The crazy lady with the costume bin

Wow, this has been the craziest Halloween season yet! This year, ever since mid-September, I've felt like I've been pulled in all directions. It all started with my Adam Lambert concerts and then it was Christian's birthday (he had a little party at school) and then I went on a cruise to Europe for the first two weeks in October (which I STILL have not documented, yes, I know, bad blogger) and then I quickly put together the Thrill The World Miami event for this year at the last moment (I've lost several years of my life stressing over THAT one) and then I went to Halloween Horror Nights and then I went to 3 parties the night before Halloween and then I went trick or treating the actual night of. I AM EXHAUSTED! Hello November! I welcome you with open arms! The only craziness you offer me is Thanksgiving (which I don't cook, so it's not really crazy for me) and Black Friday (which I go to purely for sport).

Anyway, that having been said, back to the Halloween blog. This year, someone commented that they had seen me in 3 different costumes in one season! Oh how true that is. I'm a Halloween nut and I have a costume bin at home. Every year I just pick from there and mix and match to make my costume. I hate the pre-packaged ones, they're just so void of creativity and ingenuity. Christian is starting his own costume drawer as well because this year, he too had on 3 different costumes (Wolverine, Spiderman, Darth Vader). Jordan on the other hand, hates costumes. He clearly got that from his father. I had to struggle with him to get him to wear a superman pajama (not even a real costume, but whatever) to go trick or treating!

On to my costumes, for Thrill The World, I dressed up as a zombie of course.. For Halloween Horror Nights, you can't dress up, otherwise, you know I would've had a 4th costume. No crazy costumes there, just good ole crazy me (in the asylum house no less).

On Saturday night, our Thrill The World group performed again at Hellrotika. This was a fundraiser for Save Dade (which truly deserves its very own blog post for the vast number of outrageous and creative costumes that were in attendance...I LOVED IT!). For that gig, I was dressed up as Alice Cooper in Wonderland. I picked this because later that same night I went down the rabbit hole (not a dirty euphimism I swear) to my friend Melanie's Alice in Wonderland party. She totally went all out with the decorations and her backyard looked awesome. She goes all out with decorations just like I do (even more so I would say).

And last, but certainly not least. On Halloween night I dressed up as Junice Merill. For those of you unfamiliar with Juney, she's a character from SNL. Here's the video of the skit. I was recently introduced to her via a friend's post on Facebook and once I saw it, there was no turning back. I had to be her!

Unfortunately, I didn't really go anywhere with the costume on, I just took the kids trick or treating (and went to Jenny's Halloween campout later on). I don't think that many people would have recognized who I was anyway, so the costume was purely for the self satisfaction of being able to put it together and be a freak for a night...oh wait, I'm a little strange all the time.

Christmas Card Out-takes

The other day, I got a Christmas card from my friend Karen. On the card are her entire family (3 kids, herself and her hubby), all of them smiling perfectly and looking fabulous. I don't know how some people manage to do get decent Christmas photos with everyone in the picture smiling beautifully! How do those that have 3 kids do it? or those of you that regularly photograph 6 girls (you know who you are Mrs. beautiful pictures)? I had my work cut out for me last week...and I only have 2 kids to work with.

I dressed the boys up in their "ties" and tried to take pictures of them with several backgrounds and tried to place them in several poses. I took posed shots, candid shots, paparazzi shots and yet that elusive "perfect" (I'll even take decent at this point) Christmas card shot never came out.

What did come out was a whole lot of: blurries, oops he moved, Chris wasn't looking, JJ wasn't looking, no one was looking, you have food on your mouth, the dog got in the way, sit next to your brother, closer, closer, OK, not that close, put your arm around him, no don't choke him, smile Chris, no not like that, a real smile, stop bothering your brother, see now you made him cry, stop watching TV, Hey, the camera's over here, just give him the toy, and can we stop taking pictures now mom?


But don't let me tell you all about it. See for yourself:

I am returning from the dead...

...just to show you the pictures of Christian and Jordan in their Halloween costumes!

Jordan was dressed as baby Michael Jackson (does that come as a surprise to anyone?). Christian was dressed up as Batman. He wore the mask intermittently throughout the night, but I managed to get JJ to wear his wig the whole time he was trick or treating. I guess he forgot he had it on at some point.

At around 6:45 we went trick or treating, but it felt strange because it was still light out. The first 10 or so doors that we knocked on, did not open the door. That kind of sucks. There also weren't that many kids out. Chris got tired pretty quickly, so we headed home after a short while.

