Trick or Treat!

 Cara got to go trick-or-treating for the first time tonight.  Last year she had only been home a little over a week. She dressed up as a ladybug and A curled her hair and put silver glitter in it.  At this point, she had no idea what trick-or-treating was.  She was just happy to be dressed up as a ladybug.

 Posing with Mommy and Daddy before we left.  Mommy looks tired already! ;)

First we went to the cousin's house to trade treats and pose for pics.

The Cara finally got to do some "real" trick-or-treating.  She wasn't sure at first, but she got into the swing of things quickly.

She caught up with another cousin, the Joker.

And another cousin, Batman.

We went house to house in our old neighborhood.  Then we went to a few houses in another area of town, picked up a couple of pizzas, and went home.  Here's Cara showing off her loot with a tired smile.

She says she wants to go again next year, but she wants to dress up as either a princess or Taylor Swift. ;)  Happy Halloween!

Fall Photos {Sunday Snapshot}

We went out to the farm again today to get some fall shots.  The leaves are starting to change and the colors are just beautiful.  I also got a new lens for my camera last night.  Its 75-300 mm telephoto lens for my Cannon.  I wanted to try it out.



This shot was with the new lens:

This shot was with my kit lens.  For Christmas I want a new lens for close up shots.

This one was also with the new lens.  It's a little blurry because there's no image stabilizer with this lens.  I just need more practice with it.

New lens:

 Kit lens.  Cara hamming it up!

Kit lens:

Kit lens:

Kit lens:

New lens.  Again, a little bit blurry.  I was standing in the back of the truck to take this one.  Love the colors, though.

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Playoff Football

B's Grid Kid football team made the playoffs and today was the first round of playoff football.  B's team has made the playoffs every year he's played and they have won the championship once.  Tradition for the team is that when playoffs start, the moms make goodie bags for the boys after each game.  All the moms bring stuff to the game and one of the moms fills the bags while the boys play.  I get tired of bringing just candy all of the time, so I try to think of fun, obnoxious things to contribute to the goodie bags.  Today I brought wax vampire fangs.

B's team won today.  I already have the whoopie cushions ready to put in the goodie bags for next weekend! ;)

Pumpkin Carving

Last year at this time we had just gotten back from China with Cara.  The kids all put on their matchy-matchy orange Shanghai shirts to carve pumpkins.  Cara was pretty skeptical about the whole thing.  And sad.  And a little scared.  Not this year.

Last year it took a lot of coaxing to even get her to put her hand into a pumpkin.  It was sensory overload!  This year she dug right in and cleaned the guts out of her own pumpkin.

 Isn't it nice when your kids are old enough to carve their own faces on their pumpkin? ;)

Cara supervised Daddy's work on her pumpkin face.  She wanted two triangles for the eyes, a rectangle for the nose, and a smile with 3 teeth.

Cara checked out her pumpkin after the candle was lit.

Then they all posed with their masterpieces.

Happy Halloween!

Apple Pickin' Time {Sunday Snapshot}

We have about 5 acres of apples around our house and they started picking them today.  I've taken pictures of A in the apples, but I haven't gotten any pictures with Cara out by the apples.  So this morning we donned the apple dress and went outside to snap some photos before all the apples got picked.

 Who can resist standing by a bin of apples without choosing one to eat?

 Looking for more places to snap pictures:

On another note, today is exactly one year home with Cara.  So exciting!  We will carve pumpkins tonight and I'll blog about that later.

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Spirit Week-Grandparent's Day

This week is spirit week at B's school.  He has been dressing up all week, which is a surprise for him.  He is normally Mr. "Straight and Narrow."  He is shy and tends to be pretty conservative.  Today was Grandparent's Day.  This means you're supposed to dress like old people.  B took a different twist with Grandparent's Day.  His grandpa attended the same school B does, so today B dressed like he was attending school in 1966.  He wore grandpa's letterman sweater, jeans, and black hi-top Chuck Taylors.

 I think the teachers were more impressed than the rest of the students.  His principal told B every time he saw him today, "Don't get that sweater dirty." :)

Here is the link to the 1966 yearbook page with B's grandpa (my dad) wearing the sweater.  He's in the front row on the left:

http://www.zhsowego.org/1960-to-1979/Owego-1966/12047985_VwxL5c#855146487_ke4Di-X2-LB

I think it was a pretty cool idea for Grandparent's Day.

One year Gotchaversary

One year ago we saw this sweet face in real life for the first time.  I wish I was a better photo editor and could get this picture clear.  Sadly, I've fooled around with it in a couple of different programs (Microsoft photo editor and Picknic by flickr) and I have not been able to get it as clear as I would like.  But even though my picture is fuzzy, my memory of that moment is perfectly clear.

She was so scared, yet brave.  She was sweating up a storm from nerves, but was still willing to sit on my lap, eat snacks, and drink the water I brought for her.  She would smile, but she looked so nervous.  She didn't cry until we headed to the elevator.  She saw one of the nannies down the hall, and broke down in tears.  It just about broke my heart to see her so sad.

 Look at her now!  This was tonight at a local Chinese restaurant.  We went out to eat to celebrate one year with Cara.  The transformation in one year has been amazing.  She really has gone from a baby/toddler to a preschooler.  As I look through a year of pictures, the transformation in her facial expressions is where I notice the biggest difference.  Pictures started with fake smiles and scared eyes.  Then they changed to fake smiles and sad eyes.  Gradually they have changed to real smiles with happy, sparkly eyes.  She has an amazing smile and I love how happy she is now.

 This smile is a little bit fake.  She wanted to unwrap her sucker and I told her I wanted a picture before she could have the sucker. ;)

We also had our one year home visit today.  Our social worker seemed pleased with Cara's attachment and development.  So are we.  We still have work to do in some areas, but overall she's doing really, really well.

Happy gotchaversary, Cara.  We love you so much!

Another Homecoming Dance for A {Sunday Snapshot}

A attended her school's homecoming dance last weekend and went to her friend's homecoming dance last night.  I like this dress better than last weekend's dress, but she prefers the other one.  My friend came to take picture of the kids for this dance because she does a better job than me ! ;)

I snapped this one with my camera before everyone else showed up.

 I think this black and white one is really good!

 They double dated for this dance.

 And here comes Cara, gleefully hopping along with her Laffy Taffy!

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A day off from work

Today there was no school for Cara and me.  Just a Friday off in October.  J never works on Fridays, so Cara and Daddy usually just run errands.  Today we decided to take Cara to the park in Prosser.  In 2000, a group from the community worked on a project to build a park designed by the children of Prosser.  I was working at the elementary school at the time.  The engineers hired to put the design together came to the school to talk to the children about ideas they had for their "playground of dreams."  Kids drew pictures of what they wanted and the engineers put their ideas together into a playground.  Then community members got together to build the playground.

Almost 12 years later, the playground still looks just as good as it did when it was build.  The city has done an excellent job of maintaining it.  Cara had a blast!

 After playing a bit, we went out for lunch, then back to the park to play for another 30 minutes or so.  Then we headed up to Paterson to go to a few wineries.  We first stopped at Columbia Crest.  The facility is gorgeous, but we didn't taste or buy anything; just took some pictures.  The fall decor was so beautifully done it made me want to run out and buy some new furniture! :)

 We went to a couple other wineries, but one wasn't open for tasting yet and the other was closed on Fridays.  So we ended up going to Safeway and buying some wine there. 

Our final home visit is this week and we need to have our current pictures ready for the report to send to China.  We have tons of pictures of Cara, but hardly any of the 3 of us together.  So B snapped this one out in the yard:

It was a great day!