No. No. No. No. Maybe.

Back to school shopping with Alexis is always a bit of a challenge. While I'm standing there trying to get her to pick out a few outfits, she locks her laser focus on just one item. She can't pick four things because JUST ONE THING, MOM.

I created that monster.

Alexis was a grabby, greedy, indecisive little thing when she was a toddler. She entered stores with the intention to leave that store with all of the things. ALL of them. This toy and that toy and where are all of the toys? She can't live without all. of. them.

Thus, my mantra became "You can pick one thing." I still practice the mantra on occasion today, but mostly Alexis just does it herself automatically.

Not Mila, though. That particular brand of toddler looks at the world and says, "No." To all of it. She wants nothing to do with anything. If I hand her the cutest, fuzziest toy in all the land, she will look at it, say "No," and hand it back to me.

Every. Single. Time.

The challenge with that is that a quick run through the store can't ever be quick because I can't bribe Mila. I can't hand her something shiny and bright and let her push buttons and spin and whatever while she sits in a cart and I rush through a store. I got nothing. NOTHING. She has no interest in keeping any of the toys that she sees in stores.

(Remember that at Christmas, family types. It's not that *I* am being difficult when I say I don't know what she wants, it's that SHE IS SO DIFFICULT SHE WANTS NOTHING OMG IT IS SO GREAT YET SO ANNOYING.)

There are exactly three exceptions to the "No" and instant give it back. THREE. The little porcelain dog that lives in Mila's fairy garden was a keeper from the instant she set eyes on it. She grabbed it, held tight, and refused to let it go, even when it was time to pay for it. That little dog entertains the kid every single day -- she stops to visit it in the mornings as we're leaving and again when we return home at the end of the day.

The second exception to the "I don't need your distractions" thing the My Little Pony hat Miss Mila acquired last week. She still loves that silly thing, for what it's worth.

And now we have Flora. Flora is a Beanie Boo (aka "Big Eyed Things," which is what Alexis has called them for a few years now) and Mila is in loooooooove. Flora has travelled everywhere with Mila for the past few days.

A dog. A pony. A skunk.

This is the start to some sort of terrible joke, isn't it? A dog, a pony, and a skunk walk into a bar and only Mila knows what happened next.

Sugar Drunk Puppy

Every once in a while, I have a good idea. Waking up Saturday morning was a terrible idea, but then I said "Let's go to the zoo for the Halloween thing." Good idea!

No! Really! I know that it sounds like an awful idea for people who hate other people to purposely go where all of the people will be, but the weather was sort of crappy. That means that Zoo Boo was far less of a draw for the creatures that walk on two legs than it usually is. Thinning the human herd, FTW!

Another one of my good ideas was the spontaneous decision to click the "Order" button on a Halloween costume for Mila earlier in the week. Her REAL Halloween costume is still under construction, and it's not exactly cold-weather friendly. It's not much of anything friendly, really, except that it's the ying to Alexis' yang. Apparently that's going to be a theme for years to come. Alexis picks a costume and Mila has to be her sparkly accessory.

Speaking of Alexis' costume, I think this year's costume is going to once and for all prove that she is an old soul. The oldest. Such a grandma. Except, she won't literally be a grandma because she doesn't see the beauty in the idea. I tried to talk her into a long gray wig and a walker and how amazing would that have been? I suppose she didn't go for it because she wasn't sure how to make Mila a sparkly accessory for that costume.

ANYWAY.

Alexis didn't want to wear her REAL costume just yet, so she did what any little dancer would do -- she walked into the playroom, grabbed a recital costume from last year, and declared herself ready.

So we took a puppy and a dancer to the zoo where they met a bear.

The bear really wanted Alexis' bright orange candy bag, so now Mila is obsessed with saying BEAR BEAR BEAR BEAR BEAR. The DOG DOG DOG DOG DOGs of the world better watch out. They have competition.

But so does that bear.

For as bad as the polar bear wanted Alexis' bag filled with candy, Mila wanted it more. You guys, candy. CANDY! CAAAAANDY! That's sums up Mila's thoughts on that. CANDY!

She managed to string together enough accomplices who were willing to open packages of candy for her to hit a Category 5 sugar high. It was ... special. Yes. Special. It was "special" in that way that chasing a very small human who has just figured out that you can smell colors when you're rocking a sugar high can be. She was zipping around like a drunken bumblebee, except that she was dressed as a puppy, so maybe she was a drunken puppy?

Yes. She was a drunken puppy.

Spaghetti Squash and Buttermilk Couscous

I wouldn't call either of the two things I'm posting now a "recipe," really. They're more "how I do." Given that the whole reason I post recipes is so that Alexis and Mila will eventually be able to recreate the foods that they grew up eating, it makes sense to throw in a few "how I do" things.

The first one is mostly for Alexis because girlfriend can put down some spaghetti squash. Mila prefers to feed it to the dogs, which is how she ranks lots of foods that aren't candy these days. Halloween is ruining that child, man.

Spaghetti Squash

1 spaghetti squash
2 heaping teaspoons of minced garlic
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

2. Cut the spaghetti squash in half the long way. This part SUUUUCKS, by the way. Or maybe it only sucks for people who refuse to buy good knives. That might be a thing.

Once the spaghetti squash is cut in half, clean out the inside. Get rid of the seeds and goop, just like you would a pumpkin. A spoon works nicely for scraping the seeds out.

3. Spread a teaspoon of minced garlic in each side of the squash. Then spread the olive oil all over the inside of each half. Top it off with some salt and pepper.

4. Throw it in the oven for 35-40 minutes. It's done when you nudge it with a spoon and the squash breaks apart easily.

5. Let it cool completely then scrape the good parts of the squash away from the rind.

6. It's sooooo good with marinara sauce and parmesan cheese. Alexis and her three giant servings at dinner can attest to that.

Buttermilk Couscous

2 cups buttermilk
1 cup couscous

1. Heat the buttermilk until it boils in a large saucepan. Add the couscous and remove from heat. Wait five minutes then fluff with a fork.

2. Parmesan cheese, man. It makes all sorts of things fantastic. That includes couscous.