Street Dancing

Red Sox

Daddy came home from Rhode Island bearing Red Sox cookies. Yankee fans say, "Boo!"

Vacuum Rampage

What happens when the vacuum doesn't get put up right away. It rampages and runs over elephants. Bad vacuum!

Santa's Helpers

Adam: "Hey look, there's Santa! And his helpers. The elvises. Santa and his elvises!"

Nothing can convince him that the plural of elf is elves, not elvises.

Rice Homecoming

After our visit with Karen, Logan, and Kayleigh, we headed to our alma mater. Adam and Lottie had never been, so we gave them a partial tour. Of course, Rice has built so many new buildings, we didn't recognize everything. The main academic quad did look the same, except that the hedges had been scalped from waist height to about knee height. We introduced the kids to Willy (William Marsh Rice, our founder - his ashes are under the statue).

Then we took the obligatory picture in front of Lovett Hall. We're hoping at least one of them ends up here in another 18 years or so.

We also took them to our respective residential colleges. Adam and Lottie hung out on the Hanszen sign.

Then they found Hanszen's beloved swing.

After our tour, we went to the tailgating area near the stadium. We didn't watch the football game, but let the kids try out all the bounce houses that Rice had set up. Adam and Lottie made friends with our college friends' kids, which was fun to see. I didn't get any pictures, but Adam spent over an hour bouncing with his new friends. We did see a few friends from the old days, but never got over to the "young" alumni tent.

Once the kids had napped, we checked out Lot 8, the boutique run by Chloe Dao, the Season 2 Project Runway winner. It was gorgeous - I wanted everything in the store. Chris bought me a dress (Christmas gift). We got to meet Chloe too, who loved Adam and Lottie. Nice to see talent staying in Houston. Then we took the kids to Amy's for some ice cream.

After a good night's rest, we headed to the Houston Ballet Nutcracker Market. Adam and Lottie especially liked this year's theme - Going to the Dogs. We all did some shopping (and Lottie did some napping in Daddy's arms), then we went to our favorite Houston restaurant, Patu, for some delicious Thai food. After gorging ourselves, we headed back to Austin.

On the way home, Lottie fashioned a "toy" out of a jelly candy and a piece of her hair. Yuck! She was super pleased with herself, and Adam also wanted one. Crazy kids.

Hermann Park

We headed to Houston for Rice Homecoming (Chris's 10th reunion - yikes) this weekend. We were lucky enough to stay at Amy and Sebastian's beautiful new Victorian in the Heights, although they weren't there. While they were jetting off to Australia, we made ourselves comfortable. On Friday, we hit a Japanese households store; basically, a small version of a hundred yen store (dollar store). They carried a lot of Daiso (hundred yen store brand in Japan) goods. We were in heaven and picked up a bunch of goodies. The store is surrounded by lots of yummy Asian restaurants, so we picked a Japanese cafe. If they had this when we lived in Houston, we might never have left. Except to move to Japan.

On Saturday morning, we met Aunty Karen, Logan, and Kayleigh at Hermann Park, across from Rice University. While we were waiting for them, we took some sister-mauling pictures by the fountain.

Also, some sister-throttling pictures.

Logan and Lottie had the same idea - let's crawl over this ledge into the water. Lottie almost made it. She's fast.

Then Lottie wanted to check out Kayleigh's nose, eyes, chin, hair.

Then they held hands.

We went to the Japanese garden, where the kids terrorized a poor duck. After a few laps around the azalea bushes, it figured out it could hid IN the bushes, where the kids weren't allowed to go.

We did managed to get a few pictures by the pond. No smiles, but at least they are all standing somewhat still. Kayleigh is not allowed in pictures until she can walk!

Our last stop was the train. It actually went all over the park at a pretty good clip, which delighted the kids. Logan spent half the ride under the seats, and Lottie demanded her own seat away from Adam and Logan, but they had a good time nevertheless. Their favorite past was going through the "tunnel" (train shed). They had a great time hanging out with their cousins and aunty and are now fully geared up to see everyone at Thanksgiving!

Miscellaneous

I found some pictures that were hiding on my camera from the last few weeks. My neighbor, Isabel, and I took the kids to the circus on Nov. 4. We saw the early show, so the dads were still at work. The kids had a blast. They rode ponies before we headed in for the show. We saw the elephants (available to ride for only $8!) and Lottie and Mary were fascinated. Adam ran away. Of course, he then complained about how mean I was because I wouldn't let him ride the elephant. "I don't like the pony. I ONLY like the ELEPHANT. I NEED to ride the elephant." It's hard to ride an elephant when you won't get within ten yards of it.

Once we went in, Mommy caved and bought them some cotton candy. Yum!

In other news, we had to say goodbye to one of our neighbors. This was especially sad because Adam and Lottie LOVE their kids. "Gosh" (aka Josh) and Michelle are great playmates and Lottie had a special relationship with Michelle. I had to take a picture of the two before they left.

Air Force

Adam: "I'm in the Air Force. I got a sword and a magic hat!"

Trick or Treating

Adam and Lottie got dressed up early for trick or treating. They posed for a few pictures, then we headed for the Halloween alternative at the chapel (or as we called it, the pre-show).

The kids enjoyed "riding" the pony. They were only allowed to pet the pony and sit in the saddle. That was good enough for them.

They also had a bunch of wooden play houses, which were good for minutes of fun!

Adam and Lottie gorged on snow cones and cotton candy. Then Adam got the world's worst face painting. That's supposed to be a bat. It was drawn by a very cute and enthusiastic 9 year old girl. Adam still thought it was super cool.

Then we headed to the Hoag-Stewart household for some chili and picture-taking. Declan and Ian were spiders.

Once we got back home, we dropped our candy off with our neighbor, then headed out to trick or treat. Lottie gets her first piece of candy from a neighbor.

On our way back, we ran into another neighbor. Adam, Lottie, and Mary posed for some pictures in the wagon. And also made sure that Mary didn't get anywhere near her light wand.

Home with the loot.

Fall Festival

The Youth Center held a Fall Festival on Friday. They had all kinds of traditional fun games. First, Adam got his face painted.

Then we made popcorn hands.

Adam had to try the donut eating contest. The hands stayed behind the back for all of two seconds. The prize was eating all the frosting off the donut after he failed to eat any of it off the string!

Then he wanted to try the cake walk. He somehow managed to survive the first three rounds, which they played like musical chairs (probably because he walked so much slower than everyone else and backed them up). Then it was just a matter of when you would get to choose your mini Walmart cake. Guess who was the last picked? The funniest cake walk ever - just Adam dancing around in a circle.

Our last game was the sack race. I only got the first part of it, but that's okay, because once the nice man helped Adam into the sack, he jumped for about ten seconds before he got out and just ran back to the starting line. Oh well, he had fun. They also gave out free food (nachos and chili dogs) and drinks. Then they gave Adam and Lottie candy apples right before we left. Their final haul for the night: popcorn hands, donuts, nachos, candy apples, mini cake, AND a crazy bobblehead prize.