those.

Pumpkins

My parents came into town so my dad could help my brother build his deck.  After spending the day at Siemer's in Green Bluff we stopped to pick my mom up so she could spend the evening with us.

Ryan's Halloween costume

Nana got to watch us carve pumpkins.  We tried to talk her into carving one too, but she was happy just to observe.  Connor chose a spider pattern for his pumpkin.

I found a picture of Toothless (the dragon from the movie How to Train Your Dragon) that Connor loved.  So, that's what I carved.

In typical style Jason picked a very simple pattern and was the first done.  Since Connor loves Puma gear he scanned a picture of a Puma off Connor's marker bag and that's what he carved.

As always I picked the hardest and most time consuming picture... and I was done last.

Connor actually poked all the holes for his picture and then used the little tools to saw it out.  Jason did help a little bit, but the majority was done by Connor.  Nice job buddy!

Nana helped Connor decorate the other pumpkins with the plastic "potato head" type push in pieces.

I'm still working away... Connor checking out my progress

from left to right: Krista's Toothless, Connor's spider, Jason's pump

Plus all the fun pumpkins Nana and Connor decorated

Then it was time to build our scare crow.  Jason and Connor had a blast setting him up.  We're glad Nana got to be a part of our traditional Fall festivities too.

You can see Connor in the window behind the pumpkin helping Jason to set up the pulley system for the scare crows hands.  We put the walkie talkie in the pocket of the scare crow again this year too.  Connor came up with an excellent idea to hide his remote control tarantula between the scare crows legs under the chair and walk it out as kids approached the door too.

Siemer's Pumpkin Farm

We took our traditional trip up to Green Bluff to visit the pumpkin farms.  Unfortunately the Trantum's didn't go with us this year, but we still had a blast with just the 3 of us.

 I was craving their famous pumpkin donuts so our first stop was to buy 3 pumpkin donuts and 3 huckleberry donuts to share.  Connor even shared his chocolate milk with me.

 Then we hit the corn maze.  At the entry of the corn maze is a huge 2 story pirate ship for the kids to play on.

 This is the last year it will be just the 3 of us....

 In the middle of the corn maze is a huge castle to play in.  They also have goofy stuff around the castle like this alligator.

 part of the maze is this sculpted shrubs and the other part is made out of an actual corn field.

 Connor riding on the Little Tootle barrel train

 checking out pumpkins in the field.  Connor attempted to pick this one up.  Big muscles buddy... just not quiet big enough.  We didn't actually buy any pumpkins this year since we already got a bunch of pumpkins from Grandpa.

 our family picture in the pumpkin patch

 Hay rides with a tractor

 pedal bike races.  This year they even have a bike the perfect size for Connor!

 Go Connor Go!

 Big Tootle train ride

After a fun day checking out the pumpkin patch we stopped by their craft/goody shop on the way out and I got some fresh squeezed Apple Cider and Connor found some cool new sun glasses.