Happy Halloween from the Pattison's! Our pumpkins this year are quite representative of our family if we do say so ourselves. We have from left to right: Daddy, Reese, Mommy, Emma, and the white one is Winston! Aren't we clever! :)
Last week at Art and More we made pinch pots. I'm totally into eating dough these days, so luckily I didn't take a big bite in front of my new art friends. :) This week Ms. Carol let us paint our pots. However, because she is uber OCD and only likes to give us minimal control of our art projects... we HAD to use black and orange. :)
Uncle Ayon and Iz (Aaron and Liz) came over Wednesday night to carve their pumpkins. They claimed it was because they "didn't have enough room at their apartment"... really I think they just like to come spend time with me and don't want to admit it. ;) Anyhoodle... Mommy helped out and took on one of the pumpkins after I went to bed. They decided to go for a Virginia Tech theme. Here is Aaron's state of Virginia... plus the Eastern Shore... he's very proud of his Eastern Shore.
Liz was in charge of the VT... she needed a semi-easy assignment due to the fact her hand is crippled. ;) Then there is Mommy's fighting gobbler. I think they all turned out super hot don't you?
Oh how quickly we fall! In our hearts we were already planning for a big bowl... if not Pasadena. We had a chance... this could have been ours:
(Cheeseballish? Perhaps, but Daddy was more than excited to get his picture taken with the National Championship Trophy. They had it on display at our Kroger, and Daddy literally stumbled upon it picking up a few things on his way home from work... despite the fact it looks like he purposefully dressed up to go get his picture take. Hehe!)
So now I say to you, my beloved HOKIES... pull your heads out of your hineys and play the game that so many of us love to watch you play... WELL!
So with the cold weather comes not being able to leave the house as much. Yes, the weather here is far from the blustering lows of the winter we undoubtedly have ahead of us, but we thought we'd practice some cool weather activities in the wee morning hours while Mommy gets her life together for the day. :) Eventually Mommy wants to bake homemade things with me, but we thought we'd start small... okay VERY small. Yes these are break apart Snicker doodles we made for Daddy. I may not have added any ingredients or mixed them up, but darnit these cookies were placed on this pan WITH LOVE! :)
Don't you just love the fact that they are still in the shape (at the tops) that they came in?! That's what the generic brand will buy you folks!
I hope they weren't too hot for you Daddy, I made sure to cool them off as much as humanly possible... hopefully they weren't too damp. ;)
Rachel here. We just returned from the ped's office, and all I have to say is we have some big kids. :)
Reese, who I have to be VERY creative with these days in order to keep the tantrums to a minimum... hence the dish washing above... we learned is terrified of weight scales... fantastic. This go round she had to stand on the big kids scale and wanted no part of it. Therefore we had to weigh her quickly, so we think she may be about 30 lbs. She also did not want to stand against the wall to get her height checked, so she had to lay down on the table like her BABY sister... she measured in at 35 and 1/4 inches. You'll be glad to know she's perfectly healthy. She did get her flu shot, and I asked about the H1N1... doc said her only risk was her age and that we would more than likely only get a shot if we camped overnight when they came in, so we'll wait it out. We talked about everything from her vitamins to milk and potty training. She still seems completely uninterested, so we're not going to push anything. He recommended to try to put her on the potty after meals and when we see her trying to "hide" to go in her diaper, so we'll start there. He also said to use the naked tactic as a last resort. On the big girl bed front... her side rails for her convertible crib came in... it'll be changed into a full sized bed. I also went ahead and ordered her bedding... can't wait to post pictures! Hopefully this weekend we'll be getting some mattresses for her, and she'll be all grown up! :)
Now for our sweet sweet Emma Grace. She's a biggun. She weighed in at a whopping 14 lb 1 oz... came in as average... which is AWESOME! Definitely lets me know I'm doing my job! :) That officially means we move up to stage 2 diapers! Her "height" was 25 and 1/2 inches long... that put her height in the 75thish% along with her head circumference. She's meeting all of her milestone marks and looked completely healthy. We continue to give her rice cereal even though I think she loathes it. :) She rolled over from back to belly as I posted earlier but has yet to do it again. She is seriously the sweetest little thing!We went back to the "punkin patch" yesterday. When we went for my birthday, we didn't get any pumpkins for our house, so another trip back to really enjoy the festivities was in order. I was, how do we say this lightly, A HOLY FREAKING TERROR. I screamed when we tried to look at the animals, I screamed when it was time to look at the pumpkins, I screamed while playing with the gourds, I screamed when Mommy asked me if I wanted my face painted... it was WONDERFUL. We do a few things and managed to get a few good pictures, but all in all it was awful. Mommy even took a video of me ricocheting off of Daddy and throwing myself into the grass in the parking lot while SCREAMING my head off. We'll spare you that video. :)
Emmaroo, however, was the PERFECT child.
Seriously... could you die?
Daddy later asked me if I had fun at the pumpkin patch... can you believe I had the audacity to say YES?! All in all... we definitely made memories. :) Here is our "Bass update" (CLASS UPDATE) from last week. In Art and More we finger painted giant fish, which I wanted no part of. While I drank my juice, Mommy painted it FOR me... this will not be making the fridge. On a lighter note she did meet a new friend who just happens TO LIVE SERIOUSLY LIKE FIVE HOUSES DOWN FROM US... how does this happen? Her name is Kendra, that's her down there in the picture working on her pinch pot with her little one Annaka. Can we say PLAYDATES? Helping me is Miss Carol. She's the typical Blacksburgian "townie." Mommy is slowly becoming her.
