Happy Halloween!

This year we have a little Minnie Mouse to take trick-or-treating:

Last year we had a Piglet. Look at the difference one year makes!

I won't get weepy on you. I promise. 

This was the first year where Lucy has had an opinion on her outfit, and since she's a big fan of Mickey and Minnie Mouse, she was thrilled to dress up as Minnie.

These pictures are actually from our trip to Moscow where our old church had their annual Fall Carnival. It's so fun to have TWO events to dress your child up for instead of just one.  I haven't decided yet if I'll take the camera with us when we go out trick-or-treating at 5th Street Market later. It is raining and I like to have my hands available to hold Lu lu, but we'll see! 

If not I at least have her costume memorialized on our blog. I found the dress at a thrift store in Portland, and my mom found the ears at Goodwill and she made that bow. Isn't it adorable? I love how large it is, it's just like Minnie's, and it makes her look so cute.

I didn't get any good pictures from the fall carnival, it was pretty chaotic although Lucy had a blast. But I did manage to snap this one which I think is awfully cute. Lucy and her nana.

And here's some holiday decor to wrap up the post! Happy Halloween!

Paramedic Papa

Lucy is a girl who revels in her "owies." She likes to find them, point them out, and then talk about them a lot. Even if it's just a little piece of dirt that has landed on her skin, she comes running up to me asking, "My Owie?" So on our most recent trip to Moscow, Papa decided to dig out his old ski patrol first aid kit and take care of all of Lucy's owies.  

First he wrapped one leg and splinted an arm. She didn't care much for the splint, but was thoroughly pleased with one wrapped leg and requested the other one be wrapped as well. 

So Papa dutifully wrapped the other leg: 

And Lucy was magically "all better!" At least for the rest of the evening. 

It was a lot of fun for Lu-lu. We think she enjoyed it a lot more than the cats did back when Papa used to practice on them. 

We have a 2 year old!

Lucy's birthday was last week but we celebrated it on Saturday when we could have a full-out party with family there. Lucy has a book about birthday parties, and so in the days leading up to her party she was very interested in the influx of balloons, crepe paper, and carnival-themed decorations. She kept asking very pointed questions: "MY party? People coming? BALLOONS??" It was adorable. And she did have a blast.

We went with a carnival theme for our animal loving gal, and my mom and I spent a fun day scouring the dollar store, Walmart, and Michaels for thrifty party decorations. 

Here was our part decor/part entertainment elephant stand that I drew and my dad nailed to some boards for the kids to throw balls through:

And here's the food table! 

We had popcorn, cupcakes, animal crackers and animal cookies.

Mom and I scrapped the idea of decorating cupcakes in the shape of animals, and instead found some cute wooden animals that we stuck on sticks at Michaels. Much easier and still so cute!

We set up a kid's activity table with colored pencils, stickers, puzzles and coloring sheets:

And of course, every two year old loves balloons and party blowers:

The kids opted for chowing down on popcorn first

But they also spent a good deal of time with the stickers

And the party blowers: 

And even a bit of the elephant stand game:

Lucy loved having everyone sing her happy birthday

And she is still talking about that cupcake:

Lucy said goodbye to her guests through the elephant stand:

It was a fabulous afternoon, and we're really grateful for the 2 years God has given to our spunky, beautiful little girl. Happy Birthday Lucy!

For Grandma and Grandpa

Others might find this video entertaining as well, but I figured that since Grandma and Grandpa Cohen haven't gotten a chance to hear Lucy sing the itsy-bitsy spider song, they would particularly love this clip. That is, if they don't develop vertigo from my child's insane energy bursts. I am partially to blame for that: Joel is on a business trip and this pregnant mama is not nearly as good at rough-housing with our antsy two-year-old as dada. The energy had to go somewhere.

Little Girl!

I posted this picture on facebook a few weeks ago, but I forgot to add it here as well! Here I am at my parent's house, 16 weeks:

We lost baby Christian shortly before 16 weeks, and so even though the doctors don't think this will happen again, it was still a huge relief to get past that point. 

And then, at 17 weeks (on Friday, Sept. 28th) I had an ultrasound and found out that this new little baby is a GIRL!

Check out that button nose! And look at this perfect profile:

We are SO excited to have another little girl in our family. Lucy is such a girly-girl and I can already imagine the tea-parties and dress-up games that will become a regular occurrence at our house. I know how much I loved having a sister so close in age, so I'm thrilled to think of Lucy getting to experience that same close friendship with her sister. 

Lucy is excited too, although for a slightly different reason. Today at lunch, after I took her in with me for my routine ob check-up, she told me in a hushed, excited voice: "There's a baby in MY tummy!" :)