Thanksgiving Visitors

Rob's sister Juel, along with her daughter Betty and Betty's boyfriend Joseph, came up from Salem, OR to spend Thanksgiving with us.

Here's the younger crowd hanging out watching the Macy's parade on tv while the cooking was getting underway in the kitchen.

The day after thanksgiving there is always a parade in downtown seattle. Despite cold and some rain, we bundled up the kids and trekked on down for the event. The kids really seemed to enjoy it.
A big "Thanks" to old friends Miguel and Anne-Marie who donated us these snow suits several years ago--but which we hadn't actually used until now. (They actually say "12 mo." on the tags, but they fit our kids really well this year--except for the sleeves which are a little short.)
[And no, they aren't electrified suits--the camera flash just made the reflective piping really light up.]

That night we again bundled up and headed back downtown (this time +guests) to see the annual tree-lighting ceremony. (Juel is taking the picture. We didn't manage to get any good ones with her in them. Sorry, Juel!)

Saturday Play

The twins' play has definitely evolved in recent months into the "imaginative play" of small children. Much of their time (when they're not hitting each other and screaming) is spent pretending to be characters from cartoons they've seen, or talking to their stuffed animals and dolls.


Here they are peering out from their "cave" under the table which has become one of their favorite hidey-holes.

They both really enjoy coloring and drawing, though never for more than a few minutes at a time before scampering off again.

Watching this video you can imagine what kind of a mess our house is by the end of each day.

Halloween 2008 Wrap up

This year the kids were so excited to get to trick or treating that I only got one quick picture of them dressed up. Rose was supposed to be Dora the Explorer - the Value Village wig totally made her day - and Augie was a dragon. His favorite part of the costume was shaking his butt to show off the dragon's tail to people.

They had a great time going around the neighborhood, but were soon spooked by the darkness and scary-costumed kids. August spent a good deal of the morning after Halloween moving his candy around, sorting it out, counting it and, ultimately, begging to eat it. It's hidden away now.

Pumpkin Farm Part 2

Here the kiddos are sitting on some pumpkins that were set up for display.


They had a home-made kiddie ride train that was pulled around behind a tractor. The "cars" were barely big enough for an adult to squeeze into with a kid on their lap.

A closeup of August and Becky together in the last car in the train.

Rose and Anna strike similar poses peering over the side of an apple bin.

Pumpkin Farm

We drafted our friends Tom and Anna last weekend to head out with us to "The Farm" near Everett where they throw one rip-roarin' harvest festival, complete with corn maze, pumpkin patch, hay rides, numerous animals, a pig show, duck races, a kids' play area, trout fishing, and probably some more stuff I'm forgetting.

Auggie and Rosie enjoyed climbing on some old farm equipment they had parked around.


Here's Rose ogling one of the pigs.

There was a small shed with a couple feet of dried corn piled on the floor for kids to play in. It was extremely popular. We were still finding corn in pockets, socks, and diapers several hours later!

The big barn was set up with a hay bale maze that extended to two floors.

Here we are (minus camerawoman Becky) with our wheelbarrow ready to head out into the pumpkin field to select a couple of punkins for jack-o-lanterns.