It's kind of sad because Halloween these days isn't what it used to be. Nowadays, there's hardly any kids out because they all go to the mall. For some reason getting candy from Abercrombie and Fitch just kills the Halloween fun for me. Alot of people stop giving candy altogether because they get tired of buying it year after year only to have no kids show up, the kids don't show up because people don't give candy, so the cycle continues.

I loved trick or treating with my cousins when I was young. I remember a whole herd of us would go from house to house (with parental chaperones) and almost everyone would open the door...and no, there weren't any razor blades in my candy. Some houses had such cool decorations on the outside and some were even decorated inside. Ooooh spoooky! I remember we would pass many other herds of children too. After we got tired of walking around (or the parents were tired) we would head back home and check out our stash (which was always huge)! This is when the wheeling and dealing would commence. I cringed when I got pennies instead of candies and I was always trying to trade away the candy corn for gum. Ah, those were the good ole' days.

I know I can't turn back time and let my children experience Halloween in the 80's, but hopefully Chris and JJ can make their own wonderful Halloween memories so they can carry those with them for many years to come.

Happy Love Day

Happy Belated Valentine's Day! I hope you all had a wonderful holiday filled with lovely expensive presents...err, I mean filled with love, yes, love is what I meant. Mine was filled with kickball and pasta shells and delicious children (no, I did not eat any children, I meant delicious looking).

First, I participated in a fun filled game of kickball with some coworkers. I honestly cannot remember the last time I played that game. I would say it was probably in Elementary school or Jr High (I'm aging myself because notice I didn't call it "middle school"). I felt like a kid again out there on the field, hoping and praying that the ball would not get kicked in my general direction. Hoping that if it did get kicked in my direction, that it would not fly right through my hands. Hoping that I wouldn't fall or look like a fool (no such luck) when trying to kick the ball (operative word: trying). Hoping that I wouldn't sprain my ankle while running the bases. Hoping that I actually got to run the bases. You get the point. Based on this last paragraph, I think we can safely deduce that I was not the best athlete in school. Things have not changed. Despite all the sweating (from worrying, not so much from running), I had a great time and would love to participate in a kickball league in the future. It would have to be a child's league though, in order for my skills to be evenly matched with the other players.

After the game (which we won by the way), I headed home with the kiddos to relax a bit. That evening we went to Amanda's house for a potluck Valentine's celebration with some friends. It's much simpler that way because we did not have to worry about finding babysitters or braving the crowds on a Saturday night Valentine's Day. We had delicious pasta shells and good company. Amanda even tried to get me to watch the Princess Bride since I had recently admitted (via a Facebook meme) that I had never seen that movie. What a travesty! Unfortunately, we had to leave before the movie was over (it was past my bedtime), so I still have not seen the movie. Oh well, do I get points for having seen half of it?

Last but not least, here are the delicious children:

This one's for you Ariel

And now for your viewing enjoyment, some Christmas Carols by Christian. In the first video he uses Jordan's rattle as the accompanying rhythm (we've got rhythm yes we do, we've rhythm how about you). Pay attention to the lyrics on the second one. Sorry for the crappy lighting.

Aw crap

CMan so very nicely pointed this out to me in a flyer the other day

This year

Things went a whole lot smoother with Santa. Last year CMan was clinging to me like a koala and never even touched his lap, but this time, he actually sat next to the man and even uttered a couple of words to him. Christian asked Santa to bring him a "blaster". Santa said he looked like a good boy and that perhaps he would get his blaster.

Since there was no line, the photographer took lots of shots because my child refused to smile. This was the one and only smile we got from like 15 pictures taken. It's a shame JJ was oblivious to the whole thing and looking off into space. Oh and I was pretty impressed that Santa was bilingual...what can I say, he didn't exactly have that Latin look to him.



When we went to pay for the picture, Christian said..."where's my blaster?". Talk about instant gratification. He was upset that he would have to wait until Christmas for it. By the way, I wish Santa would tell me what a "blaster" is so that I can know what to expect on Christmas morning.

Happy Be-lated Halloween!!!

I haven't really filled you in on the happenings around here this past month, so let's play catch up shall we? First off, landscaping be damned! I was able to put my creepy stuff out among the plants, so THERE! I pulled my tombstones and skulls out of my garage and displayed them in my mini yard. I took some pictures, but I can't find them right now, so I'll post them later.

