little pumpkins

It's been a busy little Fall here at Longoland...

At the first sign of cooler temperatures, we had a tiny milestone: Anna's first haircut.  While we only snipped a few edges, it's made for a much easier mane to tame.

A couple of weeks ago, we bundled up and packed the car heading for Carter Mountain, an orchard and vineyard just outside of Charlottesville.  While the apple and pumpkin-picking made for some funny memories and great stories, the scenery made it quite a tranquil mini-getaway on what turned out to be an amazing Autumn day.

 13 apples tall 

 BIG pumpkin....scared the tar out of her

enjoying the fruits of her labor....yeah, i totally went with the full-on pun there....

We've all been looking forward to Halloween for a while now.  This is the first year that we really felt AK could 'enjoy' all the fun of ghosts and goblins and pumpkins and trick-or-treating.  We started Halloween weekend with a fun Fall Festival at her school, complete with costume day. 

My friend, Vanessa, drove up from Prince George on Monday with her two boys so that we could experience our kids' first Trick-or-Treating experience together (Jack is 4 months older than Anna and Holden is 5 months old).  Unfortunately, that lasted all of about 3 houses -- not because it was a wash with the kids, but because it was a wash with the weather - LITERALLY.  While "light drizzle" was predicted "later" in the evening hours, at 6:00, the sky OPENED UP and poured on us.  The kids still had a great time at the 3 houses they ventured to, not to mention the mad-dash-race to the front door to hand out candy once we were settled at home.

 pumpkin carving laziness 101: rather than try and hull out 2 eyes, a nose, and mouth (or follow a fancy carving kit), cut letters out to symbolize each member of the family....complete with Baby's question mark pumpkinette

press the play button to see Anna and Jack learn how "Trick or Treat" can be a magical saying

One last piece of adorable before we leave you with a little news....

anna's new favorite place to sit....on eric's foot.

And the news?  The little pumpkin that's been incubating in my belly for the past 20 weeks is another little girl!  Anna is coming around to the idea of having a little sister (she was hoping for a brother), and poor Eric has figured out his cross to bear in life: being surrounded by beautiful women and a bounty of estrogen.  (Once I figure out how to upload the ultrasound pics...which means once I figure out if our scanner works.....we'll scan some grainy profiles in for all to see)