Distinguished Technologist

This past week Davis received a great honor - his company presented him their Distinguished Technologist award. As usual Davis was beyond modest about receiving this. He told me that there was a little dinner that we should go to - Elizabeth agreed to babysit Oliver and off we went. Turns out the little dinner was a very nice affair which included a presentation (and roast) about Davis and his accomplishments at work, the company's CEO and other important people.

Here is Davis with his award-

Congratulations Davis!

The Wild

Any day now our little family of three will become a family of four. In anticipation I thought it was time to change the title of our blog. I've spent the last few days trying to figure out a title that better reflects our family - our growing family. While I've been wracking my brain Oliver and Davis have, as usual, been running around quoting the movie Madagascar. Last night for the bazillionth time the two of them brought themselves to hysterics with the following:

Marty: The wild?!
Alex: Hold on a second there, fuzzbucket. You mean the live-in-a-mud-hut, wipe-yourself-with-a-leaf type wild?
Julien: Who wipes? Ha ha!
Gloria: Oy vey!

(Oliver does a pretty good and funny oy vey.)

Given these antics are pretty standard (read constant) around the house I usually go about doing what I am doing, but last night I stopped - wait - "The Wild" - what a perfect description of our existence (okay, we wipe, but otherwise it is pretty crazy around here).

Speaking of crazy, I am now 38 weeks and Davis has all but declared me certifiable. Not only am I continuing to sell things left and right (Davis remains worried that he will find himself on Craigslist soon), but I am also making multiple trips to Target for things we must have (like pillows, shower curtains, teapots...), and rearranging furniture. Well, to be honest I am not rearranging furniture, Davis is - I am supervising. He's been very accommodating, bring up the new bed frame, setting it up, having me not like it, bringing it back to the garage. Moving the dresser from one room, to the other, then moving it back again... This past weekend though I may have pushed my limit (and so now instead of asking Davis to help move things I am either doing it myself (shhhh) or adding it to a list I've created called "Things for Davis to move once he gets over this past weekend").

So, this past weekend...

Our downstairs toilet tended to run after being flushed and sometimes made a noise that sounded like it was going to eat you. Davis tried fixing it a few times, but did just quick fixes as he didn't think the issue was that bad. I disagreed and so I dragged Davis and Oliver to both Home Depot and Lowes to address this issue. Davis was convinced that if I let him by the toilet innards and actually spend some time working on the toilet it would be as good as new. Well, what is better than as good as new? New! Yes, I made us come home with a new toilet. Here is our fancy new toilet. (When you come over if you could please comment on how wonderful the new toilet is - I would very much appreciate it.)

Have you ever seen the movie Finding Nemo? Finding Nemo is another favorite at our house right now. The other night as I was talking with Davis about something before we went to bed he looked at me and said - "I've been trying to place who you are like - I've got it now." Guess who I am like? Dory! Ah yes, Dory - Dory who is described by Wikipedia as a "naive but optimistic regal tang fish with short-term memory loss." I pointed out that I may have had us buy a toilet, may have sold a few things, bought a few things, moved a few things - but I was not the one who put on hot pants and swam more than 31 miles in 58 degree water. While Davis did conceed this, he maintains Dory is an accurate description.

It is still a couple weeks before the baby is due. On the one hand I want to savor the wildness of our life as it is now, but on the other hand I am ready for a new wild existence to begin. I know that Davis is wanting the latter - he is very much ready for the baby and is hoping that when she makes her appearance his crazy Craigslisting, furniture moving, Dory-like wife will go back to wherever she came from and his "normal" wife will return. We'll see.

Things that go

Our days are spent playing with things that go. In particular things that go super fast. These things include planes, trains, cars, and Oliver. There is not usually any transition between playing with these items and I keep finding myself calling a plane a train, or racing cars when I am supposed to be fixing a train track. Depending upon how egregious my mistake I am either referred to as "silly mommy" or "naughty mommy." Davis, on the other hand, always makes amazing airports (which always include the restaurant Wagamama so Oliver's passengers can eat before boarding their plane, jet fuel, radar, and multiple other things that my airports never get quite right) and can fly his planes to China much better than my planes; Oliver is definitely very much into his Daddy.



When not with planes, race cars and trains Oliver can usually be found outside. Bulldozer has been getting some wild rides and Oliver has been begging for a station wagon - according to Oliver it is "tricky" to get Bulldozer's stroller to stay on the roof of the car.

Oliver has also been spending quite a bit of time in the pool. He's not there to play, he is there to do laps. Amazingly he actually does go up and down the pool. I am guessing in just a bit we'll be able to coax the bubble off him and he'll soon be racing Davis up and down the lanes.

Bzzzz

Trick or treating was scheduled to start at 5:00. At 4:15 Elizabeth went up to our attic and brought down her box of dress-up clothes (which neither Davis nor I knew were stored up there (wonder what else might be up there?)) in the hopes of inspiring Oliver to put on a costume. The box was not a success. However, while Elizabeth, Kevin, Oliver and I were looking at the crazy clothes, Davis was upstairs fashioning wings. Davis came down, popped the wings on Elizabeth and Kevin flew Elizabeth around the house - Oliver was sold. Moments later Oliver was dressed as, well, we are going with a bee. I think the key features of Oliver's amazing costume are his potty watch and silver lame bag. The plan was to take Oliver to just a couple houses, but he was given a lolly pop at the first house, candy and a cool pumpkin light at the second...he was sold. He kept asking (really begging) to "Go to more people's houses please...please...please."

When we finally dragged Oliver home he became equally excited about handing out candy. He wouldn't let people choose their own candy, instead he selected candy for them - carefully placing it in their bag or pumpkin. When no one was at the door he would climb up onto the chair and then onto the window sill so he could plaster his body up against the window, look out at the street and yell - "People, people, people - more trick or treaters, please...please...please."

In the end, Oliver enjoyed Halloween - even if the evening didn't include any French fries.

Halloween Eve

The past couple weeks have included many visits by the UPS man and many visits to Marshall's -- all visits have been an attempt to get a Halloween costume for Oliver. So what has Oliver decided on - no costume. Oliver asked me to return all of the costumes and get him a new pair of shoes. I did return the costumes, but said no to the shoes. (Honestly, this kid would have more shoes than Imelda Marcos if we would let him - we can walk through the toy section of any store and leave without incident, but get him near the shoe section and we have to leave the store with him kicking and screaming with him yelling - "New shoes for Oliver!" - over and over and over again.)

So with no costume to have to prepare today we decided to play in the leaves -
And carve pumpkins.

At first Oliver was adverse to carving his pumpkin and instead opted to draw on it (and, since he was given a Sharpie, something usually off limits, he decided he would not restrict himself just to his pumpkin but would draw everywhere). But after he saw the pumpkins Davis and I created Oliver decided he would like to carve his and "make it just like mommy's."



I'm not sure how trick or treating is going to go tomorrow. Oliver will have no costume and, according to Oliver, he doesn't want people to give him candy when he holds out his pumpkin, he wants French fries.