Turkey Day 2012

Happy Thanksgiving!

We are in Taos to quietly celebrate and be thankful.

We are all feeling thankful for great adventures and old knees made new,

a hint of winter for our lantern walk,

and beautiful princesses.

Stand

As we all know, Imogen is a curious little monkey and likes to get around.

Now she likes to stand.

I'm sure that soon she won't just stand there, and we will be chasing her around everywhere.

And Claire will be up and running soon! Two new knees and she's as good as new. :)

We will probably be running after Paloma too. She has already decided that it's a good idea to share her sister's clothes (but there may be a size issue).

Determined to make this onesie fit...

Festival of the Cranes

I headed down to Bosque del Apache last week for the Festival of the Cranes. I had a great morning at Research Day, talking to scientists about what has been happening on the Refuge. (Yes, really, I was there for work!)

And then I headed out for lunch in the sunshine.

Most of the cranes had already flown off in the early morning, but I did get to meet some birds and enjoy the view.

Ducks and geese...

Wetland and mountain...

Cranes!

Four more years

We watched the President's Victory Speech together. Paloma seemed to be really interested.

About two-thirds of the way through she sighed and said, "Gee, I sure hope Elmo turns up soon."

Happy Halloween!

Jack o Lantern by Paloma

Candy Corn by Paloma

Candy Corn by Imogen (cute toes!)

This was the first year that we took Paloma trick-or-treating.

Here we go!
[Thanks to Steve P. for the dress.]

We dropped in on a couple of neighbours that we know well, to say hello and surprise them with a visit from Snow White.

Knock! Knock! Hello Judy!

Showing off her Halloween stash. 

 And then it was back home to finish up the pumpkins.

This isn't a particularly interesting photo but
doesn't Paloma look like a little mini-me?

Time to instruct Papa about exactly where the pumpkin should be placed. 

Imogen likes pumpkins* too!
[Thanks for the vest, Aussie Grandma!]
*actually, she prefers sweet potato.

Carefully lighting the Jack o Lantern
and replacing the lid...

This Halloweening is serious business....

Happy birthday Paloma!

Paloma turned three last week. Three already. It feels like we just celebrated her second birthday.

My, how time flies.

Her birthday was on a Thursday, so we opened a couple of presents before school. She seemed pretty happy to get a new bunny ears jacket.

Modeling her new jacket

Ears to keep her ears warm in the winter

At school, she shared some hedgehog slice with her friends and everyone sang happy birthday.


When we got home, Howard artfully hid her next present in the backyard.

Although she seemed a little distracted, we eventually got her to try out her new trike.

And away she goes!!!

After a trial run in the backyard, we decided to take it to the streets.

She talks a lot, doesn't she?

The next night, Grandmommy and Grandaddy came to visit and she dressed up for the occasion.

Thanks for the hat, Aunt Shari!

Then on Saturday morning, we celebrated AGAIN! (Three parties: what a lucky girl!)

We had a bunch of friends around and they had a grand old time with paint and a blank wall.

Of course, no party is complete without birthday cake. Paloma had requested purple cake with pink frosting and I did my best to oblige (despite some technical difficulties).

Proud as punch!

Mia, Caroline, Paloma, Finn, Liam, James

One, two, three blow!

Thanks to Sarah for capturing Paloma blowing out the candles. Apparently, I missed the first attempt:

In the meantime, Imogen just soaked up the atmosphere...

"Yeah, I'm cool. No big deal."

And now we have a beautiful mural in our backyard!

[Thanks to everyone who came and painted with us![

There's still room to add more!

I wonder what will happen when (if) it snows?

Dreaming of camping

  Rolling the hands of time back, back to the warmer months of August, at a time when the Brandenburdetts went to explore Heron Lake. Yes, it takes me this long to get my act together to post a blog entry.

 While Paloma rigs the raft I attempt to wear Semilla down with perpetual stick throwing in the lake.

We journeyed across the lake to a road-less area so we could escape the weekend crowds and have a portion of the lake all to ourselves. The motion of the boat and the repetitive sounds of the oars has a relaxing quality to it as evident by the passengers. 

 At last we arrived and set up our little camp. This was to be our home for the next three days.

 Paloma set to work building a fire pit and gathering wood.

 Our evening were calm and peaceful...

 ...and our mornings were cozy all piled into the tent.

 We spent the days puttering around the lake,

relaxing,

 exploring the lake side,

 hiking to interesting destinations,

 (did I mention the rocking of the boat had relaxing qualities to it?)

 We organizing sticks and logs to resemble houses which we could all occupy.

 oh, and swimming too,

 and flying kites!

 The whole adventure tuckered Paloma out...or maybe it was just the motion of the boat on the water.