Happy Hallow's Eve

Happy Halloween Everyone!

On Thursday, Google held their annual Googleween celebration for Googlers and their children. Blake loved all of the activities.

This was the trick-or-treat spot where kids got to fill goodie bags full of candy:


Blake's first gummy skeleton:


They had a pumpkin patch set up for the kids:


The food was phenomenal of course (candy apples, fruit, cookies, popcorn, chips and salsa):


What is an event without a kiddie band. Andrew and I were full of them ten minutes in, but Blake could have danced his heart away for hours:


What is more fun than a cow playing the guitar?:


Proof we attended:

Halloween Is Creeping Closer

It's coming soon...


Costumes are being constructed...


The grapes are scary huge...


Cookies have been made and devoured...

What To Listen To While You Sew

Andrew came across the band Pomplamoose on Youtube while I was sewing the other night. I dig the music and they market themselves as video song where you see the instrument that makes the sound. Interesting and fun!

Quarterback Crunch Is Back!

Just letting everyone know that Quarterback Crunch is back at Baskin Robbins. This is my all time favorite ice cream flavor and hasn't been around for what seems like years. I love that it debuted the year I was born. I don't really like ice cream that much, but I just made Andrew drive over to BR and bring me home some. Move over astrology, it is all about what flavor was hot the year you were born. Get it now before it is gone.

At The Barn

Blake and I were lucky enough to be invited to watch our friend George's riding lesson. George rode Cherry today and melted my heart with her small saddle and stirrups. She is so confident on the horse and really enjoys listening and learning. I told Megana I would buy her cowboy boots at the drop of a hat. Heck, I would buy her a pony if I could. I guess I should be happy that I won't be having a little girl anytime soon. I thought I would push a girl into being a pop princess, but now I know my true weakness. Thank goodness Blake can only take mutton bustin' so far!

Blake and Turtle were great cowpokes and enjoyed hanging out on the fence together.

Walking On Eggshells, er glass...

I finally put my finger on it. I couldn't quite figure out what was so different between this pregnancy and my first one, but as I was switching over my laundry I figured it out. I went to put the wet clothes into the dryer and almost started crying as I was untangling a huge mass of drawstrings (thank you maternity pants). I sat there wondering why this was so upsetting to my body.

Was it (A) because I had just finished cleaning this up:

For dinner I made stuffed peppers in tomato sauce. All six of my peppers were so pretty in their glass 9x13 pan. The meat/onion/rice filling actually appealed to me and I got excited that I may get to eat this dinner (thanks pregnancy stomach). Five minutes after I put the pan in the oven there was a horrible noise like metal being whirled around in a Cuisinart. Blake immediately started crying and I ran into the kitchen thinking a dog had somehow jumped onto the counter and started a major appliance. When I looked in the oven I was amazed to find six peppers just sitting on the oven rack with shards of glass everywhere. My glass pan just blew up. It is a relatively new pan so we can't play the vintage card here. Fun cleaning that up!

Anyways, I am now going to choose option (B) on why I think I am losing all control. It is because I realized I constantly feel like I am walking on eggshells, as well as broken glass. Who am I scared of? The Pregnant Lady. I used to be the pregnant lady when I was pregnant with Blake. I wanted everyone to look over at me and say, "Oh look, it is the pregnant lady." My was I proud. Now it is different. Now, I wake up every morning saying to myself, "Don't upset the Pregnant Lady." I imagine this lady living somewhere between the placenta and my liver. When I ate scrambled eggs this morning I knew better. Thirty minutes later I was facing the Pregnant Lady.

She said, "Now why did you do that? You knew better than to eat scrambled eggs before 11am. See how you had your head in the sink (I now cannot throw up in the toilet because Blake thinks it is too scary so I have resorted to the sink). That should teach you, but I have a feeling you will attempt some other bad thing to make me mad."

Pregnant Lady can get mad at the smallest things like when I forget my cell phone charger upstairs after making my decent and have to turn right back around and face the mountain of stairs I just came down. She somehow put blame on me for getting stuck talking to that weird woman in the grocery store. The emotions she leaves behind remind me of a conversation I had with my high school geometry teacher regarding my intelligence -- it didn't start or end well.

As it goes, I live my days satisfying my young fetus' need for road stand hot dogs and trying my hardest not to wake the sleeping Pregnant Lady. My life is wonderful so please pardon me if I sound like a whiner, for I am just a bit overwhelmed tonight.

Erin's Baby Shower

Today was Erin and Cliff's baby shower. The weather was great and it is always fun to be in the company of Andrew's family. Erin looks and feels great. They are going to make the best parents.

