Halloween

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. I loved it as a kid, getting dressed up in costumes and begging for candy. How can it get any better?

I was extremely blessed to have had a grandmother who was a wonderful seamstress. She made every Halloween costume I wore through high school. I was a bunny, a clown, Cinderella (my fave), Raggedy Ann, a lion, Snoopy....It was great.

Sadly, JillyBean wasn't lucky enough to have grandmothers who can sew. Instead, she is blessed with grandmothers who are fabulous shoppers. No homemade costumes for this kid, but still, we've found some really great things for her to dress up the past three years.

This year she is a cowgirl. My mother found the costume and Nana found the red boots. It's all too perfect. What I love, though, is that she sort of looks like I did at her age. My grandmother made a cowgirl costume for me when I was almost two-and-a-half (same age as JillyBean), though it wasn't for Halloween. Instead, I believe that I wore it to the fair. I wasn't lucky enough to have genuine cowgirl boots, though.

Me as a cowgirl at two-and-a-half years old

Jillian as a cowgirl at two-and-a-half years old

Who knows? Maybe I can learn to sew and JillyBean will have some super cute homemade costumes to trick-or-treat in the future.

Jilly and Lou Lou

Auntie April bought a stuffed lamb chair as a shower gift before Jilly was born. It's absolutely adorable and her name is Lou Lou. Once JB came along we would prop her up in the chair each week to take her picture. It was a way for us to see how much she had grown.

Lou Lou still has a prominent place in Jilly's room. Now she is able to sit in the chair and does so quite a bit while reading or playing with her dolls. She wanted her picture taken with Lou Lou today and I thought that it would be fun to compare the two over the past two-and-a-half years.

One Week Old

Three Weeks Old

Two Months
Three Months
Seven Months
One-and-a-half

Two-and-a-half

Seeing Spots

As I have mentioned several times, Jilly loves doing art projects. She especially enjoys painting more so than coloring. She can sit at her table and paint for hours but tires from coloring after a few minutes.

Several moms that I know are a little apprehensive when it comes to pulling out paints because of the potential mess. Well, here's a great alternative that gives kids a break from the crayons - dot art. Nana bought Jilly some Dot Art markers last week. We got them out after JillyBean got up from her nap and she created all kinds of fun pictures for more than an hour. I finally had to tell her that we needed to put them away so that we could use them another day. There are many projects that you can do with dot markers. On one paper, I wrote Jilly's name and had her follow the lines, dotting each letter. We also experimented with mixing colors - yellow and blue for green, yellow and red for orange, red and blue to make purple. The fun is limitless.

Me and My Girl

Beanie Nana and great-grandmother were in town this past week and it was nice having them here to visit. On Friday, JillyBean decided she wanted to stay home with them instead of accompanying me on our weekly grocery trip. At first I thought that it was a great idea - I would be able to run in, knock out everything on the list and get home in no time.

As soon as I started my trek over the mountain I began to get a little sad. I kept looking in my rear view mirror to see Jilly and had to stop myself several times from asking her a question. It was very lonely. Plus, it didn't take me any less time to shop than if she would have been with me. It hammered home a notion that I had often felt but never truly realized until then - I like being with my daughter.

Jilly has a very independent spirit. As she grows older she is more willing to explore that side of herself. Also, she is at the age where we are having to consider placing her in preschool. Is this something we want to do now or wait until she's closer to school age? I certainly don't think she needs to go to preschool to get a jump start on her academics. Everything that they teach them at this age is what we do on a daily basis at home - letters, colors, numbers, etc. I don't think she needs it for socialization because she plays with so many different kids on a daily basis. Some parents view the three hours their children is in preschool as an opportunity for them to have their own time, or a brief break from parenthood. I have mixed feelings about this. For one, Jilly does need to get used to being away from me and in the care of "strangers." But she's doing well with her Sunday school class as well as at MOPs. And, frankly, I don't know what I would do without her.

I made the decision a year-and-a-half ago to stay home with her and I am not ready to be without her. Sure, there are a few things that I could do every now and again that would be easier without having to take her with me, but overall, those are very few and far between.

She's my buddy. And I mean that in the sense that I really enjoy being with my child and not that I'm her "friend" more so than I am her mother. I enjoy her company. She makes me laugh and I love hearing her stories and her perspective on everything that she sees and experiences. Our time together is fleeting. Soon she will be in school, she'll be running out the door to play with her friends, she'll go off to college and, well, move on with her own life. I am not ready to let go of her now.

Scary Good Cause

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays and I will have more about our plans later, but for now I want to spread some news.

Local photographer Dominique Attaway is going to be at Trailside Coffee (in Old Trail) taking photos of kids in their Halloween costumes from noon until 2 p.m. on Halloween. Each person will get a 4x6 picture of their child in exchange for a donation to HEAL Africa. Dominique says that whatever donation you feel comfortable with giving will be accepted; 100 percent of what she receives goes directly to the organization.

Dominique is an incredible photographer (she did some beautiful portraits of Jillian a year ago) and a very busy mom of three active boys, so the opportunity to tap into this amazing talent and help a worthy cause is the best Halloween treat you will get this year.

The 'hood

One of the reasons for my absence this summer is that we moved to a new house in the middle of June. As anyone who has moved knows, it takes a little time to get settled and then you still feel as if you're playing catch-up with the rest of your life. The house is nice and we love it, but it is made close to perfect thanks to the neighborhood. Not many homes comprise this place, but pretty much everyone who lives here has children - infants to middle-schoolers (not sure if there are many high school-aged kids yet). And while there are plenty of family neighborhoods, this one reminds me of mine when I was a kid because the kids - hold on here - actually play outside. Shocking, I know, in this day and age. On Friday night I heard kids running around outside until at least 11 p.m. It's great.

On Saturday night our across-the-street neighbors opened up their backyard to the kids for movie night. It was awesome. They had a huge blow-up screen and played The Wizard of Oz (a movie that I despise, but oh well). Kids came over when it got dark and sat on their blankets on the lawn. They munched on popcorn and other snacks and had a great time. It was just as much fun for the parents, even if we didn't watch the movie.

This is the type of experience that I want for JillyBean as she grows up because it's what I had. I want her around neighbors who she will form strong bonds with as they grow older. I want her to have long-lasting relationships with childhood friends and share stories of running through the neighborhood on bikes, play at each others' homes and spending the night together. I know that she will have friends who live in other parts of town, at church and in school, but having those daily play partners are important.