Neighborhood Trick or Treating and a Celebration of Life gathering

We had a lovely fall Saturday and after today's weather I am beginning to think it is the last nice day we will see for a long time. I believe the high was around 60 degrees on October 25th and today it hovered around 35 or so! It even snowed today. We wouldn't want to gradually adjust to winter we need to go for the gusto and go from sunny and beautiful to snowing sleeting and freezing rain overnight.

We enjoyed our beautiful fall day by participating in our local businesses trick or treating event. All of the shops and restaurants around Highland Park sponsor a trick or treating Saturday every year. This was our first year and it was great. We actually only made it to about 6 local businesses before our buckets were full! The main reason for that is the local Lunds grocery store has about 10 stations throughout the store and they give out a large variety of items from, Apples and carrots, to milk and chocolate chip cookies. We even ran into our neighbor friends Ann and Mikey and they were kind enough to trick or treat with us for a bit.

Ben and Mikey (Ben is carrying his sister's bucket he doesn't really have two)

Our day of trick or treating was following by a drive to Hudson, WI to attend a Celebration of Life party. My cousins Dan and Jackie had their baby girl Shaylee pass away last December at the very young age of 10 weeks old. Dan and Jackie have a 4 year old son named Tanner and they wanted to show him that when they speak of Shaylee that it can be positive and they can talk happily about the 72 days they did have with Shaylee. In a lovely tribute they had purchased 72 pink balloons that we released into the air in remembrance of the 72 days Shaylee was with them. It was truly a beautiful tribute.

Ben had a fantastic time playing with all the other kids there and Emily was quite entertained by the dogs. Both kids were really impressed by the GIANT swing set and GIANT bon fire my cousin Dan had set up. Living in the country does have its privileges. I don't have any pictures of the bon fire for you but it was the largest bon fire I have ever seen. I know Ben will be asking to go visit Tanner again soon as he loved playing on his swing set and playing with his toys. I believe Ben's exact words were, "I don't believe it!"

I was also able to meet my newest second cousin, Ellie Anna Faith. She was as sweet as could be sleeping happily in peoples arms as new babies tend to do.

Gimme Don't Get

It is always an eye opener when your children repeat phrases back to you that you say or that other people in their lives say. We all know kids can say funny things with their innocent carefree perspective of the universe. Here are a few of the sayings and phrases currently floating around the Dockerty household.

Ben

1. Gimme Don't Get - Now this one comes from his Nanny Paulette. She corrects Ben when he says "Gimme that Emily". The funny thing is apparently I must say it too as I will be in line at the grocery store and say something like "Give me that bread please Ben" and he will say "Give me don't get MOM!" Sadly I had to ask him what I should say and he proudly said, "Please hand me the bread would be better".

2. What the Heck - This one comes from both Mike and I. I of course didn't realize how often we both said it until Ben started saying it all the time. It sounds pretty funny coming out of a four year olds mouth.

Emily

We have finally added a few words to Em's vocabulary. Here is a list of the words she currently uses:

1. Mama! (said very demanding)

2. Signing "More"

3. Dada

4. BAAAA! For Ben and she will only say it if she is shouting for him!

5. Bye - Just last night she said Bye about 100 times as we were leaving my cousins house. We were taking a long walk up a hill after being at a bon fire and she said Bye to the crowd every 5 seconds.

6. Wolf Wolf - For What a dog says - she gets very excited when she sees dogs, it's a definite love hate relationship as she wants to see them but when they get close she jumps into my arms.

7. Baba for milk or bottle.

8. Uh oh! My all time favorite as once toddlers start saying it they can't seem to stop! This one is new this week too.

9. Nana - For Nanny

10. Holding up one finger - now this doesn't really count as a word but I swear she thinks holding up one finger is sign language for an M&M treat. Emily has quite a sweet tooth. Ben could really take or leave candy although he is getting more interested in it. Emily on the other hand can't quite get enough candy like most kids. We keep a candy dish of M&M's in the cupboard and I will let Emily have one at a time so I always say, "1 treat Em, just one treat" holding up one finger. It took her about two seconds to figure out how to ask for "1 treat".

