let the talking begin: almost 11 months.

hana has added "shoe", "duck" and (less frequently) "tree" to her repetoire of words. when you sing "if you're happy and you know it clap your hands..." she will. jon and i broke down and bought her a new toy... we've been reluctant because we luckily got a lot of toys as gifts and hand me downs. but even with all of those possibilities around, she prefers to play with the remote controls, water bottles, mom's "sippy cup", fire place pokers (which have finally been banished to the garage) and daddy's lap top. but she has been really showing an interest in walking so we bought her one of those walker things that gives her something to push along and balance with as she learns to walk. she LOVES it. the other night at jenny's house (party of 5!) she was playing with the twins and we tried having "walker races" with hana and charlotte (jack still gets dragged around a bit by his walker). it was pretty cool but they don't seem to want to go at the same time. charlotte generally takes the early lead and then hana goes after charlotte's finished. bit it's pretty funny either way.

she has sprouted 2 more teeth alongside her two top teeth. these two teeth gave hana a hard time which i'm sure was not helped by them coming in at the same time. she has also started being highly dramatic when she does not get her way (or when she percieves she's not getting her way). if you take something way from her, say the cat's tail, she flings herself backwards in a sqeaky whine and starts rolling around on the floor. it's very dramatic.

our little duckie: halloween '07

this year hana went as a little duck for halloween. she partook in several halloween festivities and had a pretty busy social calendar for a baby. the first halloween festivity was a baby costume party with some of my friends from the mom's group. yes, that was a cute as it sounds... it seems that many members of the animal kingdom were represented. and there was one baby dressed as a pumpkin representin' for food groups(most notably the fruits).

speaking of pumpkins, did you know that pumkins are fruits? we learned that at the pumpkin patch which was the second halloween outing. for those of you out there not familiar with the pumpkin patch phenomenon, its is a great place for kids especially. although, i think a really good corn maze would make a fun date for those who are kid free (wish i'd thought of it before becasue now it'll be a while before i get lost in a corn maze). if you think about it, it usually takes about 1-2 hours in the bigs ones and there are some secluded corners to smooch in... but i digress.

the pumpkin patch we went was at a farm in livermore about 30 minutes from our house. it was free to get in. they give you a red wagon to pull around the pumpkin patch and cart your selections (baby in the wagon with the pumpkins - very, VERY cute photo - not seen here). pumpkins from the patch were are flat rate ($6 each in our case) and you just go and hang out. we went with the twins (party of 5!) and cole and tony, nadia, daniela and glenda. the kids wore their costumes and we just set the babies down amongst the pumpkins and they crawled around in them. they LOVED it. there was soft clover upon which the pumpkins rested and once hana fell over and landed on the clover. she thought it was comfy and decided to hang out there for a while which made for a fantastic picture. in fact, the pumpkin patch pictures are all pretty great. the kids got to ride ponies (for an extra charge). maybe hana can do that next year... and there was a small maze made from hay for the younger kids to run around in (free!). they also had other farm animals to look at (at big hit!). for hana, i think the highlight of the day was her ride on the "cow train" (also an extra charge). it's really a tractor that pulls several small cars behind it and when the driver honks the horn, it sounds like a cow. the cow train took passengers on a short tour of the corn maze. hana rode with auntie nadia and reportedly had her hands up over her head the whole time (like she was riding a roller coaster... perhaps she will be a coaster enthusiast like her mother). so as you might imagine, one could really fill up a camera with all the photo ops at a pumpkin patch. there were soooo many cute pictures. too many to post. prehaps i'll get jon help me to make one of those slide show thingies with pics from the party and that patch... nevertheless, the pumpkin patch will definately be a family tradition. a really fun (if not exhausting) morning.

the final halloween event was the "halloween parade" at daycare on halloween day. you might recall that her daycare is in jon's office. every year, on halloween the kids (babies included) dress up in halloween costumes and parade through the office, trick or treating on each floor. it was a cute EXPLOSION! however, at this point, hana was finishing a growth spurt and her costume was pretty snug... she was really crammed in. on the whole, she tolerated her costume (for all of the festivities) very well but we only made it to 3 floors before the parents, teacher and kids were just done with the trick or treating thing. besides, we didn't even take candy from everyone, because let's face it, hana's not eating any of this, and we still ended up with a 1/2 large bag of candy (proabably about 3-4 pounds!!!!). i instructed jon to leave it at work because i really, REALLY didn't want' all of that candy in our house. that night, we went to family dinner (our wednesday night tradition) and accompanied cole and tony trick or treating. hana and the twins strolled along for moral support. we've decided that next year, the parent will carry a thermos of cocoa and schnapps so we can have our own treats as well.

throughout the halloween season, namely the last two weeks of october, i had the worst cold i'd had in a loooooooong time. everytime i thought i was getting better, my body would remind me that i absolutely was not. so all these festivities took their toll on me for sure. i think in this picture, we are all putting on a brave face, but at this point, we were all "over it". by the end of halloween night, i was so exausted and feeling pretty poor, i was in bed for the next 2 days. but despite that, i think hana had a good time. and we certainly had fun hanging out with her.