Gearing up for Thanksgiving

I am cooking Thanksgiving dinner this year - but I'm not too worried; I cooked last year and everything worked out pretty well. The turkey wasn't raw and everything came together nicely. This year I do have the added pressure of impressing my in-laws, but they are pretty easy to please and have already offered lots of help. No problem!

Link and I decided to do a cooking-warm-up of sorts in preparation for the big cooking day Thursday. We made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies (big thanks to my sister-in-law Suze for the recipe!) and they are oh-so yummy!



Lincoln loves to help in the kitchen, especially when licking a beater is involved. Before I even mixed up the dough he kept pointing to the beater and then pointing to his tongue. I guess that is sign language for "Mom! I want to lick that, NOW!" haha


A little messy??!
(also note Lincoln's cute little slippers that I found at Wal-Mart for $5 - gotta love Wal-Mart!)

When Mom has to say sorry

Today as I was getting ready in the bathroom I heard Lincoln banging something loudly in the other room. I was blow-drying my hair and it was much louder than the dryer, so I finally went out to check what it was. Link had taken our Rock Band drumsticks and was drumming furiously on the TV stand. I yelled at him to stop and grabbed the drumsticks away - while Lincoln looked bewildered. It was only then that I looked at the TV - Sesame Street was on and Oscar the Grouch was drumming with a friend on some garbage cans. For all I know he probably said "Hey kids, you try drumming at home too!" I felt I needed to apologize to my sweet son for just trying to imitate Oscar, and actually finding the right tools for drumming! Sometimes moms make mistakes too.

Library Photo Shoot

I wanted to take some fall pictures of Lincoln, so I thought outside the Weehawken Public Library would be a good spot. The outside is stone and looks like a castle - I heard someone once call it "The Harry Potter Library". Here's what I got:

Inside the library - there is a little stage with a "talking" tree for storytime


Link saying "Cheese!!"


Fed up with the picture-taking?





I know I am a little biased, but I think he is such a handsome boy!

My Little Personal Shopper

I don't know how you moms with more than one child do it - how can you go shopping without going completely insane? As Lincoln gets older and more mobile, I am quickly realizing that shopping is the most arduous task there is. Gone are the days of lazily strolling down aisles of clothes or taking a long list to Wal-Mart. I make my list, get a game plan ready, and then zoom through the store as quickly as possible while trying to keep Link from standing up in the cart, crying too much, or opening all my purchases before they are paid for. I have to be equipped with candy, toys, and impulse-buys to keep this little guy happy.

Here's a recent story to illustrate my point:

Last week while grocery shopping, Lincoln had already had it with the trip about 2 minutes after walking into the store. I was in the produce department and needed to buy some apples, which Link was very excited about since he likes apples now and thinks they are balls to throw. He wanted to help me by putting the apples into the plastic bag, which I let him do. Then he sat in his seat in the cart happily with the bag of apples, putting them in and out of the bag. "Great!" I thought, "This is going to keep him busy for a while; and I don't even need to break out the M&Ms yet!" A few aisles later I notice Lincoln started munching on one of the apples. Oh well, he was really enjoying it, and again, it's healthier than the M&M option in my bag - so I let him chew on the apple.

This is where I made the fatal mistake: NEVER leave a 19.5 month-old to his own devices with a bag of apples!

The next time I look at him, he is munching on another apple and then I see ALL the apples in the bag with little bite marks out of them! Ahhhh! I took all the apples away from him, paid, and got out of the store as quickly as possible.



It wasn't until after I told Ryan this story that he asked "Well, how did you expect to pay for an eaten apple? Aren't they sold by the pound?" Oops! I guess in my hopes to keep my son quiet I hadn't even considered the fact that I would have to pay by weight instead of just by item (like what usually happens with fishy crackers, fruit snacks, cookies, etc.). Luckily all the bites added up weren't that much apple, so I don't think I ripped off the store too badly. I probably should go back and give them a dollar or something...

Halloween Fun!

Lincoln had a fun 2nd Halloween. Here's a quick flashback to his 1st Halloween:

Do you think he has changed at all since then?!


We went to a parade that was held in Hoboken, NJ (the city just south of us). There were TONS of little kids there all decked out in their costumes. The "parade" consisted of about 2 middle school bands and a couple decorated cars - but the kids seemed to like it anyway. (Here are all the church kids that we met up with there)


Then all the little shops along the street where the parade was handed out candy to the trick-or-treaters. Getting the candy was definitely the highlight for Link. He especially loves lollipops...

And M&Ms


I dressed up as a "dog walker" (complete with leash and pooper-scooper bag [full of chocolate]) - which is an actual occupation here in NJ/NY, strangely enough!


We had a great Halloween and will be enjoying eating the candy for many, many weeks to come - thanks to my over-buying (again!) and having NO trick-or-treaters come to our door. :( I guess kids don't ring apartment buzzers to trick-or-treat here. Oh well!