Tree decorating

The great curiosity and short attention span of a toddler made this year's tree decorating process a speedy one!

 

Jolly

Special moments...blowing bubbles

Ho Ho Ho

Visiting Santa isn't the most joyous experience (yet).  She still kind of has that deer in headlights look like last year. (Hmmm...looks like she lost that second (and third?) chin.)

Coming home

Woo hoo! Coming home after a week away and I'm so excited!  Skype just isn't sufficient sometimes.

Le Petit Artist

We're into coloring - her preferred medium is ink, crayon just won't do.

The masterpiece in the making.

Quite a bit ends up on her hands (and shirt, table, pants, face, chair...thank you to whomever invested washable markers).

The finishing touches...

Drawing on paper is almost as fun as tearing it up. Almost.

Sticker explosion

In the battle between Annabel and the sheet of stickers, Annabel was victorious. The couch also lost.

Our favorite thing to do right now

Put things inside something, put the lid on, take the lid off...rinse and repeat.

14 months and counting

I hardly know where to begin it's been a bit busy over here ('tis the season...)  Our darling 14 month, soon to be 15 month, old is growing in leaps and bounds and I swear if I turn my head for one second and I'll have missed something.  Maybe I've said that before but it's taken me aback...again. 

This time, however, her growth is much less physical and more mental.  Cognitively, her comprehension of what we're saying or asking is unreal!  It seems like it happened almost over night a few weeks ago, but perhaps we just didn't recognize the signs.  She can't necessarily communicate back to us much beyond what sounds like "yeah" or shaking her head ("no" hasn't entered her verbal vocabulary, yet, but her head shakes are certainly recognizable).  But she can follow simple direction and give us some feedback on whether or not she wants something. 

And when she doesn't want something...or better yet we do not let her have or do something...it is often met with violent head shaking, and sometimes followed by flailing and loud complaining/shrieking/crying...aka, throwing a fit. Communication in that area is very, very clear on her end.

Some other 14.5 month milestones...
- Her imagination is growing!  She pretends to feed her stuffed animals her bottle or snacks.
- Loves to dance.
- Has 3 molars.
- Mumbles through 'cat', 'dog', 'more', 'book', 'ball', and 'all done'...they're not perfect, and it's not all the time, but it's a great start.  Sometimes we can get something that sounds like 'grandma' and 'grandpa'.
- Starting to sign 'please' and 'thank you', when prompted.
- Is using a fork sometimes...

Napa Weekend

Last weekend Matt and I headed for a blissful evening away in Napa...alone.  That's right, there will be no pictures of Annabel gracing this post.  If you came here to see the latest on her, please check back in in a few days!

In the meantime, here are a few pics from the trip...we stayed at the beautiful Carneros Inn.  Although Saturday was rainy we still fit in some wine tasting and then a wonderful dinner at Farm, the restaurant on the Carneros Inn property.  The grounds were beautiful so I couldn't resist sharing a few photos from Sunday after the rain had passed.
Annabel stayed with her grandparents for the evening and had a blast with them.  I swear she didn't miss us in the least.  The icing on the cake was my parents had to weather the daylight savings transition with Annabel while we stayed cozy in our little cottage Sunday morning.

  

Our cottage

Farm, the restarurant

Happy Halloween from Jimmy Kimmel

Annabel's obviously too young for this, but it's good to know what we have in store for us.  Mental note: do not joke about Halloween candy.  It's not funny. 



Favorite response to eating all their kids' candy they pillaged the night before - "Dad, you're ugly".  The one who gets physical with a wall..well, that just scares me.

My First Pony Tail

Halloween

Moo.

Annabel was a cow for halloween, but she hates anything on her head so we only got one decent pic of the full outfit. The others look a lot more like this...

We sat out front and greeted our fellow trick or treaters with candy...we had so many visitors that we ran out of candy (twice!) and handed out more than 500 pieces.

Trick or Treat! No candy for Annabel, but we did cruise the neighborhood, which was hopin'! Our hood goes all out for this holiday where people erect their own makeshift haunted houses and lawns are littered with body parts. We didn't want to miss out on the festivities!



A Trip to the Coast

(Nearly) a once in a lifetime opportunity...a super clear and warm afternoon and evening in Half Moon Bay! We joined my parents for a delicious dinner and drinks on the patio at La Costenara on the beach in Montera.

Pumpkin Patch