Beautiful October

Beautiful October

I've been enjoying the arrival of Fall with the cooler days and the color. I was going to rake leaves today but our trees still have about 25% of their leaves so instead I'm editing photos and videos. I'll rake next weekend.

It's very unusual for us to have a homebody weekend but we are having one now. The TV has been off all day and the girls are playing together very well. Carol is enjoying the peace.

On recent weekends we've had some good fun. We visited the Davis Mega Maze as a work social event. We spent 90 minutes in the maze, whereupon we stumbled upon the exit and decided we were done. But the girls went on to play with the big chess and checkers sets and on the bouncy obstacle course.

Two weeks ago we drove to New York for the weekend and visited my friend Bill, his girlfriend Sara and his kids Cole and Tatum. It had been a year since we saw them so it was nice to hang out. We all went to the New York Hall of Science together and the kids had a lot of fun.

We have a lot of forested "reservations" very near our house so I've taken the girls for walks. One of my favorite things about New England compared to Seattle is the distinctness of the seasons. And I especially love how different the forests look and feel in each of them. I wanted the girls to get steeped in the "fall woods" feeling.

Audrey yesterday wrapped up her first season playing soccer. She was on the Colts with Coach Joe. We had some good talks about what it means to play on a team. Audrey liked soccer and she'll play again in the Spring season.

The girls were really anticipating Halloween. They started counting down the days about two weeks prior. They had decided what they would be and remained pretty constant: Audrey wanted to be a cat and Charlotte wanted to be a vampire princess. Carol of course did a wonderful job with the costumes. When the day actually arrived the forecast was for chilly temps in the low 40s, so Carol ran to the fabric store and bought fleece and made capes for each of the girls. They can be used as blankets after Halloween.

One of Audrey's best friends from school, Aidan, came over with his family because their neighborhood doesn't have very good trick or treating. In our neighborhood it was fantastic. We covered both sides of four streets and the kids raked in the candy. The capes were perfect - Charlotte would not have lasted nearly as long without it.

Both girls love their schools. Carol and I both met with Audrey's teacher a couple of weeks ago and she's doing great (she gets bored in Math because it's "too easy" - just like her dad as a child). Carol met with Charlotte's teacher last week and all is going just fine there, too. Audrey is in the phase now where she can't help but try to read any words she sees. Charlotte is trying to emulate her big sister.