Halloween isn't JUST for big kids who dress inappropriately.

Today is officially Halloween. Our neighborhood HOA tried to command us all to celebrate Halloween on Saturday, but you just can't stop a true Halloween celebration like we had today. (Ha.) I really had no intentions of taking Max trick-or-treating. He is way too young to enjoy getting dressed up and going house to house, and he is certainly too young to be eating a large amount of candy. And I certainly don't need to be accumulating more candy around here!! But, I really did want to at least get him dressed up and it seemed sad to just dress him up and take pictures at home, so when Julie suggested we take the boys to Heritage Park to ride the train in their costumes, I jumped at the idea. I even convinced Chris to leave work early (well, 5 pm is normal time for most people) and come to meet us.

Max borrowed one of Julie's boys old Halloween costumes. Nevermind the fact that it was for 6-12 months and Max is 14 months. I managed to cram him in there anyway and we took off to meet Sam and Nathanael.

Once Chris arrived, it was "All Aboard!" for our ride on the train. We were the only people on the train, because the other thousand or so people who were at Heritage Park were in line to go trick-or-treating. So, off we went on Max's first train ride. And...he loved it.

In fact, I think Max enjoyed the train ride ALMOST as much as the Rogers boys appeared to enjoy it.

"ROOOOOOAR!!"

And, approximately 20 minutes after we arrived at the park, we headed home. Max wasn't quite ready for Halloween to end, though, so he and his buddy Bailey had their very own costume parade in front of our house. The 1 neighbor who drove by during the parade enjoyed it.

And just like that, Halloween is over. Thank goodness. I really do not need to eat any more candy corn.

He's a Pumpkin Patch Kid.

This morning at church the sermon was about, well, I can't really remember by now; I really was listening, but it was so darn cold in there that I was having a very hard time paying attention. It was Homecoming today so the sermon was preached by a former associate pastor, and one of the points he made was that at the end of your life, you're not going to be wishing you had spent more time at work but rather that you had spent more time with family and friends. I've been thinking about that all day, and I think the Ludwigs did a good job of spending quality time together today.

Chris and I have carved jack-o-lanterns every year for a while now (except for last year and I don't know what happened there but perhaps we were still overwhelmed with parenthood ?) and I really wanted to make sure we did so again this year. So, off we went to the pumpkin patch to pick out some good carving pumpkins.

Ok, so it's not so much a pumpkin patch as a pile of pumpkins on pallets in the middle of Main Street Simpsonville. But, it worked for us. Max loved perusing the pumpkins and "helping" us push the wagon.

I mean, who needs to go to a farm, where you can pick your own pumpkins and afterwards have some apple cider while admiring cute furry animals when you can easily find a pre-picked pumpkin and then take some photos in front of a parking lot? It works for us!

This place gets bonus points for A) donating proceeds to Habitat for Humanity and other charities B) being less than a 10 minute drive from home and C) being less than a 1 minute drive from ICE CREAM STATION!!!!

I can't wait to carve our pumpkins...they're gonna be good! Oh, and if anyone needs help selecting the perfect pumpkin, let us know because Max gets a feeling about these things....

Well, THAT was fun....

Despite the ugly weather, today was going well. Great even. Max took a nice long morning nap and was in a fabulous mood at Mother Goose on the Loose. He was in such a good mood that I was even able to get some quick grocery shopping done on my way home. At the grocery store, they charged me the wrong price for some batteries I had picked up that were supposed to be on sale, and for my trouble they gave them to me for FREE. Score! Feeling pretty happy, I got home and made it inside the house with all the groceries, baby, and the mail in one trip. Things were just going way too well. And that's when my nice day took a detour onto the highway to hell. (Ok, this is perhaps a slight exaggeration, but at the moment it was not.)

I had just deposited Max on the kitchen floor so that he and Bailey could greet each other properly and I was walking toward the counter to put down my groceries when.... RIP....BOOM....aaaaahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!
One of the handles on one of my grocery bags ripped. Of course it was the bag containing my 2 liter Diet Dr. Pepper.

This, of course, resulted in Max screaming at the top of his lungs, Bailey trying to frantically lick the floor and Robin having one heck of a meltdown. Dr. Pepper was EVERYWHERE. I'm pretty sure not a single cabinet escaped the sticky spraydown, I was drenched from head to toe, it even made it to the ceiling.

It wasn't pretty around here. Bailey had to be locked outside (in the rain), I had to give Max whatever I could to stop his shrieking (cheese, milk, and cheetos), and I had to wipe down every cabinet, all the counters, the appliances, and I had to mop the floor. I guess that's the silver lining: the kitchen is now spic and span.  But that's an hour of my life I'll never get back. You know what else I'll never get back? That 2 liter Diet Dr. Pepper. All that was left was enough for this one measly glass....and it was flat.

