Eating from the Tree of Knowledge...

This evening Kendall crawled up onto our kitchen table and grabbed an apple out of the fruit bowl. She sat down on the chair with it. Then, she took a bite. Then another. Pretty soon, she had eaten half an apple! Her first "whole" apple.


Nom nom nom.

Orange and Black...

We had my mom and bro and his family over for a Halloween Extravaganza!! on Sunday. The little ones got dressed up for the occasion...

And so did the not-so-little ones...

Everyone had to try on Brandon's Palomalu wig.

Palomalu, is that you??

Then, it was off to the Punkin Patch even though it was drizzlin' pretty hard. No matter, the ride and pumpkins were still all systems go.

Kendall had so much fun running around touching the wet punpkins and looking at the animals in the petting zoo.

Brandon got to go on a few rides.

And we managed to find the perfect pumpkins for Halloween. Happy Haunting!

Vocabulary of a 17-month-old

"side?" = Momma, can I go outside?

"per?" = it might be time for a diaper change here...

"bit-ee?" = Gimme a dang bite of yer food!

"nigh-nigh" = time for sleep

"Bye-yee" = Something Kendall says as she shuts the door in your face.

"wah-wah" = water or a drink

"Ball" = Ball. Duh.

"Ba-woon" = balloon

"Car" = Car

"Dadda" = Daddy

"Ma-MA!" = Mommy

"Bah-bah" = bottle

It's so cool to see her vocabulary practically exploding these last few weeks. She is a great little communicator- whether through sign language or words.

She sure keeps us all entertained and smiling. What was life like before Kendall? It's so funny to think how we will ask ourselves that same question about this new baby one day.

Yeesh, EVERYTHING is photoshopped these days!!

Cousin Love!

Little Dean is hard not to love...big, juicy cheeks to kiss, a great Elvis style hairdo, chubby-wubby thighs...I could go on and on about this guy! He is so irresistible that even Kendall had to get in on that action!

Must...hug..cute baby!

And because I am beside myself over her outfit, here are a few more pics of her in her new skirt...

Practicing for when baby bro or sis arrives!

Happy Birthday, Honey!!

Chris, what can I say? I feel so lucky to have you in my life. Every morning I wake up happy because you are beside me. You keep me smiling and take such good care of us. You are an amazing husband, dad and step-dad. I love you!!!

Couple's Retreat!

First of all, I had to edit this post to add a "better" picture of my cute husband because he said that I only put weird pictures of him up here on the blog. Uh, sorry honey. You just always look good to me! Here is an extra-good picture:

Here are a few pics of the Roosevelt hotel in Hollywood where we stayed. I wouldn't recommend it for the rooms, but for everything else (bars, food, pool, ambience) it was great!

Some highlights from our "couple's retreat" weekend in LA. We actually watched that movie on the hotel TV while we were there. How appropriate.

Creepy giant photo of some weird guy over the bed.

Chris enjoying a $20 cocktail with the biggest ice cube I've ever seen-see below.

Biggum's!

I loved the faux zebra-hide barstools at the Library bar (home of the $20 drink. Glad I was a cheap date at least!)

Lounging poolside at night- great music and drinks in a nice atmosphere. Wish I had a picture of the Cuban sammich that Chris got at the pool earlier in the day- it was seriously the best sammich we have ever eaten!

Had to stop by the Avalon hotel to check out the decor.

And Chris needed some culture so we stopped at the Getty Villa and looked at some Roman and Greek sculptures and art. Beautiful.

I think we definitely "bonded" on our couples retreat- hopefully there will be lots more to come!