Simpsons in Seattle

Happy Halloween everyone! It was a fun filled day. For Evie, she had a Halloween costume party and parade at school followed by a pajama party. We opted to skip her swim lesson after school to instead go to our neighbor's house for a pizza party and then trick or treating with some of their kids. Evie was the youngest of the bunch and it took her some time to warm up to everyone. The group that we went with were mostly older (the oldest was 9) so they were running from house to house and at first it was a bit intimidating. After a few houses though, Evie was game trying to keep up and had a great time getting candy. We let her pick 2 to eat when we got home and she chose a pack of Lifesaver Gummies and Skittles. 20 minutes after shoveling the candy in her mouth, she asked for an apple (or beans!). Good girl! Does anyone eat candy corn still? Fairy princess getting ready for trick or treating Mickey Mouse jack-o-lantern! Daddy carefully carving the pumpkin  ...

Most of Evie's drawing are pretty abstract. Usually, she draws a big circle and when she asks me what's that? I have to respond with - you tell me, what did you draw?  Last night was the first time I ever saw her draw anything even resembling a person. Milestone! Here's her drawing a Vivian (or Vivienne? not sure), complete with appendages, pink dress, brown hair, and a smile:

Evie: What's that? Me: A baby chair Evie: But it's not! I can fit into it! Yep, that's my dinky kid alright! :)

I didn't bring the connector to Orcas to take the photos off my camera, so here's the rest of the post about our Orcas Island weekend: We arrived late Thursday afternoon to a cottage we rented right across from Crescent Beach, only a block or so outside of Eastsound, which is the main town on the island. The location was great and the cottage was darling - it's a remodeled oyster shack but you couldn't tell because it was done up really well.  Our cottage The cottage backs up against a reserve so it was very pretty and private. Living room view I love this dining room, with it's "antique" table and oyster shell chandelier. Crescent beach at low tide They found a cave! The weather was really windy and it rained on us quite a bit so we were limited to what we could do. We were able to do a little hiking, walked over to the new Island Hoppin' brewery, and had a fun picnic in the yard. We also did lots of snuggling in ...

I'm not sure how families with multiple kids handle bedtime. Every night it's a struggle with putting our munchkins to bed. Nora doesn't have a great schedule figured out yet so I'm hoping this will get better in a few weeks. More often than not, there's lots of playing/tickling, whines of "one more book!", followed by one (or more) parent falling asleep right after Evie is put down. Yeah, you read that right - we count it as a good night when we're in bed by 9pm! 

Little girl is getting better at tummy time! 

We broke out the bumbo for Nora and I think she likes it!  Doesn't she look super chubby here?