Today we went trick-or-treating at Rosewood Estates Senior Living Home with the mom's group.  We had a blast.  Oliver seems to understand the overall concept, but more times than not he forgets to say please and thank you.  There was a man sitting in the hallway with a bowl of candy in his lap.  Oliver walked right up to him and took a piece of candy out of the bowl.  The man's reply was "that boy is going to be rich someday".  I said thanks, but the more I think about it, I hope that's not how he gets things.  I hope that it is just a 2 year old seeing candy and taking some.  I know that's what it is, but it just got me thinking.    I hope gets what he want's in life, but doing it the right way.  Politely, honestly and caring about other people.  If being rich fits in that equation, so be it.  I'm sure he'll share with his mama.  

Thank you Oliver

Oliver and I decided to make caramel apples yesterday after I put Amelia down for her afternoon nap. I had anticipated it to go like every other time I've tried to make something with him. He usually starts out strong, makes a huge mess and then ends up watching cartons while I finish the last 98%. He surprised me this time. He helped me unwrap the 50 caramels, melt them on the stove, put the 5 popsicle sticks in the apples and spoon the gooey goodness over the apples. He immediately wanted to eat one. I told him he had to wait becuse it was almost dinner time and they have to go in the refrigerator for an hour. There was extra caramel even after adding extra to the 5 apples. I thought what the heck, why can't we have a treat before dinner. I'm the mom and I make the rules (at least while dad's at work). I cut up an apple, put it in a bowl, and drizzled the sticky caramel on top. You should have seen Oliver's eyes light up when I told him it was for us to eat now. Just from his expressions he seemed to understand that it was a special treat and we were breaking the rules. One for you, one for me as we casually enjoyed the fruits of our labor. I had dinner to make and I didn't care. I was taking this un-interupted time to enjoy my son's company. Also, keep in mind he has been in the kitchen with me for about an hour. That is a record. The whole time we were eating he kept saying 'thanks mom!' At one point, he even got up and moved his chair closer to mine, 'there' he said. He looked up at me with a really sweet look and said 'friends mom'. I gave him a huge hug and said 'yes honey, we're friends'. You could tell at that moment he felt very happy, content and loved. As did I. There you go, my favorite mommy moment to date. Oliver, I will always be your mom, you can't change that, but I hope you will always want to be my friend. I am very proud to have you as my very cool, sweet, caring and sensitive little boy. I don't feel like I say that enough.   I love you Sweetheart. 

ps. dinner was still on time.

MMMM...Chocolate

He is definitely my son. 

No, I was not letting him eat a bowl of chocolate.  He was licking the bowl after I melted some milk chocolate chips in it.

Disney movie here I come

My aunt bought Amelia this costume at a garage sale earlier this week. 

 

She absolutely loved it, and we had a lot of laughs. It was well worth the $1.00. 

I can't pass up a good deal

So I'm learning that my thriftiness can sometimes be a curse.  I had a mission on Saturday, make baby food for Amelia.  I woke up early.  Oliver and I were at the Farmers Market by 8am. *side note-  I had a great time with Oliver.  I rarely get 1 on 1 time with him.  If we split up I usually get Amelia because she is more cooperative if I am tying to get something done*  We were looking for  squash, apples, carrots, pumpkins & sweet potatoes.  We found butternut & acorn squash  for $1 a piece.  Great, I'll get 2 of each.  The butternut squash was so big the vendor asked me if I wanted to pull my car up.  Nah, I have a cloth bag.  I can carry it.  Then we found nice looking carrots for $2/ basket.  I'll get 2.  Throw in $1 for a yummy sprinkle doughnut for my cooperative, sweet son.  So total I spent $9 at the farmers market.  Since we only found 2 things on my list, we stopped at Rainbow on our way home.  They had sweet potatoes and apples on sale.  Fantastic.  I started to feel the "I'm getting such a great deal" rush.  I bought 6 lbs of sweet potatoes for $3.50, 6 lbs of apples for $6,  2 avocados for $2.50 & two huge cans of pumpkin for $4.  I had the drive home to try to figure out how much I spent. Grand total for all of the food was $24.  I could wait to tell Tim.  He was lucky to have married such a thrifty mom.  I started boiling sweet potatoes and got the squash in the oven.  I wish I would have taken pictures the butternut squash. It barely fit on my cookie sheet.  I pureed the potatoes in the blender.  And got them in the ice cube trays.  Keep in mind, I have 6 ice cube trays to freeze the purees in.  6 trays are usually enough to freeze all of he food I make, once in a while I have to do 2 batches.  The sweet potatoes took up all of the 6 trays.  I don't know why this surprised me.  So I was just going to puree the squash and refrigerate it until the trays became available.  I filled up the blender, but it wouldn't turn on .  I fried the blender.  Aggghhhh.  So I had to resort to using the tiny baby food processor I had stashed away.  Long store short, I am still not done.  I have not even touched the carrots or apples and my freezer is full.  I have to get rid of some of the food in order to finish my project.  Why did the freezer space not come into play when I was buying all of the food?  I'll tell you why.  I'm crazy!  When it come s to getting good deals, my common sense goes out the window.  But I must tell you,  I have 350 cubes/ounces of food already (not counting the apples and carrots).  That is 2 1/2 months of food for less then $24.  If anyone wants some squash or sweet potato puree, let me know.  I need my freezer back and I think Amelia would enjoy eating something other then those 2 veggies.  Next mission... get the rest of the food done before it spoils.