Happy Birthday Nina!

Nina is 1 year old!



We love this stage with Nina, as every day it seems she is trying something new, or impressing us with a new feat. Just in time for her first birthday, Nina ventured into the world of the walking, and she's now able to string together 5 or 6 steps before gravity takes over. She is thrilled with this new achievement, often stopping to laugh, clap, or wave as she tries to maintain her balance.

Nina loves to climb things, and has already made us think that a certain additional level of babyproofing may be required this time around. She's also become quite the chatterbox, talking words or even what seems like sentences in her own language. Words so far include "Dada," "Mama," "Buh-bye," and something that sounds like "Tank you" (if you really listen for it!).

It's hard for us to believe that it's been a whole year since we were preparing for a big Thanksgiving feast with a 5-day-old...Happy Birthday Nina!

SNOW!!

We've been through enough winters by now to know that all it takes are a few inches of snow to completely shut the City of Seattle down. Our perspective on the chaos is a little better this year, however, with a 3-year-old girl who is extremely eager to get out there and make the most of it!


With Sammy home from school today, she and I bundled up and joined our neighbors for some sledding and snow angel action outside, and even a trip to the snowy playground down the street. Then, it was off to carefully walk down the slippery hill (past multiple abandoned Metro buses -- quite the sight!) to meet Daddy for lunch at the sushi place in his office building. Temperatures are around 25 degrees, but the sun is shining and it's a beautiful scene here. Now we just hope it melts in time for our Thanksgiving trip to Portland!!

Here are a few pictures from our adventures today.

Fall Recap

It's a snow day here (pictures to come!), and I'm catching up on a few great pictures from the fall...seems like a long time ago already that we were picking pumpkins with the Cho-Thompson family, riding bikes on Alki with the Sousleys, and trooping down in the rain with the girls to the Husky game!

Halloween 2010

Happy Halloween! We had a very fun Halloween night with Jake, Aurelie and Julien McKinstry joining us for the Capitol Hill festivities.

These are our pumpkins (l. to r.: Karen, Sam, Paul, Nina). Note: Sammy specified that she wanted a "mad" pumpkin this year.

These are our trick-or-treaters -- Nina as Lion, Sammy as Bumblebee (round 2 -- she decided not to wear this year's costume, a monkey), and Julien McKinstry as none other than Chewbacca.

And here they are, having a rousing time wandering the streets of Capitol Hill! Both Sammy and Julien were pretty excited to trick-or-treat this year, and Nina loved being along for the ride, until she decided to call it a night...

Happy Birthday Samantha!

Sammy is 3 years old!

We had a great time celebrating Sammy's big day along with Grandma, Gramps, Nani, Papa, and Aunt Abby. This was the first time that Sammy really seemed to anticipate her birthday, and she loved running around telling us that she was now THREE! Of course, she is now already talking about what she'll be able to do when she's four...

We're so proud of our big girl. Happy Birthday Sammy!