Halloween

Here are some pictures from our Halloween festivities last week. Kaitlyn was Tigger, in honor of her beloved stuffed animal. First, there was Trunk or Treat at our church on Sunday afternoon. It was a zoo with all the kids there! Kaitlyn was a little overwhelmed and didn't smile the whole night. But she picked up on the whole candy-in-your-pumpkin idea pretty quickly and eagerly ran from car to car to get treats. She even got an orange balloon, which was the highlight of her evening. When she got home, she spent lots of time gleefully dumping out the contents of her pumpkin and putting every piece of candy back in. She didn't show any interest in actually eating the candy, but I'm sure that will come in the years ahead. Meanwhile, the candy seems to be mysteriously disappearing from her pumpkin. I have no clue where it's going :)

Kaitlyn with Emily Kirby

With Mommy

Then Jeff's parents came into town for a quick visit. We carved a pumpkin while they were here and Kaitlyn was very interested in the glowing jack-o-lantern.

Kaitlyn got to spend Halloween weekend with Gran while Mommy and Daddy went on a little weekend getaway. Gran and Papa Bell took her trick-or-treating, and from what I hear, Kaitlyn had a great time. She came home with even more candy!

Here are some more pictures of Kaitlyn in her costume.

We're Having a....

...little boy! We had our ultrasound today. Everything looked normal. There were a couple of heart measurements that the tech wasn't able to get because of the baby's position, so I have to go back in a couple of weeks to "finish" the ultrasound. But if everything continues to go smoothly, Baby Boy Krinks will be making his appearance in mid-March.

More Fall Fun

This weekend, we went to Walden Farm for an afternoon of fun. It's a pretty exciting place for a toddler, and Kaitlyn kept running from place to place, exploring to her heart's content. (Which meant we had to run after her! Not an easy task when there are lots of people around!)

There were troughs full of grain and corn. Such a simple idea, but it was a magnet for the little ones. She played there for quite a while.

Kaitlyn found some sunflowers and cotton plants to wander through. No time to look at the camera.

She loves pumpkins. Everytime we see them in a grocery store or drive by a house with pumpkins outside, she has to point them out. So I thought she would be in heaven with all the pumpkins at the farm. But I think she was a little overwhelmed by the sheer volume. She paused in front of them for a while...and then kept on going.

But her favorite part was getting to sit on the antique tractor. She could have stayed on that thing all day!

Here are a couple of pictures from the same farm last year. What a difference a year makes!!

Fall Fun

It was a beautiful fall day today, cool and sunny with bright blue skies. Kaitlyn enjoyed a little bit of fall fun in our yard.

Playing in the leaves

Smelling the last of the summer flowers


Feeling the autumn sun on her face

Wagon Rides

Today Kaitlyn decided to give some of her friends a wagon ride. So she loaded up Pegasus and Doggie into the wagon and pushed them around...

...and then pulled them around. A great time was had by all!

The Zoo

We decided to take advantage of the nice weather this weekend and took Kaitlyn to the Nashville Zoo. She was pretty excited to see some of the animals that we read about in her books. It was hard to decide which animal was her favorite. It was a toss-up between the elephants and giraffes, although I think the giraffes edged out the elephants in the end. Their habitats are right next to each other, so she kept running back and forth between the two animals, pointing and jabbering in her own little language. I think she was telling the giraffes something very important!

In contrast to the fair that we went to last month, Kaitlyn was happy to pet the goats in the Critter Encounter. I think the baby goat was a little more her size! It's about the size of our dog, which she loves to chase around the house.

The camels were also entertaining. Fortunately, none of them spit at us. It's very fun to see these animals again through the eyes of a child. I'm sure Kaitlyn was wondering why they all had weird humps on their backs!

We ended the day with a ride on the carousel...Kaitlyn's first merry-go-round experience! She was happy to be riding a giraffe, and she was mostly all smiles until the giraffe started moving. As you can see below, she wasn't too sure about things at first. But she warmed up pretty quickly, and by the middle of the ride, Jeff had moved her to a neighboring koala bear that actually moved up and down. I wouldn't say that she really enjoyed it, but she didn't cry, so we considered it a success :)

A visit from Noah

This weekend, we got to spend some time with Jess, Adam and Noah. Kaitlyn and Noah were pretty funny together. They actually played together this time...sort of. Mainly, they followed each other around and tried to imitate the other one. Fortunately there wasn't any fighting over toys (yet!) and they were all too happy to share toys with each other. They're going to have some great adventures together as they get older!

Otherwise, there hasn't been a lot happening here this month. Just the normal busyness of life. Kaitlyn is learning new things each day. She's much more animated in her dancing now. It used to consist of just bobbing her head when she heard music. Now she stomps both feet and bounces up and down. The rhythm needs a little work, but it's fun to watch!

And on Sunday as we were watching the Eagles, Jeff taught her how to make the touchdown sign. She was gleefully doing it the rest of the night. Even when I was putting her to bed. The lights were off, we were quietly rocking, and I felt her lean back and let go of me with both hands. With the dim light of the clock, I could see her making the touchdown sign in the dark.

