Thanksgiving Feast

This year, we had the pleasure of celebrating Thanksgiving at Cooper's school.  The Raintree Thanksgiving Feast is one of the biggest events of the school year.  The kids spend weeks making all of the Thanksgiving food, and then parents come for a special lunch.

The buffet table, complete with turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, corn bread, cranberry relish, cinnamon apples, rolls, butter (that the kids made by shaking cream!), and pumpkin cake.

Coop talked a lot about making the mashed potatoes, and using a big grinder to make cranberry relish, and making the frosting for the pumpkin cake.

Our table -- just the right size for Coop.  A bit small for us!

Coop and his best buddy Jackson.  I don't know how these two get anything done during the school day.  Whenever I see them together, they're giggling at each other and running in circles.

Since the Raintree Feast (and pretty much every day of Thanksgiving break), Coop has been making us a pretend feast at home.

Not quite as tasty.  But still appreciated.

Have we talked about Seinfeld yet?

A while ago, Alan and his friend (and fellow econ teacher from Eastern Illinois University) Linda started using Seinfeld clips to illustrate various economic principles in class.  They eventually decided to present some of their ideas at conferences and maybe even in a paper.  So they starting "researching" Seinfeld.

(And yes, I always use air quotes when I talk about this "research.")

Alan was forced to buy all nine seasons of Seinfeld on dvd, and then sit on the couch and watch every stinkin' episode, taking notes on any scenes that illustrated (or even remotely sounded like) an economics principle.  Eventually, they put everything together in a website called The Economics of Seinfeld.  It's a nice set-up -- you can search by econ topic and then get a list of any Seinfeld storyline that addresses that issue. 

And then some magic started to happen.  Linda gave a talk about the economics of Seinfeld for a friend at a small college in Georgia, who posted the link on his blog, which got seen by some mildly important econ blog big-wig.

Well, before you could say "no soup for you," Alan and Linda's website was linked all over the internets.  And big name places too like the Wall Street Journal blog, the NYTimes blog, the Economist blog, the Atlantic blog, to name few.

Well then, people started calling including this random radio station in Connecticut, and some local television and newspaper places.

Lately (seriously, I have no idea how this all happened), CNBC did a little piece on the website.  And Alan and Linda were interviewed for an article in Businessweek.  Alan tells me that the article was mentioned on the cover of the latest edition. 

And in the midst of this 15 minutes of fame, the president of a literary agency in New York emailed Alan and Linda to ask if they had considered turning this into a book, and if not, could he visit with them about the possibility.  Um... yes please.

So.  Alan and Linda spent this past weekend working on a prospectus to send to Mr. President Agency Man who will help them polish it up and then shop it around to publishers for them.

Unfortunately for me, I still don't really like Seinfeld (*gasp* can I say that??) and I've been mocking this "research" project since the beginning, so I'm fairly certain that I will be cut out from the millions this book rakes in.  It's not too late for you, though!  Quick!  Send Alan an email nonchalantly asking if he's got any interesting research (don't use quotes around "research" -- that's been my fatal flaw), and then offer effusive praise when he mentions Seinfeld.  Tell him what a great idea that is and how much hard work (again, don't use quotes around "work") that must be.  (In fact, Alan mentioned to me today that he'll probably have to watch all nine seasons AGAIN now that they're working on this book thing.  Poor Alan.) 

You might even casually say that you saw something about that on CBNC and did he see that link?  "What?  It's YOUR link?  Oh my word, I had no idea."

Something like that.

Puzzle time:

Train track time:

Nutella time:

(You know, the chocolate hazelnut spread?  I had a small sample size container that Coop managed to lick clean.  That's my boy!)

Coloring workbook time:

Bedtime with witch:

Jack-o-lantern time:

Angry face time (just like the jack-o-lantern):

Halloween

Cooper wanted to be Buzz Lightyear for Halloween.  Luckily, Walmart can accommodate that request with very little effort on my part.  Hurray!

We ended up celebrating Halloween three times this year, which was at least one (maybe two) times too many.  Friday night, Coop and I went to a church party.  He spent the entire time proudly announcing that he was Buzz Lightyear and that he could fly.  And then he ran in circles around the yard.

(The take-off to flight.)

Saturday, we met Parker and his family at the Agricultural Hall of Fame in Bonner Springs, KS.

They had several activities available for kids, including a train ride around the premises:

Coop rode it several times.

The old-timey school house was open:

And kids (or their fathers, in our case) could roast marshmallows for s'mores.

Nifty tip:  Instead of messing around with chocolate and graham crackers, use Keebler fudge stripe cookies.  Two of them fit in a cupcake holder, and then we just plopped the marshmallow in the middle for our s'more.


Sunday afternoon, we met Parker and family up in Lawrence to go trick-or-treating down Mass St.  That was a nightmare, and at least right now, mere hours after the event, I have no designs to ever go again.  Ever.

