Thanksgiving 2012

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving at home. The boys and I woke up and watched the Thanksgiving Parade with Nana and Papa.

This was my fourth time cooking Thanksgiving dinner, and I'm happy to report that I'm getting quite proficient at it! I don't touch the turkey - but thankfully Jeremy or Nana have taken care of that, but the rest is falling together quite nicely. Now if I could just conquer Passover seder - OY!

I made my first (and second!) pie. A sea salt caramel apple pie with flaky crust from scratch and I had enough left over crust for a creamy pumpkin pie. This is something that has been on my bucket list for several years so I'm happy to have learned - and they were good! WIN!

Owen made a Thanksgiving craft the day before

And in the morning Owen was running around and falling to the ground while Gillen giggled hysterically. It was so adorable and reminded me of all the things I'm thankful for this year (more on this here at Kveller), my family is at the top of my list.

Trick-or-Treat: Rescheduled

Due to the hurricane, Halloween was reschedule from Wednesday to Saturday. It worked out really well because the rain had stopped, Jeremy had the day off and while it was still chilly, Saturday made for a much better day to trick-or-treat.

This was the first year that Owen really understood what was going on. We practiced saying Trick-or-Treat and Thank-You and off we went with Gillen in the carrier.

We live in a Jewish community that doesn't celebrate Halloween so the main drag of businesses opens their doors for little beggars and hand out candy. This is the perfect situation for parents with little kids because there is no walking up to doors. Just up and down the street. We live two blocks away so we put on our costumes and walked up to the main street.

We got TONS of compliments on our family costume and lots of the store owners were dressed up. Owen was so excited to go to each place his little hand was wriggling out of Jeremy's hand before we even got to the door.

(I took these pictures with my phone so they are a little blurry but you get the idea)

Incredible Banking

 Robin Hood

 Ran into our friend Sam who was also a superhero!

Clifford the big red dog (who apparently works at a mattress store now?)

 Such a happy boy!

After Owen's treat bag was full we stopped and picked up Chinese take out. 

Superhero families need to eat!

When we got home we ate our dinner and then helped Owen sort and count his candy. We let him choose a few pieces. The first piece he chose was a weird chocolate coin wrapped in foil which he tried to eat with the paper on. Two houses down they were giving out FULL candy bars and instead of picking a Butterfinger or Snickers -- Owen picked a bag of peanut M&Ms. Jeremy and I both looked at him dumbfounded. Granted, the M&Ms were the only candy that was recognizable to him since he's never eaten a candy bar. And yes, we live down the street from a dunkin donuts and they handed out a small bag full of doughnut holes. It was awesome.

Jeremy and I ate most of Owen's candy after he went to bed. And other than Owen asking for a piece of candy the next morning he'd all but forgotten about it by Monday ;)

Halloween 2012: Our Family is INCREDIBLE!

Jeremy bought this Mr. Incredible costume in 2008 when he rotated at Children's Hospital as a medical student. He later found a toddler costume on clearance and we've held onto it until we had a kiddo that would fit in it. This was the year and while Owen has never seen a movie, let alone the Incredibles, we told him we were all "superheros" and he was thrilled. I used my highly untrained sewing skills to make a costume for Gillen and one for myself - they weren't perfect but I think we looked pretty cute. We all had several layers of sweatpants on so we kept warm.

Someone commented that they can't wait to see what we are next year. I think I set the bar too high for family costumes. I wish we all wore trash bags, that way there would be lots of room for improvement.

Happy Halloween!

Pirate Pumpkin Carving

Soaking up the last of a beautiful Indian Summer

We watched an elephant take a bath and spent long mornings at the park.
We walked to the library and gathered our bounty of books with delight.
We shared the biggest bowl of Superman ice cream on the planet "superhero food"
Each trip outside results in new leaves ("kites) being carefully collected and brought inside.
The yellow boots finally fit, despite having been worn for almost a year.
Our favorite snack is sliced apples - fall's perfect treat to us.
We had to pull out the sunscreen this week and I was reminded of our perfect summer.
Owen now calls any shirt with long sleeves a "fall shirt"
We color and glue and string pumpkin bead bracelets - any craft ("project") to fill the evening hours.
I am in love with this family, this season, these boys.

Pumpkin Patch!

Our First Year to the Pumpkin Patch

(and here)

Our Second Year to the Pumpkin Patch

Gillen Meets his Godmother

Sissa came to spend the weekend with us and meet her new Godson for the very first time.

They got along just fine :)
Not to mention Owen was also thrilled to have his Sissa here!

Zoo BOO!

Jeremy has to work during trick-or-treat next week so we skipped Owen's nap today and went to the Zoo BOO after Jeremy came home from the hospital so that we could spend a little Halloween together. Jeremy chose Owen's costume this year and I've gotta say, we have one adorable lion cub!

 tired lion cub on a 1,200lb pumpkin

 Owen was VERY interested in his "treats"

Pumpkin Patch Love

Someone needed to pick out the *perfect* "cuk-pin" (pumpkin) 

Found it.