Visit to Grampy and Grammy's in Austin

We took our first trip up to Austin this past weekend to visit Grampy and Grammy in their new home in Austin (recently moved from Rye, NH after 30 plus years on the New England seacoast.) It is a beautiful home in a nice neighborhood and a great place for grandchildren to visit. Upstairs there is a bedroom with side by side twin beds just for Jacob and Catherine and they thought it very novel to sleep in the same room. Grampy also had purchased a nifty new video monitor which swiveled from side to side thereby allowing us to check on them both while they were sleeping. There was also a "Texas attic" to play in filled with all of Dad and Uncle AJ's old toys. Jacob's favorite by far was the bins full of Legos. Catherine thought the Care Bears were kind of cool - remember those...?! There was also a nice, safe backyard to play in. The weather wasn't great on Friday so we didn't get to visit the Zilker Park train as planned; however, we did go up to the UT campus and visited the turtles in the turtle pond behind the tower and then took the "Forty Acres" bus ride around the campus which Jacob especially liked. (Grampy was at home getting the new TVs installed and Grammy was watching Cousin Alex.) On Saturday we had a nice dinner and got to visit with Uncle AJ (who Catherine in particular liked - he makes very cool animal noises), Aunt Christy, and Cousin Alex. The kids really liked Alex and wanted to hug/kiss her a lot. I think she was a bit overwhelmed by us all, but seemed to settle in after a while. We were glad to get to spend some time with our newest family addition.

Halloween

Halloween this year was "touch and go" as it has been for the past several years. Last year Jacob didn't want much to do with the Trick-or-Treating part as he preferred to sit aloof in the wagon. While Catherine on the other hand at just 11 months loved it (I think she was thinking who doesn't like a holiday where they give away free food?!) This year Jacob was much more engaged and enjoyed having a friend along (Theo and family) while Catherine would have nothing to do with her costume. After several frustrating attempts (to both mom and Catherine) to don her costume we gave up and she wore her Halloween dress instead. It was fun to have Grampy and Grammy come down for the weekend and also show our friends from Germany how proper Trick-or-Treating is done... : )

Halloween seemed to start the year's inflatables that pop up in the front yards around the neighborhood. The kids loved these and Catherine still asks if the Hickman's (our neighbors across the street) inflatable is deflated: "ghost deflated Mom?"

The month of October

This past October and well the whole fall really seems to have passed quickly. We spent the month going to soccer practices on Tuesday evenings and soccer games on Saturday mornings. Jacob also has continued to attend pre-school MWF. The kids got their pictures taken at JC Penny's in their Halloween clothing and we had a really nice visit with Gramma Toria early in the month. We had a fun time hosting the Starfish class Halloween party here for Jacob's pre-school and found watching three-year-olds bobbing for apples quite entertaining. : ) We also visited several pumpkin patches and went Trick-or-Treating of course on Halloween night with Grampy and Grammy and our German friends too, the Schubert's. And then there was our usual visits to various parks and the library. (These pictures are from both the Clear Lake UMC and also Bay Harbour MC pumpkin patches as well as a few soccer games.)