Thankful

Sunny in November

Birthday celebrations

Claire recently turned three years old. We are a little slow getting the pictures out, but here they are. Since her birthday was early in the week and the family party the weekend after, we decided to do two cakes. Here is Claire on her actual birthday.

For the family party, many were able to make it, so it was a lot of fun! (Nana, Ma, Pop, Jo, Drew, and E were all there.) There was some running this year, too. (a new family tradition?) I think she was significantly faster than last year. (video) (Pictures from 2nd birthday weekend)

This picture is a little blurry, but seems to be the only one we have where a certain sparkle can be noticed on my little sister's finger! Congrats Ellen and Adam!

Claire wasn't too interested in trying to blow out the candles, especially in front of a large audience. The apple cake was good (thanks, Will!) Same cake recipe as Claire's first birthday cake!

Playing the Ladybug board game, a birthday gift.

Reading stories with Nana.

The girls together.

It's difficult for me to believe that this was three years ago. And these too. Time flies when you're having fun... and getting very little sleep!

Baby Camo

Happy Halloween

Today was the first Halloween that actually meant something to Claire. We had a great day home as a happy, healthy family. This morning Claire and I went down to the last outdoor farmer's market and bought our eggs, garlic, and honey. Within the first block after leaving the car (yes, we drove down this time) Claire was complaining about the cold and the wind. Her mood brightened considerably after she realized that all the vendors were handing out treats to kids. After we got home it took her no less than 30 seconds to have her candy out on the floor where she had to count it all. Pumpkin carving followed.





This was followed by some chores. Since Claire will be three in a few days she will be taking on new responsibilities. One of those will be helping to clean the bathrooms. Here she demonstrates good form scrubbing the floor.



After some time spent helping plant garlic for next year, eating lunch and taking a nap we headed over to Ma and Pop's house for a one-stop trick-or-treat. After returning home we headed out again for some more candy. What really excited Claire most, though, was handing out candy to those who knocked on our door. While she did that we enjoyed our favorite homemade pulled pork sandwiches. Mmmmm. (What was Claire dressed up as? A "Wild Thing.")

In other news, Lise has taken the first step toward adulthood. She is eating "solid" food. No, make that a semi-solid food - mashed up bananas. She will start developing her gourmet tastes tomorrow, when she tries rice cereal. Mmmmm. Or not.



Enough verbiage. Here are the pics you want to see:

Happy 1/2 birthday!

Lise turned 6 months old yesterday!

Claire has the flu (probably, and we hadn't even fed her pork either! jk!) but livened up enough to help us sing happy birthday to Lise at dinner last night... and then she kept singing and singing and singing it. I think she might have sang 'happy birthday' once for each day that Lise has been alive!

Here's a picture from a month or so ago, when everyone was healthy. So far the flu isn't so bad, but we're all just sort of waiting for everyone else to get it. Claire is very good at sharing these days.