Welcome to The Beauchamp Family website. This is our home away from home on the web. This site is for our family and friends who live near and far to be able to keep up with us. We will try to keep you guys up to date on our goings-on. For anything prior to January 2006, please Click Here. - Tom, Candy, Jamie & Cassie Beauchamp, Austin, TX
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Yeah, we are THOSE freaks...
Every year, I swear our neighbors must think we are NUTS. You see, we are the Halloween freaks on the street. We have more Halloween decor than we do Christmas. We decorate, our house can be seen as the orange speck from outerspace.
I was going to wait to take pictures and post until tomorrow, but a dear friend of mine, Halloween Grinchy Barb over at So The Thing Is... posted, so of course, I have to do it sooner...
This is the front yard of our house and the walkway... enjoy and BOO!
I was going to put commentary, but you get the idea. One shot is really blurry, it's a Halloween tree with purple lights, a graveyard and a severed leg. The witches pot will have bubbling fog tomorrow night coming out of it too!
We're famous again! We are major Recipe Zaar-a-holics and we get entirely too excited when we are featured in any way on the site. We have the photo of the day today! It's the Halloween bones that Tom worked so hard on last year for Jamie's party! How cool are we?
Lots of posts added tonight, so keep going after this one :) And pop over to my biz blog to see other thoughts: http://www.offassist.com/blog/
A friend and colleague invited us to join them at Maker Faire. I'd never been. To be honest, when she first suggested it, I wasn't sure if it was something we would like or not.
It was AWESOME. The kids had a great time, I had a great time, Tom (of course) had a great time. The highlight for me was that I got to see the Eepy Bird guys live and in person!
Showing you the videos first and then the pictures...
I told Jamie that I deleted this one from the camera - I didn't, of course... but it's freaking hilarious. The bike spanks you as you ride. Classic!
This was at the end of the day - Eepy Bird! Jamie got stung by a yellow jacket, so Tom ended up leaving with him to find some ice and calm him down, we had an excellent spot too! So I taped it for them to watch and I thought I'd share... it was SO cool in person. Cassie told it was "way cool, mom" - if you don't know who these guys are - they are the Diet Coke and Mentos dudes, then you've been living under a rock.
We also got to see a Pleo. OMG. This thing is so freaking cool. But $350 pre-order at Amazon, OUCH. I could totally see gentle-heart Jamie loving this thing. Not only is it a dinosaur, but it's not RC controlled, it's totally dependent upon you and your actions, the ones they had there were all lovey-dovey and responded to you petting it and talking to it... These things are gonna be huge - let's just hope the price comes down. Santa has already been told they want a Wii so it's out for this year. Check 'em out at Pleoworld.com
Pumpkin painting! Jamie and I built a transistor something. I dunno, you hooked it up and it made a noise. The dirty car art dude was there... so neat! We made kites with the Austin Children's Museum (ACM) And played with tinker toys... This was the coolest robot. It sang the hills are alive with the sound of music and several other songs too. Which now that I think about it, if I was going to build a robot, I'd want it to like do my laundry or fetch my coffee or something... and they made it sing old songs? Pinatas were there too! I dunno if they do this in Austin every year or what, but we will definitely go again if so! It was awesome!
After the soccer games yesterday, we decided to make our own pizza! Jamie and Cassie each made one... if I've done this right, you'll see a little slideshow from start --- to finish!
And of course I star to feel like I have a clue as to what I'm doing and it will only show it from finish to start, whatever, you get the point. My kids are cute. LOL
Poor Jamie. He likes to play, but... he's very artistic, he's the absolutely best draw-er and can color a mean coloring page, but he's too busy looking at the shape of the clouds or the bugs crawling around on the ground. Cassie is doing really well. Dare I admit I think she might be better than Jamie and this is her first year playing? *laugh* Seriously, though, they both (yes, even Jamie) are really enjoying themselves playing this year and it keeps us busy!
We had a school-friends party for Jamie this year. And, oh, the saga of the 7th birthday. It started out with him insisting on having the party at the jumping place in the mall. Okay, great. I put down a deposit. Then I tell him he probably can't have costumes at the bouncey place because of various reasons, he says no problem, he'll have a dinosaur party.
Well, then Tom opens his big mouth and we end up buying a bounce house. Okay, fine. We decide to have the party here, but Jamie now wants costumes. Okay, whatever.
So the day of the party, he decides not to do the bounce house, just he and his friends playing outside with the costumes.
Whatever, dude... he had a great party, but I'm confused. What else is new, eh? Without further ado... here's the video and the pictures... Happy birthday, big boy!
First up, the costumes!
