So....I have a job now.

Last night I went in for training at my new job.  That's right--I have a job.  Ten hours a week working at the tutoring center at Mercy College (nights and evenings only).

I am so psyched about it.

Everything about going to work for a couple of hours felt perfectly natural and after a 3+ year hiatus I am glad to be back (though I will tell you that I have forgotten how to dress business casual {hence the all black outfit}).  The hubbs is so great about it and even worked out his schedule to come home a little early on the days when I have to go in.

And the kids didn't suffer having their dad put them to bed.  This morning they were back to their regular antics.

**I know that the mirror selfie is out but seriously--it's just so much easier.  So I'm just going to buck the trend--mirror selfies until I get a new phone (so not very soon)

Book Club--Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me

Have you read Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me yet?

Mindy Kaling is so funny and this book is hilarious. The hubbs did not think it was that funny but that's because he was stuck in bed with a bed-mate who was laughing so hard she had tears rolling down her cheeks and the bed was shaking. 

Luckily I read it in a 24 hour window so he didn't have to put up with it for too long.

Who is this person?

Who is this person painting and glittering acorns on a Saturday night while watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer?  That would be me. Not characteristic at all but I just love acorns so dang much. And seriously?  How cute are these going to be garlanded around my house?

We also had some wildly successful preschool crafts including...

Hand print turkeys,

And this awesome craft where you add soil and water to a pumpkin you just cut open and you let it grow. We're nearly 2 weeks in and the pumpkin is starting to mold so we won't keep it much longer but it's still awesome. 

Keep Calm 

And 

Craft On

Warning

Let's just pretend that you're at the library and your kids haven't had their hair combed, their clothes don't match (your 3-year old at this point in the season is still sporting shorts and t-shirts though this particular day she settled for a long sleeve shirt from last season that showed a fair amount of belly) and a fair amount of breakfast is still on their faces.  Now pretend that your little boy has just mowed over an impeccably dressed toddler--her sweater alone cost more than my whole outfit put together (and was most likely not purchased on ebay) and her nanny (a beautiful woman with a Jamaican accent) laughs it off the bowling over and then smiles and says, "oh, are they yours?"

You may look over at your kids and think, "who are these homeless-looking, rag-muffin little people and why are they running around the library?"

Going home and deciding to take matters into your own hands by cutting your toddler's hair while he thrashes over the bathroom sink is not going to help...

.

...because then they will just look like rag-muffin kids with bad pompadours.

Leaving the house

Have you seen this video?  I'm blogging from my phone (yes I know how crazy that sounds) so I can't embed the video but it's a British comic telling the world what having kids is like.

http://youtu.be/uFQfylQ2Jgg

After you watch it come back and look at this poor picture of Noah. 

Here he is in his coat eating a marker because after I had them all coated up and ready to run an errand Claire (who swore up and down she did not need to use the potty before I made her sit down) decided this was the perfect time to take her sweet time working on her business. She'd been in there at least 15 minutes and told me she had at least 2 more poopies to go.  Poor Noah was, meanwhile, overheating and snacking on markers.

Ahh.  Kids.

And here are some other random pics from the week

See anything wrong there?  I walked into my closet to grab my red sneakers and the knot the laces are in was (okay still is) at least 2 inches long 

I love kid art.  This is a picture of Claire holding hands with her baby doll, Dora

Thanksgiving center pieces. 

Going for a walk

And both of the kids working on building a dam with sticks and rocks (this is a game their dad taught them though generally the hubbs is a dam purist and doesn't allow sticks in the dams he makes)

A trip to the big city

This week the hubbs heard about a running store on the upper-east side that was going out of business.  He wanted to go check it out and see if he could get a good deal on running shoes. He thought we should all drive down to check it out.

I thought that was a terrible idea and I told him how it would just correlate to me taking care of two wild kids in a cramped Manhattan store or endlessly driving around looking for parking.

I may have whined a little.

Or a a lot.

And I just need to publicly say that I was so wrong.  The weather was perfect and we had a practically perfect afternoon in the city.  I have also been converted to driving to the city.  Parking on the weekend was $15 for up to 12 hours (which is still crazy but oh well--it's New York) which is the same price as a train ticket and this way our kids napped in the car and we were in control of when we left (instead of being at the mercy of the train schedule).  It was also faster--30 minutes from parking to our front door.

The kids and I went to Dylan's Candy Bar while the hubbs picked out his running shoes.

So you see that face?  That is how exciting the candy bar is.  

The candy bar was made even more exciting when she and her dad went back to check if they had his favorite kind of British candy bar and she talked him into buying her this lollipop with her name on it.

We walked around Central Park and stopped by the zoo.

And stopped by the Billy Johnson playground.

And then we went to Subway for a late lunch.  Some of you may be scoffing that we went to a chain restaurant when all of the Upper East Side was before us.  But people, chain restaurants in Manhattan offer food my kids will eat, bathrooms and enough room that when my kids throw goldfish they don't hit anyone. Everybody wins.

I also captured this video of the new walker.  About a week ago Noah started walking and he could not be more pleased about it.

I'm back

A couple of days ago (**warning that in my family 'a couple of days ago' can mean anything from yesterday to 5 years ago--in this case it was at least 2 weeks**) the hubbs picked up my phone to look at something and somehow ended up looking at my pictures.  He was fascinated looking at the screen and said, "I haven't seen any of these."  We then talked for just a minute about how since I hadn't blogged in a while he hadn't seen the pictures of the things we do every day.

Sorry hubbs.  I have all kinds of excuses (not the least of which being that we hooked my computer up to the TV while it was in the living room accommodating all of the guests that we've had in the last month) but they aren't really important now.

So.  

On with the show.

We loved the fall weather here.

Claire throwing pixi dust at the park

We had a good Halloween

Claire's pumpkin--she drew, I cut.

Enjoying the spoils of trick-or-treating

We created.

A picture of Claire and her dad going to Home Depot to do craft projects

making wrapping paper for a birthday party

Following treasure maps

making lego creations at LegoLand

We played

The crown I ordered for Claire's fairy costume (which she did not use because she made a more beautiful one) was actually a mermaid crown and gave her magical powers.

We took a subway ride for about a million hours to go to the Staten Island Ferry.  Soooo not worth it.

We also went to the Hamptons with my parents (except the hubbs--he was traveling for work)

The house we stayed at (which belongs to a friend from high school who sooo generously let us stay there) had this awesome coffee table which turned into an incredible train table.

And basically just had a good time.