Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a lovely holiday, many thanks to Aunt Dani and Nana Lin for hosting such a lovely meal. It was a huge success! We are deeply submerged in leftovers.





A good friend  joined us, and helped cousin H enjoy the day.



I somehow forgot to get many pictures of the kids, but here are the few photos I got from the day.

Halloween

Sabine had a very successful October, and a fun lead-in to Halloween. She can anticipate it more than ever, and looks forward to all the traditions. There is a big, inflatable pumpkin that goes up in front of a local farm every year, and we watched for it every time we drove down that road, Sabine was THRILLED to see it's reappearance!

Grandmom and Grandpa were kind enough to take Sabine to our favorite pumpkin patch this year, since Mommy is not as mobile these days. (As Sabine likes to say, "Little sister is a handful already!")

They apparently had a very good time.






(The annual shot next to the measuring tape; click HERE to see last year's picture)









And the big day. Sabine went as Mrs. Banks from her favorite movie, Mary Poppins, this year. Grandmom and Mommy had a really good time putting a suffragette costume together!






With our next-door-neighbor, who went as Hermione.

Cousin E also joined us for some trick-or-treating







This year ended much less abruptly, I think Sabine just wore out after hitting the majority of the houses in our neighborhood, so she and Daddy came home to taste the spoils.



Daddy was required to don his costume before he was allowed any candy. (His department did an Alice in Wonderland theme this year.)



All in all, lots of fun!

In Loving Memory

We did have a good week and a fun Halloween, but first there is something more important we need to record.

Last week we lost Sabine's Great-Grandmom. She was 101 years old, and just adored Sabine. I hope Sabine will have some memories of her. I have many more than I can recount here, and I miss her very much, but I am happy she got to know Sabine, that they got along so well, and that she knew we were expecting a baby sister--due right around Great-Grandmom's birthday, nonetheless!

Without further ado, here are some of my favorite pictures from the last four years:

2010







2011





2012









2013



And a video from our visit this summer. They were talking about a picture of sailboats that Great-Grandmom had. Great-Grandmom was weaker, but still very happy to see Sabine. We miss you and love you so very much, Great-Grandmom.