Some other random pictures are below.

Pegasus is still her most beloved stuffed animal.

This is her latest version of "Hide and Seek." If she can't see us, then she thinks that we can't see her!

And she still loves her hats! It's a bit early for fleece winter hats, but this one is her favorite.

The Lincoln County Fair

We took a little trip down to my hometown this weekend to take Kaitlyn to her very first fair. We took her to the livestock barns to see all the farm animals. She loved watching them from a distance, but she didn't like getting too close to them. Notice the look of fear on her face as we try to get her to pet the pony!

We also had this grand notion that she would get to ride her first merry-go-round. After all, merry-go-rounds look pretty harmless, especially when a parent rides with you! But then we looked at it from a toddler perspective...loud music, bright lights, lots of strangers, weird horses that suddenly start moving...and we started thinking that the merry-go-round probably wasn't such a good idea after all. Plus, those things spin surprisingly fast (funny how you notice these things as a parent!). We decided that there was a very good chance that she would start screaming as soon as the ride started, so we just skipped it this year. Besides, she was perfectly content to just sit and watch the action from the safety and comfort of her own stroller. And it was a lot cheaper too!

The Agriculture Building was much more Kailtyn's speed. There were all kinds of vegetables and plants for her to explore...and nothing that mooed at her! She was pretty fascinated by the prize-winning pumpkins!

Here's a video clip from the fair (thanks to Jeff for the editing!). You can see for yourself what she thought of the cows and horses. She was a little more tolerant of the goats...I guess they were a little smaller. And at the end, she got to enjoy some quintessential fair treats!

New Skills

Apparently Kaitlyn learned a few new skills while we were away. She learned how to lock the deadbolt on our front door. Unfortunately, I learned about this skill when she locked me out of the house! We had just returned from the grocery store. I took Kaitlyn inside, and then I ran back out to get the groceries (a routine that we do every time I get back from the store). We play this little game where I ring the doorbell and knock on the door and she comes to the door and jiggles the handle, trying to open it. But this time when I tried to open the door, it wouldn't budge because she had turned the deadbolt...who knew she could even reach it?!?! My keys were inside, the back door was locked, and the spare key was in a very "helpful" location inside the house!

For some odd reason, I happened to have my cell phone in my pocket. So I was able to call Jeff and tell him what was going on. Since he had the only other key in existence that wasn't locked inside the house, he rushed home from work. Meanwhile, I was sitting at the back door watching Kaitlyn though the glass. She was crying because she couldn't get to me, and I was desperately trying to think of any kind of song, game, trick, or funny face that would keep her close to the door and out of trouble!

Fortunately, there's a happy ending. Jeff made it home in record time, Kaitlyn never left my sight, and the spare key is now back in its normal hiding spot outside. I think we'll have a couple of extras made just to be on the safe side!

Malibu Vacation

Jeff and I returned from our Malibu vacation yesterday afternoon. We had a wonderful time! We stayed right on the beach and enjoyed glorious sunsets, walks along the beach, beautiful mountain drives, and even a couple of hikes. The above picture is taken from Santa Monica looking up toward Malibu.

We stayed at the Casa Malibu Inn, and this was the view from our room. You can't get much closer to the beach than this! In fact, during the peak of high tide, there wasn't much room to walk along the beach.

With the new baby on the way, we probably won't get this type of vacation without kids for at least a couple of years, so we decided to thoroughly enjoy ourselves. We had breakfast at the super-nice Hotel Bel-Air. We'll never be able to stay there, so we decided to enjoy the restaurant and garden grounds instead.

This picture was taken at sunset from the cliffs of Point Dume. This has always been Jeff's favorite Malibu spot, and he shared it with me the very first time we went to LA in the early months of our dating. Since then, we make it a point to watch a sunset or two from "our spot" every time we're in the area.

Those of you who know Jeff and I well know how much we love to explore, especially when we're on vacation. I lost count of the drives we took through the mountains and canyons of the Santa Monica Mountains, oohing and aahing over the ocean views and the mansions clinging to the sides of the hills. We also spent a day or two driving through the winding roads of Beverly Hills and Bel-Air. On Sunday, we bought the LA Times and found some multi-million dollar estates for sale that were having open houses that day. So we picked out the three most expensive ones that we could find and went "house hunting" in Beverly Hills. The picture above is one of those houses (we didn't take this picture). It's listed at over $12 million and it was incredibly gorgeous and opulent. It was perched on the side of the mountain with amazing views. 10 of our houses could have fit in this one! While we'll never live in a place like that (who really needs 9 bedrooms and a guest house?!?!), it's always fun to sneak a peek into the lives of the rich and famous.

While we enjoyed our time in California immensely, it was nice to get back home and see Kaitlyn. We knew she was in good hands with Gran. In fact, she had so much fun with Gran that I wonder if she really even missed us at all! But she was happy to see us when we got home, and she got lots of hugs, kisses and attention for the rest of the night! We look forward to a time when we can take Kaitlyn (and her brother/sister) out to California and share our special places with her.