Christian and I also carved some pumpkins. Unfortunately, I did it too soon and they were long gone by the time Halloween came around. I think I did a mighty good job though considering that I've only done this about once or twice before.

Of course, my spooky village also made an appearance this year. Christian managed to only break one figurine this time.

On Wednesday we headed up to Orlando to go to Halloween Horror Nights once again. Since JJ is breastfeeding, I had to take him with me. I also took my mom with me so she could watch him in the hotel while I went to party with the monsters. I'm crazy, but not insane enough to take my child to that wacky madness. The rest of my party consisted of 8 other friends, some repeats from last year and some new volunteers too. Unfortunately we got a late start, so we didn't get to the park till about 8 or 9. We had an express pass, but unfortunately it wasn't enough and we weren't able to see all the haunted houses. We missed out on Creatures and Interstellar Terror. The scare zones were really fun though and since I had my Vault shirt on, I got quite a bit of attention from the creatures that were roaming the park that night. (Ha ha! I just went to the vault website so I could link to it in this post and I noticed that my picture was on the page!) We had a great time, but it felt a little rushed this year and the houses felt a little empty. Hopefully next year will be better. I was supposed to meet up with my Orlando friend WB, but my mom wanted to leave the next morning asap, so that didn't happen either.

On Halloween night I took CMan trick or treating for the first time ever (my mom took him last year, he didn't go the years before that). He was a little (alot) spooked out by the whole affair and wanted nothing to do with it. Oh sure, he loved wearing the costume (a pirate of course) at home, but going outside with it? in the dark? knocking on strangers doors?...not so much. He endured the torture and was very happy to be home. Hopefully this is not a trend that will be continued...Mama needs her candy! JJ also went trick or treating, I didn't want him to freak out too when he was older, so I figured I'd start him out at a young age...plus hello, more candy for me. After we were done with our neighborhood, I left JJ with Ren and headed to my mom's neighborhood to check out the decorations of the houses. While roaming the streets, I found a guy who built his own haunted house. I was totally floored with excitement...another loony! Like me! Except his house was outside and it was actually a structure that he constructed out of plywood. Awesome! I couldn't take enough pictures. Even though it had no actors, just props, CMan refused to go in...and I didn't force him. We don't want to traumatize him or anything you know.

Hey! Remember me?

I feel like I've been away for ages, but it's only been about 8 days since my last post. Either way, I've got some updates due to my lack of blogging activity.

First off, I hope you had a great Fourth of July because mine kinda sucked. It rained by my house the whole day (and evening), so going anywhere to see fireworks was not on my list of things I wanted to do (rain, puddles, mosquitoes, big pregnant lady, 2 year old...no thanks). Fortunately, I am a lucky soul and some neighbors were doing some fireworks. I happened to look out my bedroom window and noticed that I had my own little show going on. I got to enjoy fireworks from the comfort of my bed. Yay! Cman got to see them too, but quickly got bored since there was a minute lapse in between each one. Hey, it wasn't professional or anything, but beggars can't be choosers. When the private firework viewing was over, we watched the ones from NY on TV. It was raining there too. Booo.

My son has been up to alot lately. He's gotten even more into the pirates thing where now he wants to watch the movie all the time. Fortunately, he's also learned how to turn the TV on, turn the DVD player on, put the DVD in there and press play all by himself. A skill that I will find immensely useful come 5 weeks from now. So where was I? Oh yes, Pirate-fever. Sheets of paper are fashioned into pirate hats, mustaches are drawn on with pen, toilet paper tubes and paper towel tubes are all telescopes and God help you if you don't wear the pirate patch when commanded to do so. You must wear it at all times, especially during the numerous sword vs hook fights that take place in our house. Well, I guess the frenzy is fitting for him since he's got the attitude of a pirate these days...and to prove it...a recent quote...."Don't tell me what to do!"....nice.

Little wiggly's room is starting to take shape. The boys will be sharing a room (because I have too much junk in the other room), so I'm changing things around a bit. We ripped the border off and my mom is going to paint a new one, so I'll show you that when it's done. My nesting instinct wants to take over, but my tiredness instinct is winning the battle right now. How is one supposed to "nest" if one is short of breath?

Bunny Pictures and Chimbo Eggs

So here are the bunny pictures that I promised.
On Sunday we went to Amanda and Eric's house to celebrate Eric's birthday and Easter. We had some yummy food and then all the kids went on an Easter Egg hunt. CMan was better at it this year than last. He didn't stop to examine and play with each egg. This time he actually continued to pick more eggs up.