It was really crowded and Cooper was in fine form -- lost of random touching Parker with his feet or his pumpkin, and some screaming, and plenty of hopping.  (To Coop's credit, he was tired and hungry and unbelievably excited to be Buzz Lightyear.  But still.)

Fall

We've been enjoying some fall-related activities lately.  First, we made shrunken apple heads.  We peeled some apples, carved faces on them, soaked them in lemon juice:

And set them out to dry:

After about a week, they looked like little old people:

(One didn't make it the entire week before it got too moldy.  And the lovely umbrella hats are to keep them standing up.  Festive, don't you think?)

We've had lots of fun raking leaves and playing in them:

And Coop got to go to the pumpkin patch with his class at school.  (First field trip!)  He was allowed to pick a pumpkin "as big as my head."  He wanted to make pie with his pumpkin, but that sounded a bit complicated to me, so we made pie with canned pumpkin and then carved his into a jack-o-lantern:

Zombies

There's a house down the street from us with this out in the lawn:

Cooper dubbed it a zombie.  And he loves it.  We even had to stop the car to go talk to it.

And the next time we drove by it, we held up an acorn to show it.  (I'm sure it was impressed.)

So we figured we should build one of our own.  Coop and I hit the Goodwill store for appropriate clothes.  Alan found the perfect face at Dollar General, and picked up a bale of straw at the gas station.

Coop named our zombie Big Bill, and was excited to show him off to Grandma Joan!

Maple Leaf

It's that time of year again -- Maple Leaf Festival in Baldwin!  We watched the parade (with Parker and his family and with Grandpa Cecil and Grandma Joan).  Lots (and lots and lots) of firetrucks.  And marching bands, which we love.

And following up on our success at the State Fair, we tried some rides this year.  No cars to drive, but really fast boats:

And motorcycles:

And a carousel.  Coop rode on lots of animals this time!

Finally, a corn dog for supper.

What a great day!

Hays High Class of 1985

Alan and some friends headed back to Hays last weekend for their 25th high school reunion.  I sent the camera with him.  I'm not sure I'll do that again.  There are some things I just don't need to know.  (And here's your warning -- this blog entry, while still rated PG is probably not as family friendly as some others...)

On the drive to Hays, Alan and John stopped at Hooters (allegedly for lunch).

They continued the quest to prove their virility by stopping at Fort Riley and sprinting up the hill to the cannons.

Some friends doing mildly obscene things to the Fort Hays tiger, who looks appropriately mortified:

I'm not sure where they were going, but I think it's a bad sign that they had to climb through barbed wire to get there.

I know you men-folk are proud of your ability to pee standing up outside (and goodness knows Cooper is too), but I'm not sure I need 10 pictures to prove it to me:

Pondering buffalo:

Apparently, they had a great weekend!

Playing in the sink:

Story time on the Kindle -- doesn't quite have the same feel to it, but Coop did sit through Hansel and Gretel.

Some mornings, Alan leaves for work before Coop wakes up, so we usually try to call him during breakfast.  Coop is quite the phone talker!

Coop and his good friend Jackson from school:

Trying on winter clothes.  The coat is one that Alan wore when he was a kid!

Every boy's right, I suppose

Someday, I'll blog about potty training, but not right now. Suffice it to say that it hasn't been a painless process.

I got home from work one day, though, and Coop had been "driving in the truck pretend" and he had this to tell me:




And then he reenacted the entire thing, except the part where he pulled down his pants because Red Hen was standing right next to him. Much like cooking bacon naked, standing next to a chicken when you're short and naked could be very dangerous.

Eavesdropping from the front seat of the car

Ironman:  I’m Ironman.

Blue Beetle: I’m Blue Beetle.

 

Ironman: I’m taller than you.  I’m taller than the Incredible Hulk, too.

Blue Beetle: Who’s Incredible Hulk.

Ironman: My best friend.


Blue Bettle: I squeeze my legs to fly.

Ironman: I fly too.


Ironman: Where are your lips?

Blue Beetle: I don’t have any lips.


Ironman: See.  My legs come off and my chest is in Cooper’s hand.

Blue Beetle: Who’s Cooper?

Ironman: The person playing with us.

 

Blue Beetle: I’m Blue Beetle, and I’m mean.
 

Ironman: I’m Ironman, and I’m mean too because I give little kids yucky snacks.  Yucky snacks like candy.  Yucky smarties.  Yucky tootsie rolls.  Yucky minties.  Yucky peppermints.

 

Ironman: I can stand by myself.
 

Blue Beetle: I don’t know if I can.  Sometime when we get home, I’ll have to try standing up by myself.

 

Ironman: I’m going to get back in my box now.  Oh, I’m falling apart it looks like.  This cool button—look, it makes me fall apart.
 

Blue Beetle: Bye-bye Ironman.