THANKSGIVING

A tidy Thanksgiving at home with just the Larson side this year. Note the swell place cards and centerpiece Asher helped me make.

"IS THERE A PROBLEM, OFFICER?"

SHORN

I took Oliver to Cookie Cutters for some help with his long locks. The stylist buzzed him much shorter than I requested. Maybe since it was Veteran's Day, she was providing haircuts suitable for lads wanting to enlist. Right afterward I thought it was cute, though drastic. But the next day I cried a little for my baby. He looks so big--especially as he is running everywhere he goes these days. It will grow.

TEETH

X's first tooth finally poked through on November 16th, just before he turned 9 months old. He let us know it was coming a few days prior by screaming all night, according to Brent, "like a chimpanzee getting skinned." Poor baby. Oliver was cutting a couple new teeth at the same time. Instead of crying about it, he found something soft to bite.


Naughty, but Lennox is so delicious, you can't really blame Oliver.

NEWPORT BEACH

LONG LIVE HALLOWEEN!

Much to the disappointment of the neighborhood, we didn't do our standard Halloween Bash. Three reasons: 1) two mobile babies who would have ruined or been injured by our haunted basement/backyard. 2) Shayna and family, some of our most dedicated party patrons, had a 7-day-old baby. 3)We were flying to California the morning of November 1st. So we had a drastically downscaled Halloweener. The party was at Shayna's on the 30th.

I even let slip my philosphy of "creepy over cutesy" costumes. Lennox had to be a bunny. He simply is an adorable chubby bunny. So Oliver was his magician. Cool as ever, he stayed in character all night. And when I decided Lamb should be a sock monkey, I tried to think of another toy for my costume. I found the blouse in the costume closet, and "Back From Beijing Barbie" evolved. Looking at the pics (I'm only sharing the most flattering), perhaps "Thunder Thighs Barbie" would have been more accurate.

Here's Kinners again since she got cut off in the slide show:

BABY VIOLET

Shayna had her baby girl October 23 at about 3:30 am. (Kevin called me about 2:20 am, "This is your brother-in-law, Kevin Swiss." I guess you want to be specific at that hour. He said I was quiet for two beats and then replied, "BABY??")

Violet Jan Swiss. Jan after our mommy whose birthday is the following day. Our mom didn't much like her own name, but we really like our mom. Shayna is She-ra. She devlivered naturally again, by choice. Kinsey and I joined Kev to witness the miracle. Nothing, NOTHING like the birth of a new person. I get weepy thinking about it. Violet is beautiful like her momma, and we all love her.

She's about 12 hours old in this picture.



And here she is in confection form: the cake I made for Shayna's shower.

FALL PICNIC OCTOBER 16, 2008