I have a feeling we are about to have a language explosion for Em right now as she seems to be repeating sounds more and more these days. She also has her own sing song way of saying Thank you and Knock Knock. Its like she has the inflection right but can't say the words. Pretty sure I can't do it justice in words. Ben is very into telling Knock Knock jokes and they are pretty bad. In fact just about every knock knock joke he tells has something to do with a Jellyfish on your head. Although today he did have a Halloween themed joke for me.

Knock Knock

Who's There?

Boo

Boo hoo?

More from Vegas

Woman discovers CNM in Las Vegas

John modeling his mask he picked up for Halloween from the "O" gift shop.
Jen, Mike and The Ent in the Belagio Gardens.
Dinner at Prime Steakhouse after seeing "O".
Sheli having her photo with the Coke bear "for her children". Right.....
Oh the M&M store, like kids in a candy store, oh wait!


The Chocolate Nut Martini aka CNM
The Belagio Hotel
John happy as can be eating Shepard's pie, drinking a pint of Guinness
and listening to Live Irish music!

A toast to a 4 day weekend in Vegas sans little children.

I discovered the Chocolate Nut Martini at the Baccarat Bar in the Belagio. If you know me your thinking, really Jen a martini? Wow! What a fantastic drink! Not only does it taste good but its also quite nice to look at! And to drink it in such a lovely setting too, sitting on nice couches and listening to live piano music. You wouldn't have even know there was casino surrounding you! There is something different about the casino in the Belagio, no loud digging and cling cling or loud bells and whistles.

We had a lovely time in Las Vegas this past weekend. The Belagio was everything I had hoped for. On Friday I spent the entire afternoon at the spa, that is what I call a vacation! Plus the Belagio had a beautiful bathroom with a tub that was built perfectly for resting your head and arms while you read a book. Our room had a lovely view of the Belagio water fountains and of Paris with its smaller scale Eiffel Tower.

We of course ate all kinds of good food in Las Vegas from dinner at Nine Fine Irishmen complete with a genuine live Irish band to a Private dining table at Prime the fancy steakhouse in the Belagio. Thanks to our reservation getting um lost we got to sit in the private dining area after we enjoyed a fantastic show. I was trying to lower my expectations as Mike has been talking about how amazing the show O is for the last 10 years! Now I finally got to experience it myself and I was equally impressed, of course the third row seats we had didn't hurt either! What an amazing show and theatre. If someone hasn't already recommended for you to see this show in Las Vegas than please let me be the first to say go see it!

Diane, Sheli and I had a great time shopping. Mike even had a great time playing poker. John and Sheli both spent time at the pool and I spent my free time at the spa! I only gambled for 45 minutes and ended up $100! Mike and I played roulette a game I had never played before. It is much calmer than my normal game of choice, craps. Of course it helps that on the very first spin or turn I won $80 off my $10 bet! I put 10 chips down on the intersection of 15,16,17, and 18 and 18 is the number that hit.

Haunted Gingerbread House

Ben and I had a lot of fun putting together this haunted gingerbread house. The kit we bought from Target made it a great project for a 4 year old. Emily really wanted to help but we distracted her by letting her play with a bowl of orange candy jimmys (all of which ended up on the floor of course).

I'm not sure the haunted house will last until Halloween but we had a good time putting it together anyway. Ben is very proud of it.

On another note my second day of my new job was GREAT! I think maybe the two scary meetings I was in yesterday were anomalies! The 4 hour meeting on my calendar ended up only being a 1 hour meeting and the department meeting this afternoon was great. I was able to see and meet everyone in my department group and we even played some fun games it was honestly one of the best meetings of that sort that that I have ever been to. Yesterday, I was a bit overwhelmed by all the TLA's (Three Letter Acronyms) that Best Buy uses and after hearing that comment my boss decided to make a game of it. Everyone had to write an acronym on the board and say what it meant every time you got one you received a casual day sticker. We just kept going round and round the room until no one had any acronyms left! It was great as I was able to make a 2 page list of acronyms and I ended up with 8 or so casual day stickers! The funny part of the whole thing is that I was given the wrong meaning for two of the acronyms from yesterday and that is why I was having such a hard time understanding them. I will try and explain but it will probably bore you to death as the acronyms are EMAC and MAC. Yesterday, I was told the M stood for Markup when it really stands for Moving. I was having difficulties figuring out the difference between EMAC and MAC as I thought the MAC was the one that included the markup and EMAC was just the Enterprise Markup Average Cost but was basically just average cost of the units with no markup. But I couldn't figure out if it didn't include markup why the word markup would be in the acronym. Turns out I was correct in what EMAC and MAC really were and I was correct in being confused as the M was really for Moving and not Markup. So really we didn't need the game as most my frustration with acronyms came from that but it was still a fun game and I did learn that Best Buy has a lot of TLAs!

