Morning exercise

On Sunday morning, Natalie wanted to go back in her crib after breakfast: It turned out she just wanted to get her morning exercise in...:

Happy Halloween

Friday was Halloween! We had such a great time trick-or-treating! Here's Natalie in her bumble-bee outfit:

Yep, that's a sucker in her hand. She was eating suckers the whole time. I know, lots of sugar, but oh, well, she's a kid, and it's only Halloween once a year...

Most of the time she was in her wagon with Karsten or myself pulling her. Here are some short videos from that:

And here's the picture that just says it all:

Happy Halloween!!!

Santa who?

The other day, Natalie and I were looking at some Christmas giftwrap. Here's our conversation:

Me (pointing to a penguin): Do you know what that is?
Natalie: Pen-gin!
Me (pointing to a snowman): And what is that?
Natalie: Now-man!
Me (pointing to a drawing of Santa): Do you know who this is?
Natalie: Red Clown!

Hmm, I guess she might be onto something there...

Apple picking - apple pie

On the weekend before Halloween, we went applepicking at a local apple orchard. It was great! Natalie really got into it. There were plenty of apples low enough to the ground that she could reach them. She loved running around finding the best apples, then picking them and putting them in her little basket:


At the apple orchard, they also had a walking trail where you could see different animals like llamas, alpacas, sheep, goats, pigs, deer, and ducks. We bought some food for the animals, and Natalie loved "feeding" them. She didn't want to get too close, so she would take the food and give it to Karsten, so he could feed them! Pretty smart if you ask me...

After we got home, Natalie helped make apple pie from the apples. She made the dough, helped squeeze it in the pie-form, and she sat on the table next to me while I was cutting up the apples and taste-tested them - each one of them, several times! We had so much fun that day.

The two pictures in this post are "book-ending" a really great day - so great that we kinda forgot to take pictures in between!

A real Jack-o-Lantern

Natalie and I made a real Jack-o-lantern last weekend. Look, Mom, that's a big pumpkin!

I was surprised that Natalie didn't really want to help take out all the seeds and fibers from the inside. Normally, she dives right into whichever project we have going on. But the "pumpkin-guts" must have been a little too scary-looking, because she kept a two-step distance thruout the removal process. But only two steps, after all a girl needs to be able to see what's going on! And she loved talking about it and seing the finished result:

Natalie told me all night "Big-one pumpkin light on!"

Halloween party at daycare

Last week, we went to a Halloween party at Natalie's daycare. It was so much fun. Each room had new adventures to be discovered, like decorating cupcakes, searching for spiders in a tub of spiderweb, and throwing bean bags thru a setup with pumpkins painted on it:

Natalie quickly got the hang of this one, and she wanted "more":

Another favorite was the room where we decorated cookies.

Orange frosting, and sprinkles, what more could a girl want...

Gotta love that orange grin!

The craft box

The big box behind Natalie in this picture is usually full of her craft supplies... But it's soo much fun to empty it out. Look, Mom, I found some pink sticky-tape!!!