We couldn't stop her from turning 1!

We tried.

(sort of.)

It was bittersweet, as are most (all?) milestones. Excited to watch her continued development, sad to see the dependent baby begin to slip away.

She still is a baby, but we watch everyday as she comprehends new things, communicates more and generally kicks butt.

Here she is the morning of her birthday, enjoying her birthday cupcake. She was a fan!

She was the star of the show at her party and I am pretty sure she knew it!

She got into unwrapping presents :)

Blaise got into it, too!

At one year she was standing and taking some practice steps.

I made butterfly cupcakes to go along with our theme.

The aftermath:

Kate has been an unbelieveable addition to our lives. She has become a pretty spunky little girl and a joy to be around. 

The Gift

Jan and his sister lost their father much too young. Jan was only 13 and his sister 16. They never had the opportunity to have an adult relationship with him or chat about their favorite sports team over a beer (or two!).

Now that we have kids, I think Jan misses his dad in a new way. In a how-I-wish-you-knew-my-baby way. 

Last weekend we found this picture at his sister's house:

That baby looks shockingly similar to this one:

No one has mentioned before that Kate might look like her aunt, but clearly at this age there is an eery resemblence.

I keep having to remind myself when I look at the old picture that is actually NOT a picture of Kate. Blaise is convinced it is. He keeps saying "KayKay" when he sees it. I hope this picture of Kate does the resemblence justice.

Now Jan has a picture of his dad holding his baby. It's really special.

St. Martin Parade

The Feast of St. Martin on November 11 is celebrated in style in parts of Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Italy and The Netherlands. The legend is that Martin was a Roman Soldier and while riding home he saw a beggar on the side of road. Playing the part of the Good Samaritian, he gave the beggar his warm red cloak.

There are many organized parades (though, I guess it is more like a procession) where the children have a lantern and walk behind St. Martin on his horse singing the traditional St. Martin songs. Luckily we go to music class, so Blaise and I learned the songs this year and he sang along! We walked through our town and ended at the newly opened town square with an address from the mayor and a sweet bread roll for all the kids. Another fun fall tradition :)

Blaise showing off his lantern:

Kate didn't want to ride in the buggy anymore, ugh:

Our lovely lighted procession:

The Bear and The Cat

I stupidly overlooked getting a picture of the Bear with the Cat...so the single shots will have to suffice.

We participated in a Trunk-or-Treat Saturday preceeding Halloween. It was a nice gathering of ex-pats looking for a Halloween outlet. Blaise grasped the concept of trick-or-treating pretty quickly, although no one must have told him that you only visit each car ONCE. Whoops.

Here you can see her whiskers a little better...and her fistful of gummi bears!

Happy Halloween!!

Buddies with Apples

This post has way too many pictures, but I couldn't help it. Anyone who has known me for longer than five minutes, knows my love of all that is fall and apple picking is quintessential fall! I can't get enough of the backdrop, or these two:

For some reason Blaise had some fasciation with Kate's ears:

hmmmm, what's in here?

Weirdest Blaise face ever!

Kate's apple looks pretty good...

I think I'll take a bite...

It was good, but I'll give it back to her...

On second thought, that was pretty tasty...

Love this Kate look!

Don't worry, she got it back.

I tried to get a picture of them in front of the sign, but all I got was Blaise trying to keep Kate from dive bombing off the bench. It's a full time job.

Love this little monkey!

And this big one!