Fall was fun while it lasted.

Today's weather: cold and rainy. I guess fall is over. It lasted for around 2 weeks. That's about as much as we can expect around here. Too bad. It was fun while it lasted.

We had some fun with the Rogers while the weather was nice, including a trip to the Zoo, where Max was able to practice his newfound walking skills. He also practiced wearing shoes, which is new for him as he has refused thus far to leave any shoes on his feet for longer than 5 minutes. So far, this quirky pair of dinosaur moccasins are the only pair he will wear. Baby steps, literallly....

All that walking can really wear a guy out:

Another great thing about fall (at least for the guys)? Football! Sam has been doing what he can to impart his love of the game onto Max. Max IS a fan of the touchdown, but he doesn't quite so far get the finer points of the game. It's going to take a few more hours of watching games and being coached by Sam, I think. Here they are, taking in a game (based on these faces, they weren't happy with the play):

Last Friday, on an absolutely couldn't-have-been-more-beautiful fall day, we went to Falls Park for a picnic with the Rogers. I had hoped to keep Max calm and happy with a pre-picnic snack. Look at him eating at the table like a big boy. (Moments later he hurled all his snacks on the floor and climbed onto the table).

I'm not sure how much of Max's kids' meal he actually consumed versus how much he smashed into the picnic blanket.

With a 14 month old a picnic is really just "inhaling your food as quickly as possible so that you can chase your kid around while he's not wearing any pants." Look at him go, though - I think he might have even been running.

He did stop long enough to enjoy the view (while chewing on someone's discarded straw).

Then he was off again, chasing bubbles...whilst carrying some more trash, the empty bubble container. Oh, my little trash man.

We concluded our day at the park with a walk across the bridge. I did put Max's shoes back on him, but the pants weren't going to happen. Chris is, I think, mortified that I allowed Max to strut his stuff in a busy public location looking like this:

but even rockin' his mocs with no pants and a much-too-small onesie, people commented on how cute he is. Imagine how cute they might have found him to be if he had been in proper outdoor public attire? :)

Fun times...I guess we'll have these in our memories as we're trapped inside on these cold and rainy days to come.

A Major Milestone (and a couple minor ones)

With all of Chris's traveling over the past few months, and particularly with his 2 week trip to Germany and China, we figured he would most likely miss Max's first steps. (Well, he's actually been taking 2 and 3 steps here and there for quite a few weeks, but I'm talking about more than 3 steps and a tumble). So, he was really lucky that Max picked the weekend of our Oktoberfest to really start walking. In fact, he started cruising around on Friday, September 30th, and Chris had taken the day off. So he didn't miss it after all.

It's been so funny watching him perfect his walking. Here is one of his early strolls.



And within a couple of weeks, he has progressed to this crazy level of multi-tasking: walking, talking, AND carrying a seahorse!

Of course, with first steps come first falls. Max took his first major tumble outside the front door while he was trying to run after his cousins as they were leaving our house. He got a chin boo-boo, but he was a trooper.

His other new trick is answering the question, "What does a chicken say?" This  makes me particularly proud, because I've always done a killer chicken clucking imitation. He needs to work on his to be any competition with me, but it's a start.

And finally, one of my favorite milestones: Max's first Cheeto! I love Cheetos. Bailey loves Cheetos. It was inevitable that Max would "request" one of my Cheetos as I eat my lunch. So, the other day, I figured it was time he got to try one. I think it's quite obvious that he loved it. On second thought, this was not my best plan, because now I have to share my Cheetos with Bailey AND with Max. (Just to be clear, these are Baked Cheetos, so I'm not really the worst mother in the world for feeding this to him.)

Fun times around here. Now, the next milestone I'm eagerly awaiting is "Max's first sleep in  until 8 am or later."

Artiste in the making?

Since the sun (sort of) came out today, whereas yesterday we spent the whole day cooped up in the house, Max and I spent as much of the day outside as we could. It was cool(ish) on the deck and I thought it was the perfect time to see how Max's artistic skills had progressed since his last foray into fingerpainting.

I did learn from our last attempt that "less is more" when it comes to the amount of paint you should provide to a young artist.

Max couldn't WAIT to get started!

Observe his process:

I have to say, the finished product didn't look all that different from his first attempt, but who knows? Maybe he's going for a signature look.

He seemed to be pretty happy with his work, though...and he's already found a buyer for it, so all in all I'd say it was a productive work session for Max.

The artist, after practicing his craft:

I love how he totally looks the part of an artist with his paint-smattered jeans. Go ahead and buy that boy a loft in Tribeca, because I think he's well on his way to opening his own studio.