After the egg hunt I brought out my secret stash of Salvadorean chimbo eggs (huevos chimbos) that my mom had made and started smashing them on people's heads. Fortunately for my victims, they aren't as bad as they sound.

Huevos chimbos are hollow eggs that are painted and have confetti in them. They are part of the Holy week traditions in El Salvador and are thrown during the processions. I had trouble finding any articles about them under that name because huevos chimbos is also the name of a candy in Venezuela (and other countries). This blog talks a little about them, and if you know Spanish you can read up on them here. They are really fun, but they make quite a mess; if you don't believe me, just ask Amanda (sorry!). They are also used in Mexico but there they are called cascarones. Under that name, you can find many more articles about the confetti-filled eggs. Here are some instructions on how to make them so you can trick your friends next Easter!

Happy Valentine's Day

From the cheeto bandit and company

This past weekend we went to Brandon and Matthew's birthday party at the park and we had a great time. At first Cman was hesitant to get in the old bounce house o'fear, but he eventually got over it and was bouncing in there all by himself. We also rode on the little train, but I think I liked it more than he did.

Tonight I have a date with folding the laundry so that should be hot and steamy. Ren and I hate going out this day because everything is super crowded. We celebrate our anniversary in 8 days anyway, so we'll go out then!

Last but not least, I went to the OB today. Little Wiggly is doing well. HB 177.

Happy V. Day to all!

One Little, Two Little, Three...

Thank you for all the good wishes in my previous posts; all is going well so far (cross fingers).

This particular post is over a month late, but it's taken me that long to gather up all the required pictures. I had to go into my parents vault of old and embarassing pictures to aquire these beauties so read on and enjoy.

In El Salvador December 12th is celebrated as "Fiesta de los Indios" (literal translation = party of the Indians or Celebration of the Indians). On this day Our Lady of Guadalupe , the patron saint of Latin America, is venerated to commemorate the account of her appearances to Juan Diego on the hill of Tepeyac near Mexico City from December 9 through December 12, 1531. Even though this event took place in Mexico and has nothing to do with El Salvador, it seems that Salvadoreans like to party and will gladly borrow another country's holiday to do just that.

Juan Diego was an indigenous Mexican, so on this day, children in El Salvador dress up in indigenous costumes and walk with the Virgin of Guadalupe in a procession.

Salvadoreans apparently also like to dress up (see people, I'm not crazy...it's in my roots). Here I am in my Indian outfit holding some mangos.

Not wanting to waste a precious dress-up opportunity, I asked my aunt to send me a little Indian outfit for Cman to wear on December 12th.

Behold the indigenous cuteness:


The only thing missing was the painted on mustache.

Here are some pictures of me and my cousin Camilo (circa 1980?) in El Salvador wearing our little Indian outfits:

Greetings from El Salvador

I've been here for 8 days now and I've been nasty sick with a cold for three of those days. I have no morning sickness though (6 weeks, 2 days), so ever the pessimist, I naturally assume the worst (I need to stop hanging out in those TTC/pregnancy forums). I will update on my adventures thusfar at another time, but for now it's time to make resolutions. Ok, but before making new resolutions, let's see how I did with last year's:

CLAUDIA'S RESOLUTIONS FOR 2007 (in no particular order):
1. Fit into my clothes (check, somewhat)
2. Get more exercise into my daily life (at least 3 times a week) (check, somewhat)
3. Organize my bed/scrap/playroom/office...ok, the whole freaking house (I had a yard sale and donated everything that didn't sell. I organized the playroom, so check, kind of)
4. Get somewhat caught up on my scrapping (I'm a year behind)...NO CHECK
5. Give Christian a sibling (almost check...technically)
6. Convince Ren that it's time for child #2 (check)
7. Eat out less/eat less junk food (by less I mean not every freaking day)...(check, somewhat)
8. Drink more water and less soda (check...yay)
9. Take a cooking class (ha ha, no check)
10. Save money by not spending it on useless crap (no check)

7 out of 10, nor bad.

CHRISTIAN'S RESOLUTIONS FOR 2007 (in no particular order)
Get molars (check)
Use a spoon (check)
Don't scream during bathtime (almost had a check, but now he's doing it again)
Climb (check)
Run (check)
Talk (somewhat check)
Stop putting everything in my mouth (check)
Stop throwing things (NO CHECK)
Reduce my violent tendencies (smacking, scratching, hitting, biting)...(check)
Learn my numbers (somewhat check)

8 out of 10, once again, I was beat by a toddler.