Jamie is a ninja warrior and Cassie is a pink power ranger: I thought these were 2 interesting pictures from the party. The girls sitting nice and talking and the boys, I think they are taking that wagon into battle or something ;) And Tom made some halloween foods. Bat Poop, smiles, Mummy Fingers, Monster Mish-Mash were all on the menu :) Who could forget the cake. First a word about the cake. I'm not bitter or anything, but we usually make the cake, but the past few years we've slacked off because life is just crazy. Tom and I had plans to make this elaborate 3D dinosaur cake. Jamie fell in love with the one at TARGET. Why? They had plastic roaring dinosaurs on them... not that I'm bitter... And Jamie's favorite part... the presents (actually, he told me the best part was being with all his friends... awww...) Afterwards, Tom's parents took us out to dinner at Dave & Busters. Jamie wanted his picture taken with his Halo guys and I took the picture of the two littler ones playing the trucker slot game :-) A good time was had by all!
Jamie turns 7 soon. 7. SEVEN. As in seven YEARS old. When did that happen? Where was I? I have this... this... this... boy. And he's smart. Like really smart. He scares me sometimes how smart he really is. The things he has learned to do just over the past year and half just freaking amaze me.
Now, before you watch these, you should know that they make me read this book a LOT. So, he knows the "feel" of the book, but he doesn't know the book by heart. I thought it was so impressive that he was reading THIS book that I had to take video of it.
The kids love this book, it always makes me tear up a little if I think about the words too much. I love Dr. Seuss, of course, but this book cuts a little deep for a momma. It's all about letting your kids go and the ups (and yes, the downs) of life and getting stuck in that prickly perch and soaring to new heights and just... just growing up and coming into your own.
I'm glad they have quite a few years before they come into their own, in the mean time, I'll just have to continue to get sappy around his birthday. He's my little man, the one that changed my life forever. And he's cool, he's just so cool to be around. AND he still likes me. *I* am still cool. Sigh, in a few years, I won't be cool anymore, huh?
Anyway, without further ado... the first is him showing off and the second is him reading while Cassie interrupts and acts like a little brat (I love you, Cassie).
And yes, I know how to pronounce BOIL - I was distracted by the genius of my son. Leave me alone *snicker*
Oh, and the book he's reading is Oh, The Places You'll Go by Dr. Seuss.
I'm completely crazy with work right now. So blogging has been mostly mobile pictures I snap rushing from one place to the other. I'm exhausted!
So, it's soccer time again! Jamie is playing again and is all excited. Cassie wanted to play this year too so we signed her up. Well, we found out AT Jamie's practice that hers is RIGHT AFTER. So Tom ran back home and got shoes and shin guards and she had her practice. Would I be a bad mother if I were to say that Cassie, who is 4 and this is her first year playing, is a MUCH better soccer player than Jamie? *laugh* Poor Jamie, he's just more interested in the bugs, Cassie wants to get in there and KICK the ball. I love it! Tom and I laughed and laughed about that. So, because we were so caught off guard, we ended up just doing the "drive this way and stop somewhere that looks fast and good to eat", we figured we end up at Burger King or something. We found a new favorite burger joint! It's called Moonies Burger House and I blogged it on my Reviews Blog. Yum!
So today, I'm crazy with work and Tom is crazy with work and he walked through the living room in time to see the television CATCH FIRE. Thank goodness he was there and unplugged it and nothing was damaged, but what if we had gone to the post office and left it on? Yeowch! So, off he went to Best Buy with the gift cards I'd been collecting for my new camera and he had apparently been getting cash back for a while to help me pay for it for xmas... how sweet, but of course, we need a television. And it must be a big one because I'm blind and we watch way too many movies to deal with a 20" screen. Oh no, it must be a huge honking television.
So we have a new TV, that was already marked down that Tom got 10% off of because it was the floor model and another 5% because it doesn't have a remote (dude, we use the one that comes with the cable box!).
I took this of Cassie asleep the other night... awww...
... and today was Jamie's teacher's birthday. Tom, room parent and suck-up extraordinare, organized for the parents to give gift cards for her and he put them into a flower arrangement, there were about 12 cards total to all kinds of places - 3 to Starbucks though! Awww... Happy Birthday, Mrs. H!
Oh, and do you SEE the HANDMADE card he made for her with all the kid's signatures inside? Do you know when the last time *I* got a card was? Hurumph! *snicker*
Apparently Lanel over at Random thinks I don't have enough going on in my life so made me answer these questions - well, she didn't make me, but ya know, it's hard to ignore your name sticking out on someone's blog. It's this odd compulsion!
1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet, current car) Dolly Windstar 2. YOUR GANGSTA NAME: (favorite ice cream, favorite cookie) Cherry Vanilla Milano (okay, really that doesn't sound gansta at all) 3. YOUR FLY “GUY/GIRL” NAME: (first initial first name, first 3 letters last name) C-BEA 4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal) Purple Crab (huh?) 5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born) Elizabeth Charleston 6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (first 3 letters last name, first 2 letters first name) Beauca 7. SUPERHERO NAME: (2nd favorite color, favorite drink and add” the”) Pink the Tequila Sunrise 8. NASCAR NAME: (first names of your grandfathers) Lucas Owen 9. STRIPPER NAME: (favorite perfume, favorite candy) Vanilla Reeses 10. WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (mother’s and father’s middle names) Coy Wilson
I'm supposed to tag 5 other people... don't hate me, you guys! Crystal Delaine Denise Dy Elaine
