Happy Halloween!

Our Little Flower, Paprika, had a GREAT second Halloween! We went to our neighbor's house for a party. All the kids looked adorable in their costumes, but of course I thought Paprika looked the cutest!

Here's our little flower:


Wondering Where the Candy Went:


Sitting on Mommy's Lap:


Contemplating the Meaning of Life:



The Three of Us:



Trick-Or-Treating:

These are some of the cool, decorated houses in our neighborhood. They were so spooky we were almost too scared to go up to the doors!:

All in all, a good Halloween was had by all!

Spiders!

We were up in Santa Barbara this past weekend. Paprika had a great time sitting on this rocking chair at Grandma's house and reading all about spiders! She was so excited to have a chair to sit in that was just the right size for her, and she was so happy to rock herself. This chair has seen a lot of use, since both Mr. Mustard and Andrea used it when they were kids. So perfect!

My Books Have Arrived!

My books are back from the printer's and they are gorgeous! I am getting ready to send a big batch to Amazon tomorrow so they can get ready to ship them out to the first customers. Paprika has had a great time scaling the boxes of books in our living room.

Every day for the past week, I have taken Hauser and Paprika to the baseball field about 1/2 mile from our house. It's fenced in and provides a huge play space of grass for both Paprika and Hauser to run. I bring a few tennis balls for Hauser and he gets worn out in no time. It's really wonderful. We go at dusk, and once it starts to get dark, the baseball field is entirely illuminated with lights. It's a bit of a surreal feeling when everything else is dark, but the field is so bright. I've never played sports at night- but I can imagine the rush of being on a field lit up at night. The weather right now is perfect for it, and there's never anyone at the field, so we have it all to ourselves. It's been a perfect few days for us.

The fires are starting to settle down. We are thankfully out of harm's way. The fires are raging to the East, West, South, and North of us- but thankfully not in our own backyard. The sky has been a deep pink color and the moon a dark blood red. The air smells like burning wood, and feels heavy. I feel so terrible for everyone who has lost so much in the fire. I'm praying that the fire is contained quickly and that no more lives are lost. We will have a lot of warning if the fires start to move towards us- I think that we are pretty safe for now, though.

Mr. Mustard is Home!

Yea! Mr. Mustard just got back from his week and a half trip to Chicago. We are so excited that he is finally home. Paprika is still sick- day four of this terrible cold. She is congested and not sleeping well at all.

Since her nose is all stuffed up, she can't nurse because if she tries to, then she can't breathe. So, I have been pumping and trying to give her lots of solids to make up for it. Well, she does not like solids in general and so far today she flat-out refused: bananas, Yo Baby yogurt, cheerios, pumpkin muffins, carrot muffins, and spinach lasagne with baked brie.

Earlier tonight, I was on the phone with my mom and I heard Paprika choking on something. I ran to the kitchen, only to find that she had opened a box of dog treats and had about eight stuffed in her mouth and was desperately trying to eat them ALL at once. I figured she was hungry, so I warmed back up the spinach lasagne and as we're sitting at the table, she starts screaming and reaching for the dog treats on the counter, saying "I want! I want!" Then I said, "no Paprika, treats for the doggie..., for doggie." Then she said back to me, "for doggie! for doggie!" Although, it sounded more like "frrrr gawgeee, frrrr gawgeee."

She had seen Hauser eating the treats earlier in the evening, and of course she wants to do everything that Hauser gets to do! I calmed her down, hid the treats, and was pretty successful in getting some spinach lasagne into her for dinner, after all.

I hope she gets over this cold quickly. We are not going back to the indoor playground again. The only times she's ever been sick in her life were after playing there, and it's just not worth it to go back there again if it's only going to make her miserable. We're going to miss that place.

A Little Under The Weather

Paprika caught a cold on Friday when we were at the indoor playground. This little boy came up to Paprika and started coughing and snotting right in her face. I immediately moved her away from him, but was worried that she would catch something from him. Sure enough, by Saturday morning, she was miserable. She had the high seal bark of croup and was inconsolable. Saturday night was very rough- she slept maybe three hours total the whole night and was actually crying in her sleep. I slept in her room, and could hear her laboring to breathe and wimpering. I put her on the queen bed with me and stayed up all night listening to her breathing, making sure she was okay. It was pretty scary. She is a lot better now- she slept okay last night and today she has a deep chest cough, is still a bit lethargic, but I think the worst is over. I've been running the humidifier in her room, her head is elevated in her crib to let her nose clear, and we have been using the steam in the bathroom to clear her head. I wish I could just take her sickness away and make it all better for her. It's tough.

We had plans to go up to Santa Barbara for the weekend, but Mr. Mustard got extended at the last minute to stay in Chicago for longer. He is working for Harpo there, and has been in Chicago for over a week now. I stayed here to watch the dog and take care of things, since it was supposed to be a short trip. I hope he comes home soon- Paprika really misses her daddy, and I miss him, too!