Still busy

"Still busy" is pretty much going to be the theme of our lives until January.  I love it and, at the same time, I'm already tired thinking about it.

Last Monday I threw a dinner party for all of Monica's remaining out of town relatives. She had been hosting them at her house for close to a week and I thought she could use a break in the "feeding a lot of people" department. 

I'm proud of myself for throwing a dinner party for ten people (yes, one of them was a tiny baby who didn't eat anything) with no help from Michael on a week day.  It's the first time since having two kids that I wasn't even phased by the idea.  I did plan a pretty simple menu though: goat cheese crostini, bacon wrapped pork roast, roasted potatoes, creamed spinach and homemade ice cream sandwiches.

My plan was to photograph the whole shebang.  You know, for blogging purposes.  Then something happened.  You'll see.

Goat cheese crostini with balsamic fig jam

Goat cheese crostini with olive tapenade

This is what happened.

I went into the dining room hutch to get two big servings platters and found this:

Yes.  A scorpion!!!!

It was dead, but it was still incredibly unnerving to find this nestled between my dishes.  We have since taken everything out of the hutch and checked for his or her family members.  We found none.

So, after that little problem was quickly and quietly dealt with, I forgot to get pictures of any of the other food.

I did manage to get the people though.

And this gem.  Josh with a bottle of Josh wine.

I don't have either of my grandmothers remaining in my life.  Just memories.  So I sometimes feel like Monica's grandma is my grandma too.

All the lovely ladies, including baby Emma.

Spencer had a big Veteran's Day assembly at his school last Tuesday.  The 2nd grade provided all of the music and Spencer had a speaking part to introduce "The Army Goes Rolling Along."

He was supposed to wear patriotic clothes.  All of the clothes he has with flags are short sleeves or tank tops, but at least we got the colors right with this long sleeved, striped shirt.

Elliott wanted to look good too.

The assembly lasted about 45 minutes.  The 2nd graders did a great job with all of their musical numbers.

The principal spoke.

As did the man who the school is named for.

Elliott got restless after about 15 minutes so I let him run around with some of the other restless toddlers and preschoolers.

I love the joy on his face.

Each individual class did one of the military songs.  The veterans from each branch stood during their song.

Spencer's class did the Army song.  He read part of the introduction.

This is what he read:

I should mention that his palate expander fell out on Saturday and we didn't go in to have it re-glued until Wednesday, so it really helped him be less lispy and slushy with some of those tricky words (Caissons, ammunition) without all that metal in his mouth.

Spencer's teacher was one of the last speakers.

I thought the art work that the students created made a nice back drop for some pictures.

Fast forward to Tuesday night.  I checked on Elliott before I went to bed.  This is what I found.  What a silly kid.

Then I decided, again for blogging purposes, to take pictures of all the sleepers.

Spencer doesn't stay in his pajamas for more than 10 minutes ever, so I had to cover his body with buttons.  You can see his little head sticking out though.