No more carefree days for me....

Well, I'm back to having a real job. No more late afternoon runs or mid-day shopping trips for me. No more long lunches, no more late mornings chatting with Paulette, no more taking Ben to preschool, and no more carefree blog all day days for me! I choose this lovely picture of Ben for this post for two reasons. One, what could be more carefree than jumping in a pile of leaves? And two because it was taken yesterday the day before my first day of my new job. (and also because I can't have a post without a photo and this one is so FUN)

So about my first day. It went pretty well but it was also a bit overwhelming. I know I'm really going to like the people and the actual work of the job but there is this one pesky thing that is going to make it less than perfect. Can you guess what that might be? Yes, MEETINGS! There is something about meetings at big companies that just drives me crazy. I was in two particularly bad meetings today and I'm told that they are not normally that bad but as they are the only two I have to compare to I don't have much hope. The Best Buy campus is beautiful and my comfy little short wall cube is open to the window so that is nice. I'm on the 8th floor of what they call building A. I can see both highways (35W and 494) out my window along with downtown Minneapolis. Right now with the fall colors the view is beautiful. Well, I guess I imagine it to be beautiful it was a dreary rainy day here today.

When I logged onto my computer at 3pm today (that is when IT finally found me) I already had 69 emails! Yes 69 emails! Approximately 20 of those emails were for meeting requests and of those 20 meeting requests 3 of the meetings were for before I even started. Yes, I had been invited to meetings before I was even an employee, go figure! There is something disconcerting about opening your email for the first time and instantly getting 3 pop ups saying such and such is overdue!

I know I have to give it a chance and that first days are always hard etc. etc. I just didn't expect to be so overwhelmed the first day. So many acronyms and things I feel like I don't know. Part of it is just getting used to the lingo of the retail industry. I'm certainly not familiar with the key measures in the retail sector. That will come in time and be fine but right now my brain is buzzing!

Tomorrow is another day. And I have two meetings to look forward to including one from

10am - 2pm! I'm not even kidding!

Oh and how can I forget to talk about how my laptop was delivered. The IT guy was wheeling it on a GIANT cart. One of those carts you would expect to have a BIG tube TV on or something. The only thing on this cart was my laptop! It reminded me of the hospital where they won't let you walk in the halls with your newborn baby you have to push him/her in the bassinet. This was exactly the same thing, the IT guy had to push my baby laptop on this over sized cart. But the real irony is that they had it over to you and have you sign a bunch of forms about having to give them your first born child if you harm it in anyway but then they don't even give you a bag or case or anything to carry it in!

Tweite's Pumpkin Patch

The Dockerty Family Pumpkins at Tweite's Pumpkin Patch!

Ben loved the tire mountain of sand!


Ben deciding to try out the GIANT slide. At first he was scared but when we told him it was closing in 15 minutes and it was his last chance he decided he would try it. Turns out he LOVED it. (But you already knew that!)
Ready, set, GO!
Emily and Grandma greeting Ben at the bottom.

Emily's favorite part was playing with the boats in the water.

Can you find Ben?

Emily very tired after a fun afternoon at the Pumpkin Patch Park.

Every year we try to go to this amazing Pumpkin Patch in Byron, MN (near Rochester). This year we lucked out having fantastic fall weather. We also arrived at 4pm and they close at 5:30pm so we were lucky enough to be there as everyone else was leaving. Even though we did not get to go on the wagon ride to get a pumpkin we still had a fantastic time. Tweites has a few new attractions this year including a giant slide and some interesting wooden tractors with slides. This was Grandpa Dockerty and Daddy's first time at Tweite's pumpkin patch. Hope you enjoy the pictures.

Side note: Mike and I are taking a photography class and we are doing some experimenting with our camera so we took a lot of photos, even more than usually due to the fact that both of us are testing out our new skills or lack there of! It will get better.