Oden Adventures

Vianne had a fun overnight at the hotel with Granma & Grampa, so this was the next morning while we were waiting for them to come pick up Oliver :-).

We also visited the majestic Pasadena Library for a little playtime.

We met up with Brandy & Luke, our former neighbors in San Dimas, at a park in La Verne for a fun afternoon of playing.

And we spent the last few nights at Uncle Lynn & Aunt Pat's house in Glendora.  The kids always love going there because it's tons of fun...

We finished off our trip with a family dinner at Pizza N' Stuff in La Verne.

Returned to Sacramento, to endure the awful election week, but enjoy the burgeoning sign of fall.

At last there were a sufficient amount of leaves on the ground to satisfy little V.

The second day of leaf jumping, the leaves were deemed too scratchy and blankets were brought in.

We had a robot parade to get the mail.  (Oliver says his r's like l's, so he was technically a lobot.)

A cold weather tea party!

And the month ended, much to Vianne's impatient delight, with the bringing-in-from-the-garage of the Christmas boxes, and while I slowly started to empty them, Vianne spent the last two days of November dressed like this...no pants, because the Grinch doesn't wear pants, telling us to imagine her covered in green fur, walking around with a bowl of glass shards (really pita chip pieces) to munch!  She definitely keeps us laughing, this girl!

Our turkey this year, a 24 pounder...

Patrick doing the flour-turkey-bag shake

First major holiday with our new chairs - love them!!

The kids were not too keen on Mama's idea for a photo shoot...this was like pulling teeth...

Kitchen spazz!

I know this picture doesn't look like much, but this is the gravy that turned out perfectly.  It's always touch-and-go.  It's always the nagging worry as I head into the holiday.  I had two false starts, but the third one this year turned into perfect turkey gravy, and for that, I was exceedingly thankful.

Post-meal gifts from Granma

This boy.

Shortly after gifts, my little man just fell asleep right on me, and was out for the rest of the night.

 I have a picture like this from last year, too, same spot :-).

Reading the next morning with Grampa & Granma...

...while big sister helps frost the orange rolls.