The Next Michelle Kwan or Frido Kahlo?

Family photo. Olivia drew this picture of Mama, on the left, and of Olivia and Papa on the right

Olivia in her new figure skates after watching a video of Michelle Kwan.

Olivia's 4th Birthday Party

Olivia had a nice group of friends over and chose the same castle cake that I remember my mom making for one of my birthday parties. The main difference being that Olivia really wanted princess figurines on hers... although now she's saying that next year, she wants a pirate castle!

It was a very warm October day, so we played outside in our shirtsleeves.

The first thing Olivia did with these two dolls was to straighten out who wears the pants...

Our First Family Noodle, - er um, Cat

After going to the fair, Olivia came up with the idea of wanting a rabbit, but given time, worked around to wanting a cat, which we could all agree on. We took a couple trips to the local humane society and had a hard time choosing among all the wonderful cats there, but finally decided on a black, shorthaired, extremely friendly and floppy kitten with an incessant purr. We call him Timothy.

Olivia became comfortable with Timothy quite quickly, though she still doesn't like him to bother her at bedtime. Her comfort with him seems to have been generalized to other pets - she is even alot more comfortable around dogs than she used to be. Timothy is a very happy addition to our family. Olivia has recently started saying she wants a dog... we'll see...

Fall Day at Billings Farm with Hope and Hannah

A curious new rare species of bird...


Olivia takes a turn helping to make pumpkin ice-cream whilst Hannah looks on.

Enjoying the fruits of her labor, looking out over a beautiful vermont fall landscape.