Since they are naming the baby holly, hollyhocks were the theme of the party. Shirley made the centerpieces.


Here they are showing off Shirley's grammy quilt.


Mmmmm...cake.


She looks like a pregnant Barbie doll!


The happy parents to be.


Gift table full of goodies.


And a video of them opening gifts:

Baby Shower Bonanza

This weekend I have two baby showers to attend. I am glad the weekend is finally here because I have been wanting to give the mommies their gifts. Today's baby shower is for a woman I met while taking aqua aerobics at the YMCA when I was pregnant with Blake. She is 9 months pregnant with her second baby and I can't wait to meet her little baby girl.

I started the quilt in the summer and now it doesn't seem to fit the season. I picked up the center piece at an estate sale. The green striped fabric is vintage, but everything else is new.


The birds close up.


The back. I love this print of kids playing old school games.


I wish all these mommies the most splendid births.

Small Things

I was just on the phone with a friend and we were laughing about how our houses can be upended so quickly once our toddlers wake up. So I thought I would share some scenes from my day.

This would be the bagel bag I put in the recycle bin this morning. Blake dug through the silverware drawer for the perfect utensils for lunch. When I put him in his high chair I tried to retrieve the forks from the bag, but he screamed and insisted they now live there. Fine.


Of course slippers belong on the table.


Is she coming or going?


Time to hit the shower while my interior decorator sleeps.

It's A ...

It's official, it's a boy! We had our 13 week ultrasound and found out our next baby is indeed a little boy. The good news is his intestines have returned to the inside and everything is where it should be. We are still working on naming this little one and are having quite the hard time figuring out a first name. We know it will be ? Wright Hurst. Wright is Andrew's father's middle name and I love that it is English for carpenter. I want to pick a first name that represents the Burton side of the family (family name or something to do with woodworking/clocks). I have plenty of time to decide. My morning sickness has finally eased up so hopefully I will be a more fun person to be around.


This is a side view with his arm over his face.

Fall Festival Time

It is Fall Festival time around here. We took Blake to the Los Altos Fall Festival to get him in the spirit.

We saw scarecrows:


He played "pick the pocket"


He fished for goodies


He did a beanbag toss


We rode the train


And saw fun cars at the mini car show


Later that day we went to a pumpkin patch. Here Blake is having fun in the jumpy house. Andrew took photos with his camera so I will post those once I get the camera out and upload the images.

The History of Halloween

Halloween, 1999

Does Andrew not look like a baby and man do I miss being a blonde! So I have been researching the history of Halloween to inspire me to create a festive holiday for Blake. Here are some fun tidbits that I found (this website is not the greatest, but it sums up what I have read from many other sites) from http://www.history-of-halloween.net/:

The Celts, who lived 2,000 years ago in the area that is the present day United Kingdom, Ireland and northern France, celebrated Samhain as their new year on November 1. This time marked the end of summer and harvest period and the beginning of the winter, which is a cold and dark time in this region of the world. The Celts associated the season with death and believed that on the night before Samhain the boundary between the living and the dead was distorted.

The Celts celebrated the night of October 31 when ghosts of the dead where believed to return to earth causing trouble and damaging the community’s food supply. Celtic priests called Druids thought it was easier to make predictions about the future during this time. For the Celts whose existence relied entirely on the whims of nature, the prophecies made by the Druids were an important source of comfort for the long, dark winter months ahead.

The Celts observed the event by burning crops and sacrificing animals to the Celtic Gods in bonfires built by the Druids. They wore costumes, typically of animal skins and heads, to tell each others’ fortunes. And when the celebration was over, the Celts lit their hearth fires from the sacred bonfire to protect them during the coming months.

I love this part:

Halloween also has some close ties to superstitions dealing with love. Some believe if you catch a snail on Halloween night and lock it in a flat dish you will see the first letter of your sweetheart’s name in the morning. Another one says that if a girl puts fresh rosemary and a silver coin under her pillow on Halloween, she will see her future husband in a dream. Girls who carry a lamp to a spring of water on this night are said to be able to see their future husband in the reflection. Additionally, carrying a broken egg in a glass to a spring of water during the day can not only see their future husband by mixing some of the spring water into the glass, but she can also see a glimpse of her future children. Another old tradition said girls should go into a field and there scatter the seed of hemp while chanting “Hempseed I sow thee Come after me and show me”. Upon turning round, it was said each girl would see a vision of the man who would be her husband.

Now, to make Blake a squid or something scary?