On a much lighter note, here is what I'm stellar at doing in Energy Outlet: Emma Grace is growing up so fast! Literally it seems like just yesterday we were in IOWA GIVING BIRTH TO A VIRGINIA BABY! Now here we are 4 months later putting her in my old exersaucer! :) This is such a super cool toy. I pretty much love it more now that I did when I was a wee one. Here I am trying to show her all the cool gadgets.
I just know she'll love it. She's still kind of small for it, so Mommy has her wedged in there with a blanket. As of right now, she can only stand to be in the thing for about 5 minutes, but she'll soon realize it's the best 5 minutes of her life. ;)
Perhaps I'm getting used to this stuff...
Juuuuuust kidding! I loathe you Mommy... you and your Gerber spoon!
Rachel here. We've since had SOME better luck. Last night she ate all of her cereal and within 10 minutes had barfed it all back up... baby steps. :) We're trying to get into the "winter swing" of things. In a few short weeks the weather will start to become too cold to go outside... which results in stir crazy Pattisons. While the weather has been BEAUTIFUL the last couple of days, we're trying not to get used to it. Instead we've been playing outside like it's going out of style and practicing some of our soon to be favorite indoor activities. We hope to get into some winter classes at the Rec Center, but aren't depending on that possibility. Art activities will no doubt become something we do on a daily basis, and we hope to FINALLY get in some skills practice. Mommy has said that before, so I'll believe it when I see it. :) Here I am doing some painting... which by the way I LOVE to do!
I tried to tell Mommy that I wasn't eating the paint... but alas... I was fibbing. :)
WE HAVE A ROLLER! :) Just yesterday I was writing how all she had to do was sneeze and over she would go. Well... she's done it... SNEEZELESS. :)
Rachel here. So we've been having MAJOR bedtime problems with my mini-me. Reese is basically a nightmare when it comes to going to bed at night. Naptime was no problem, but she would literally scream at the top of her lungs and kick the bejesus out of her bed FOR HOURS. It was so bad last week that at one point I took her crib away from her. DON'T ASK. So Bryan and I were talking yesterday and we decided to try and transition her to a big girl bed. Bryan actually walked in on her trying to escape from her crib one evening, so it may be time. We had an extra twin mattress in our closet from my old day bed, so we put that on her floor up against the wall and used her crib as a barricade on the other side, so she wouldn't fall out. She wanted no part of it at naptime. I layed with her and I asked her if she was sleepy and wanted to take a nap... flat out... "no." Now she's a lot like every other toddler, but she doesn't say "no" ALL THE TIME, so I took her seriously. No nap. We went about our day and ran some errands. She managed to fall asleep for about 20 min in the car. Dinner and bath followed as usual... then it was bedtime at 800. We took her upstairs and put her on the mattress. She was a little iffy at the beginning, but she eventually fell asleep within about 30 min. We then didn't hear from her until about 8 this morning. I'd call that a success! So we're going for no naps during the day and a new bed. Bryan and I went ahead and ordered the side slats for her crib... it converts into a full sized bed. Once those arrive, we'll be getting her a mattress set, and then some bedding. Now in an ideal world, she would have one of the following bedding sets:
Sadly... we don't live in an ideal world! :) So as of right now she'll have to settle (translation... I'll have to settle) for one of the following: 
Dalima Quilt from Target
Zoe Quilt from JCPenney
Winsome Quilt from JCP
Stacy Bedding from JCP
Eden Mini Duvet Cover from Overstock 
Aloha Girl from OverstockIn a couple of these the girls are IDENTICAL! It's crazy! Reese is on the LEFT in all of them, while Emmaroo is on the RIGHT.
Guess who's 4 months old today!? Yep it's me! The second picture is MUCH better than the first, but Mommy thought we should include the first to show how "tall" I am. :)
While we have no measurements for you as of yet... we have our appt on Monday... here are some things I've been up to. First off... I'M GETTING HAIR ON MY HEAD!
Okay so not THAT much, but I do have some peach fuzz that was definitely blog worthy. :) I'm also still not rolling over, but look at how close I am.
SERIOUSLY!? If I sneezed I'd probably go all the way over. It drives Mommy nuts because I'll go up on my side like this and just chill out... FOREVER. I'll do it when I want... she knows that... seeing as how my sister was 24 years old before she rolled over. 
Mommy and Daddy gave me rice cereal for the first time last evening. My expressions were too hard for them to read, but I did not eat much... so we'll go with a mediocre review for now. We'll try again this evening.
I command quite the audience. My sister was nice enough though and cheered me on. She kept saying "oooohhh... so nummy"... "good girl!" 
Speaking of eating. Mommy is still breastfeeding me... YAY MOMMY... but let's be serious... I still HATE bottles, and I'd more than likely starve if she didn't bf me. :) During the day I'm still eating every 2 hours... ON THE DOT... DOWN TO THE VERY MINUTE. It's crazy! Occasionally I'll throw in a three hour break, but not often. Mommy doesn't mind though... we've both gotten quite used to it.