Ok so how about this year's resolutions...

CLAUDIA'S RESOLUTIONS FOR 2008:
1. Stop wasting money on crap
2. Put more money in savings
3. Don't gain 42 pounds like I did when I was prego with Christian
4. Force Encourage Christian to learn to play by himself
5. Organize my house
6. Definitely need to catch up on my scrapping now

For some reason I can't think of that many resolutions right now...maybe it's cause I feel like crap.

CHRISTIAN'S RESOLUTIONS FOR 2008:
1. Eat my food
2. Learn to play by myself
3. Stop screaming at bathtime
4. Gain weight
5. Grow 2 inches so I can ride the rides at the fair
6. Stop kicking mom in the stomach (my mom seems to think this is very important)
7. Learn my colors
8. Learn to use a regular cup without spilling it all over myself

That's all folks. Update coming up when I feel better.

Happy New Year Indeed!

Let's hope I don't watch a TV special on Australia next

Last week I was watching a travel channel type special about how Disney is celebrating the holidays this year. I love me some Mickey...and I love me some holidays...put them together and well...It's overwhelming.

They showed how the castle was lit up with a jillion lights this year and I just lost it. It was such a beautiful sight that my mouth was open and the tears were flowing from my eyes. I can't say I've ever had that reaction to a Disney TV special before, but there you have it. At that moment I decided that I needed to see that in person. I needed to see that!

So..um, guess where I went this past Thursday?

Here's a hint....and here's another...and there's several more on flickr, so check out the little badgie over on the right!

What's between your couch cushions?

Yesterday at my mom's house, I was trying to get Chris to sing some Christmas Carols. Here I am trying to get Christian to sing "We wish you a Merry Christmas". He wasn't cooperating and started looking through the couch cushions.



And here we have Jum-bo-go (Jingle bells):




For the record, he found a button in my mom's couch.

It's beginning to look alot like Christmas...

I snapped some pictures of my decorations on my way out of the house this morning:

PS. Happy Birthday Amanda!

iTree 2.0

We ended up taking the other tree back. I couldn't get my hands on a chainsaw and it was really brown at the bottom, so we just took it back. They gave R a bit of a hassle since he didn't have his receipt, but after much arguing they finally gave in and gave him a store credit.

I didn't get to go with him, so I was scared that he'd come back with some Frankenstein looking tree, but he didn't disappoint. He picked out this gorgeous beauty. It's a douglas fir and it's almost 7 1/2 feet tall. I like that it's not as fat as the other one, so it doesn't take up my whole living room. Oh and it was cheaper than the other one too.... $21.99!

I'm working on dressing it up...decoration pictures to follow...

My tree needs an I.V.

Thanksgiving was spent at my brother in-law's house. Christian made friends with a giant boy (he was born the same month and year as Christian). My uncle was here from El Salvador, so he got to experience his first Thanksgiving. It was hard to have that wonderful, peaceful, thankful feeling because Cman was crabby, tantrumy (is that a word?) and tired.

This past Sunday we bought our Christmas tree, unfortunately we seem to have gotten a defective one. I put water in the holder three days ago and it still has the same amount of water. The tree is refusing to drink and the bottom is starting to get brown. I can't figure out how to get it to absorb the water. At this pace, it will be all brown before Christmas.

It's also a bit misshapen. It's really full and lush and beautiful at the bottom, but the top is kind of wimpy.

Judge for yourselves:

I haven't put any lights or ornaments on because I want to solve the water problem first. All my other Christmas trees have been well behaved; I don't know why this one is acting up. It was trimmed at the bottom when we bought it, so who knows what the problem is.

I also got a nice wreath at a yard sale. It's big and beautiful and it only cost me 2 bucks. That's what I'm talking about man! I guess the two dollar wreath balances out with the $140 I spent at Pottery Barn Kids yesterday right? right? Yes, I thought so too.

Scary Santa

Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Cla....Wait Christian!...Come back!...It's OK baby, it's just Santa...

Yeah, this year's Santa picture didn't go very well (not that last year's was any good either). At least last year though, I was able to get him to sit on Santa's lap. This year, I had a monkey-boy that attached himself to me and wouldn't let go.

I can't say I blame him though...that Coca Cola Publix Santa was kind of scary looking. It's a good thing the picture was free. I'm glad I didn't go through the hassle of dressing him up and taking him to the Falls like I did last year.

Click here for some more hilarious Scary Santa pictures.