candy party!

alex gets invited to all sorts of random fun stuff, and this time he got to invite us along, too!  alex picked penny up from school early (ooooh) and brought her into the city where we all met up at dylan's candy bar for an early halloween party that the hub threw.  i don't know if you've ever gotten the opportunity to tell a two and a half year old that they're going to a halloween party at a candy store, but it's an experience that i highly recommend.
penny wore her ladybug costume, and the first thing we did was take a picture with a ginormous care bear.

this, by the way, is an official press photo from the hub.  thanks!
the party was adorable - there were cookie decorating stations:

and lots of yummy food, specialty drinks and games with prizes.  everyone was so nice to us, and kept thanking us for being there.  at one point, alex turned to me and said "that guy over there talking to that lady...that's R L Stine".  and then he came over and introduced himself, saying "hi, i'm bob".  and my brain exploded a little bit.

he and the kids wrote a ghost story together

 totally adorable - and then we got to preview a show that had all of the kids screaming in terror and clinging to their mommies.  but that's ok!  because after THAT, we all got empty buckets that we filled up with candy!  it was amazing!

you can read alex's waaaaay more professional write up of the events here, and stay tuned for next week's blog post, where you find out what we're ACTUALLY doing for halloween.  it's pretty awesome.

fish sticks

tonight, alex made fish sticks (from scratch!) for dinner, and penny "doesn't like fish".  she was happily eating away at them and asking "are these chicken strips?"  i do my best to never lie to her, but if we let her know what they were, she would definitely have stopped eating them and told us they were yucky.  here is as many truthful responses that i gave as i can remember:

• you can certainly call them that!
• they look like them, don't they?
• aren't they tasty?
• do you like them?

oooh, i just realized how many of these are questions - answering a question with a question, time honored parenting technique.

New York Comic Con

good stuff happens when alex comes home with presents from  NYCC.

the apple festival that kind of wasn't

today we headed out to the queens county farm museum for the apple festival!  it was drizzly, so the hay rides and the world's largest apple cobbler were cancelled.  we got to do lots of stuff - like feeding adorable piglets:

petting tiny chicks & ducklings:

hanging out on some pumpkins:

and picking apples, sort of:

though we were a little soggy by the end, penny's assessment of the day:

Fastener Update

Penny can now operate buttons, zippers, and a real belt!

busy big girl

we started out the weekend at old bethpage with cousins!  penny looooves her cousin jacob, and they had a great time on a hay-less hay ride together.

the best part for both of them, so far as we could tell, was the school bus that brought us from the village to the parking lot.

we also went to a school friend's birthday party at the carousel, and a book signing for penny's grandma's newest book!  it was a busy weekend, but lots of fun!

today, penny and alex went to the library and got her her very own library card!  she is so big i can hardly believe it.