Ghosts and Goblins

It's that time of year again; the first of the holidays that provide ample opportunity for pigging out. We start with Halloween candy, then move on to all-things-pumpkin culminating with a HUGE meal surrounded by close friends and family, slowly slide into cookies of every conceivable shape, size and recipe, while finally ringing in the new year with a plentiful amount of libations.

But, I digress... the holiday at hand is Halloween where naturally the children's play evokes phrases like "And I was chewing the eyeball furiously". We spent the afternoon outside sprucing our house up with all kinds of orange. Unbeknownst to Bartee, Sanjay woke up at the crack of dawn to get started on it. We added some new things to the display which we picked up on clearance last year so it was exciting for all of us to dig through the boxes to see what was waiting.

Priya's Rosetta Stone

Yesterday she carved this into a blob of play-doh. It reads, "Alyssa is one of my best friends". The "i" is missing because of lack of space, so she says.



This afternoon at the park, she purposely, within earshot of said friend, said to me, "She is not my friend anymore". I don't know what happened, if anything. She wouldn't tell me and I didn't see anything that would provoke these feelings.

She's so fickle with her emotions... it drives me crazy. I suppose it is the tween stuff that everyone with older kids keeps talking about. I think we are entering it head-on and I need an "oh sh*t" handle to hold onto to keep my patience in check. Bartee does much better at handling her emotional highs and lows and sassy attitude than I do. I have a few things to learn from him and I'd better get started.

Dictionary by Sanjay

With the exception of the last one, these have all been recorded and/or verified within the past couple of months. :)

What he says...	What he means...
Garageway	Driveway
Light Saver	Lightsaber
Constructions	Instructions
Not Chips	Nachos
Tears	Cheers (when clinking glasses)
Academy in Denver	Academy Endeavor (a local elementary school)
Toothpicks for our ears	Q-Tips
My smelling powers ejects me that we are almost home.	We are getting close to our house. -circa Summer 2008 after returning home from Maryland

All About Me - Priya

This was on her desk when I went for back-to-school night back at the end of August. After drawing a self portrait, she completed some sentences about herself. I have italicized her words.



My favorite food is doughnuts.
When I am an adult I am going to have six dogs.
Someday I will go to Alaska.
My wish for the world to be cleaner.
I'm happiest when I see animals.
I would do anything for a puppy husky and a horse.

A Little Something About Priya

It feels like the blog has been a little dominated by Sanjay lately, so I'm slipping this little piece in about Priya.

She has been in a music program for the past couple of years and she's starting to play some really nice pieces. Last weekend we enjoyed a concert of this song on repeat while she practiced for the upcoming week. It sounds really nice on "strings" so we had her switch the mode and recorded it to share with everyone. Enjoy!

Kindergarten Curriculum

Meant to post these after the first 2 weeks of school, when he brought them home but I'm quite the procrastinator.

As I haven't been able to volunteer much in the classroom thus far, I can't comment on the reading or math concepts that he's learning, but if held hostage and a monster drawing is all that's required for his release, I guarantee you he'll make it out alive. These lovely drawings came home in his backpack within days of each other. :)

First Round of Golf

Sanjay LOVES his golf clubs. After school he usually grabs his golf bag and from the backyard, hits whiffle style golf balls at the house while Priya is inside doing her homework and I'm cooking dinner. He especially loves to show off to anyone willing to watch. If I open the door to let Caboose out, he yells over to me... "Mom you wanna see me hit one? Just one ball", which sometimes turns into, "Now watch me hit the driver". It's fun to see him so passionate about it and he's got a pretty good swing as well.

Last weekend Daddy was planning to take him to his first Par 3 "real" golf course, but those plans were canceled when Sanjay was running a fever. So, today was the day that he got to play a real round of golf... not the mini-golf with the dinosaurs and fake lakes. This was the real deal and Sanjay insisted on renting a cart, too. Seems that with his handicap considered, Sanjay ended up winning the round. I'm not sure by how much, but he was very proud to tell me all about it when he walked in the door this evening.

From the outing, he has a souvenir ball and these awesome pictures that Daddy captured to remember the day.