Wassail Night at Peddler's Village in Lahaska, PA

 I know me missed out last year.  I think I had scheduled a night out with the fellas that night not knowing that it was Wassail night!  Patrick and my mother-in-law took Christopher anyway, but we didn't get any pictures.  This year, we carried on the tradition.  This is one of those events that always seems like it will be a lot of fun prior to, but ends up being slightly over-hyped and overrated upon arrival.  It wasn't all too bad really, just incredibly crowded and people tend to be more than just a little on the rude side...definitely not "in the spirit", which rubs me the wrong way, but that's neither here nor there.  On a down-note, Christopher wanted to go for a walk, so he and I went trekking around "the circle" where the Christmas lighting was about to take place.  It was completely dark, however, aside from the lights emanating from the storefronts windows.  We tried to go around the whole circle, but there were just too many people and too many strollers and people were less than friends about "giving up their spots" to let us through, so I hiked Christopher up on my shoulders and turned around and started back the way we came.  It was so dark that about half-way back, I accidentally went off of the brick-paved sidewalk and into the grass center of "the circle".  I didn't realize it until it was too late and when I tried to turn back to return to the sidewalk, there was a seeming flood of people...I couldn't break back to the sidewalk that way.  So we turned back around.  The other thing I didn't see because of the darkness was a tree right in front of me, so when I started walking again, with Christopher on my shoulders, I ran him into the bare branches of the "invisible" tree.  Two ladies saw it go down and yelled towards me that he was caught, and I stopped immediately and brought him, crying and screaming, down to my chest and we returned back to Colleen and Matthew with no more harm done.  He has a couple of scrapes and dings, but he's relatively unscathed.  

We ended up having a great night with the boys.  Christopher got to see Santa turn on the Christmas lights there and helped everyone count-down...totally recovered from his battle with the invisible tree.  Matthew initially freaked out a bit, but came to after we took him from his stroller and lifted him up to see all the lights.  His eyes were as wide as saucers.  We walked around Peddler's Village for a bit, bought some coffee from one of the local merchants and headed back to the car to get the boys home and to bed.  Aside from the one incident, a very successful and pleasant night for all of us.

(pictured below: some of the lights from around Peddler's Village)

Pictures: 

Left - Christopher and Me 
Right - Colleen and Christopher
Below - Matthew and Me
Large Pictrure - Christopher donating to the Salvation Army....for a candy cane.
Bottom left -The Peddler's Village String Band playing Christmas Songs
Bottom right - Col's Family

Random Pics of the Boys Playing Cars

I hear that's natural for a parent to feel that way from time-to-time, and tonight was one of those "times". Prior to this, they played very well together.  Christopher asked if he could bring his Hot Wheels out from his bedroom.  We let him and off they went to playland.  They were being extra cute so I decided to take the time to get a couple of good shots. Of course, once the camera was out, the "cuteness" began to cede, but I managed a few shots of both boys playing cars.  Matthew is fun because he makes a "car" sound...it sounds more like a moped that needs oil than a car, but it is very cute.  Christopher is at the age where it's fun just to sit back and watch and/or listen to his imagination run away when he's playing.  We get to hear the events of his school day translated through Hot Wheels play (mostly "school bus, you have to stay in line." or "No, no, police car kick your legs out!").  Regardless, here are some photos of the evening.

Gift from Karen

 Christopher just wanted to show off his hoodie from "Aunt" Karen.  

The morning starts off as usual...no problems.  Then, from out of nowhere.....A HUGE DINOSAUR COMES OVER FOR BREAKFAST!!!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(screams of terror)

Halloween Rap, Son!!!!

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Halloween 2011

We have the great fortune to have two very funny children.  Although some might think that this could very well be a future bane (and I might be inclined to agree), but, at least for now, I find it be amazing and almost refreshing.  We spent a few weeks before Halloween having multiple "discussions" with Christopher (and for those who know him, I use the term "discussions" loosely) about what he wanted for his costume.  The conversation went something like this:

 
Colleen: "Christopher, what do you want to be for Halloween this year, buddy?"

Thomas: "Do you want to be a pirate like Jake [and the Neverland Pirates (Disney show)]? Or maybe a robot? Maybe a car? That would be cool, right?"

Christopher: "Um....maybe...um....Mommy, maybe I wanna be a 'caution wet fwoor sign."

Thomas: [with a giggle and a curious expression] "A caution wet floor sign? Really?"

Christopher: [laughing] "Yeah, Daddy, I wanna be a caution wet fwoor sign."

Colleen: [laughing with Thomas] "Okay, we'll try."

For days, we verbally checked in with Christopher, "Christopher what do you want to be for Halloween?" His response every time was "A caution wet fwoor sign!" usually accompanied with a belly laugh (the kid still has that infectious laugh that comes forcefully and joyfully from his belly).  He never swayed, so we had to make it happen.  After some work, some trial runs, and some experiments, we were able to find a workable prototype for him to try on last Friday.  It worked, but could have been better, so we made the appropriate changes and we have now, after some painstaking and time-extensive labor, finally arrived at the final model...one that will have to work.

So, the question was then, what to do with Matthew.  As he could not verbally inform us of his wants and desires as far as a Halloween costume, we had to find something on our own.  We thought it might be a good idea to try to incorporate his costume with Christopher's and try to make him some variation of a mop and bucket.  Again, we hit the grindstone and worked on some "prototypes".  We came up with what we thought would be a great final product, but it fell drastically short, as he was unable to physically sit up in the contraption that we had constructed for him.  Back to the workshop we went, and finally came to a model that is not only workable and implementable, but also weather appropriate.  He was begrudgingly compliant.

So we arrive at our final models for the Halloween 2011 costumes for Christopher and Matthew Kane....

 May the Kane family proudly present:

The Caution Wet Floor Sign and the Mop and Bucket.
(The costumes were pretty much spent by the time I was able to get the pictures, sorry.)

 

Here are some other pictures from Halloween Trick-or-Treating

Christopher Makin' da Pizza

 Nonna's Pizzaria in the Levittown area is a location we've been somewhat frequently since we discovered it next to the newly constructed Super Walmart.  The food is good, the prices aren't too bad, and, most of all, the people who work there are very nice and friendly.  We actually love going there.  There's a pizzaria in the front, and behind that is a very small, quaint dining area.  It's rarely crowded in the dining area, as most people just come in for pizza dine-in (there are tables in the front as well, but they're not "served" so to speak) or take-out.  The man who makes the pizza, I think he's one of the owners or managers or something, but I'm not really sure, has befriended Christopher (professionally, of course), gives him high-fives and what-not when we come in and when we leave.  Very nice, man.  A few weeks ago, he offered to allow Christopher to make his own pizza and told us to bring our camera so we could take pictures.  Of course, we came back the following week, camera in hand, and they were very, very busy making pizzas (baseball playoffs were on and the Phillies were playing that night, so it made sense, but we didn't think about that, of course) so Christopher wasn't able to make his pizza.  We had neglected to remind him that he'd be doing that, so it wasn't an issue.  We hadn't been back since (this was a few weeks ago now) until last Thursday.  Nonna's wasn't too busy and Christopher was able to make his pizza.  At this point, however, we'd forgotten about the promise and, thus, forgot to bring our camera.  We got pictures, but they're grainy and a bit out-of-focus, but Christopher had a blast making his pizza and eating something he got to actually "make". Don't worry, the Garbage Disposal (a.k.a. "The Nudge", a.k.a. "Prader-Willi Boy") Matthew enjoyed eating Christopher's creation, too.