Happy Halloween!

This year we are taking it easy for Halloween, but I guess we have been since Aaron and I got together. One of these years we will go all out. Along with my Bride of Frankenstein wig, I've lost my will to dress up for Halloween. But that doesn't mean that we can't have fun dressing up Claire! We went to a ward party the other night and she was clearly the cutest Toddler there. There were some cute kids, a baby skunk, and lots of little ladybugs, but we are definitely proud of our little fairy.

Claire is all decked out in her costume. She is pretty much the cutest Tinkerbell ever.

At the Trunk-or-Treat...

At our ward party. There was a dance and Claire was a little freaked out by the flash of the camera.

We thought Aunt Hiromi might like this picture :)

Earlier that day Claire decided to dump out her toys and take a rest in her toy basket. We thought it was pretty funny that she fits in it so well. Hope you all enjoy your Halloween!

Grandma and Grandpa come to Texas!

We had a nice visit from my parents. They flew in from Virginia and stayed with us for a week. It was so nice to have some extra hands to help with Claire. They also came though for us big time and hooked us up with gas and groceries while they were here. Thanks, Mom and Dad for everything! Here are some fun pictures from our week together:

We decided to take them downtown to see the infamous bats of Austin at the Congress street bridge. We decided to stop and take some pictures of the family on the way. Here is Claire with Grandma and Grandpa.

And here she is with Mommy and Daddy.



So the bats never showed up. At least while we were there, but we walked along the river - Lady Bird Lake and saw lots of turtles in one of the inlets. Here are a couple of swans that swan right up to us, I think expecting food. The bridge with to apparent bats to be seen is behind.Here is Claire all tuckered out after a walk we took with Grandma and Grandpa. I found a trail that I really like finally.

Here we are at Zilker Park Botanical Gardens. They are really beautiful and they are free. We let Claire get out and walk a bit, but she tripped and hit her head on the pavement. The goose egg is huge. It was a very sad moment. But she is very resilient and decided it might be better to ride in the stroller after all. We also checked out the Zilker Park Sculpture Gardens earlier and may I suggest that you visit only if you love sculpture enough to pay $3.50 per person. It was peaceful and pretty and the sculptures were nice, but it was tiny. The botanical gardens were 10 times better.

Here is Grandma in front of the main part of one of the gardens. I wish we could have come earlier while the roses were in bloom, but its not bad for October, eh?
And here we are with Grandpa in the Oriental garden at one of the foot bridges. There is a waterfall just to the right of my left shoulder, above Grandpa.

Oh no!

So Claire's new thing is exclaiming, "Oh no!" I guess I must say it quite a bit. I noticed I said it the other day. She had gotten into her wipes and pulled them all out of the container and had thrown them all over her room. Anyway, she will say it when she doesn't want to do something or just for fun. So today she was pointing to a picture of a baby and made the sign for baby just afterwards. I said, "yes, baby!" I then proceeded to tell her that Mommy has a baby growing in her tummy. I pointed at my tummy and then made the sign for baby. Matter of factly, she says, "Oh no". I guess someone is a little worried about big sisterhood.