Halloween Preview

We are completely pooped! This weekend we visited with friends and family in Oakland and Berkeley, on three different occasions. Claire officially went to a theme park for the first time, a place called Children's Fairyland in Oakland. She really seemed to like the kiddie carousel, and all the craziness of children screaming and running around. Claire donned her monkey costume, which we will break out again for Halloween this coming weekend. So don't worry, there'll be better quality monkey photos soon!

Claire has been fighting a cold this week, which includes a hefty cough for the first time. She's on the mend and will hopefully be feeling 100% for trick-or-treating.

Pumpkin at the Pumpkin Festival

For Halloween Claire is going to be a monkey. But what better way to dress up for the pumpkin festival in Half Moon Bay than to wear a big orange pumpkin suit. Claire picked it out, so don't blame the parents. So yeah, we dressed her as a pumpkin and put her in the BoB and then made her do a 10K with us. Sarah and I managed to navigate the full 6.2 miles without hitting any of the pumpkin-loving runners with the stroller, an amazing feat given the fact that both the 5K and 10K run along the same narrow path. Anyway, neither of us tried to set any records, we just wanted to see what it was like to run a race with the baby and I'll mark this off in the success category. Claire was cordial and didn't really complain during the race but I do think she growled at a few runners. This proved to be a good technique, because after hearing the growl and turning around to see the cute little pumpkin, most of the time the runners would step to the side and let us pass.

After the race, Claire continued to look cute and we headed over to the festival for our annual tradition of eating pumpkin pancakes. Of course the festival is more than just pancakes, but if you ask me once you've seen one 1500lb pumpkin you've seen them all. Farmer Mike and his title of "World Class Pumpkin Carver" continues to impress and the endless line of artsy booths is worth looking at (but as I like to say this is my least favorite part of the festival). In the following photo, you can tell that Claire was astounded by the delicious pumpkin pancakes, which she is wearing all over her lips.

A trip to the Half Moon Bay pumpkin fest is not complete without visiting a pumpkin patch and we picked out two great big pumpkins at the first patch we saw.
Sarah had fun too. She even got to reminisce about being pregnant:

We had dreamed all year long about how exciting Claire's first visit to a pumpkin patch would be. We imagined her being pulled in a wagon through endless rows of pumpkins, sitting on barrels of hay, poking all the scarecrows and lawn ornaments. However, all the prior excitement of the run and festival tired her out! Instead of enjoying the patch, she just slept the whole time and never even saw it.

It's Raining Teeth

Another day... Another Tooth. Two teeth in two days.

Bring on the Tooth Fairy

Breaking Headline News:

CLAIRE GOT HER FIRST TOOTH! 10/16/2009 IS A BIG DAY FOR CLAIRE
Its the front middle tooth on the bootom. Woo hoo!

Growing Pains

When Claire was 3 months old she and I went to a few "mommy and baby" yoga classes. After the classes all of the mommies and babies would sit in a circle and we'd share little anecdotes with the group. I remember one of the mothers crying in despair over the fact that her baby girl was growing up too fast and she wanted her daughter to stay just as she was at 9 months old. At the time I was thinking "geez somebody's feeling hormonal". But now I must admit that I completely understand! Everyday I find myself telling Claire how much I'm going to miss her at this age, and getting teary-eyed. It's got alot to do with how cute she looks standing in her crib lately, all proud and smiling. She definitely has a sense of accomplishment and we can't help but get excited too, even if she should be napping instead of pulling up to standing. I never want to forget this!

Wining not whining

We got up Saturday morning and thought "hey let's go to Napa just for the heck of it"! So off we went, strategically driving during Claire's morning nap-time. Our first stop was V. Sattui winery in Napa since we like their picnicking grounds and lunch options. We laid out a blanket and plopped Claire down on it, and within a minute she was already trying to eat dirt:



We explained to her that there are much better things to eat than dirt. So she moved on to the wine:

We explained to her that she is much too young to be trying wine. Instead, she practiced pulling herself up to standing, using Daddy's legs for leverage.

V. Sattui was the perfect place to relax and nap in the sunshine. Afterwards we went for a hike in Bothe Napa Valley State Park, where you can find redwoods even this far east. We didn't get any views of the valley however, so the next day we went to Sugarloaf Ridge State Park and hiked up to Bald Peak for views of both Sonoma and Napa, as well as San Francisco.

After the hike we stopped at Viansa Vineyards for a picnic lunch. It's perched up on a hill and has amazing views. Claire couldn't find any dirt to eat but she did go to town eating her teething biscuit, and using it as a medium for "painting" Daddy's jeans.

Thursdays are back!

I've decided to go back to working 3 days a week (instead of 4) at least until Claire is a year old at the end of January. For our blog readers, this will likely mean more posts for you to enjoy! For me it means more time with Claire and more time for exercising and cooking. (You don't even want to know how often we've eaten Taco Bell in the past couple of months) I feel VERY lucky to be able to do this and have my awesome husband to thank for this extra time! He really is amazing you know. I think he has a superman cape hidden underneath his work attire.

This week we have been working on getting Claire to return to her old sleeping routine. It took a few AWFUL nights of screaming before she started sleeping through the night again but I think we're back on track. (It is so hard to listen to her scream in the other room!) I'm not going to prematurely declare victory yet though...

Claire is relying on her teething rings alot lately, for pain relief and for entertainment. It goes like this: teether in the mouth, teether banged the floor, teether in the mouth, teether banged on Sasha's head, teether in the mouth, teether banged on the coffee table, etc. I am so impressed with Sasha's patience. She gets bopped on the head and she does nothing.

Now don't freak out, but here is a photo of something other than Claire! I'm experimenting with a succulent garden, since everything else that I have planted in this pot has expired. It looks cute and still green so far.