Who doesn't love fall? We have been taking in these gorgeous days in fistfuls with abundant walks, hours spent at the park, and wheeling our stroller through every stretch of this town. Here is some of what we love:
Marin plays "tea set" (tea party) and invites all her friends. She sets a place for each of them, and always matches the plate to the bowl to the spoon exactly. Her guests are always served soup and we almost always sing happy birthday.
Recently, GG gave Marin an antique tea set that Marin calls her "fragile fancy tea set". Marin adores it! You can see that she asks to play with it pretty much first thing in the morning.
At the park Marin climbs and hangs and jumps, squealing with the delight. She loves to steal my glasses and I chase her until I catch her and we crash into the grass with a tickle fight. I usually try to time trips to the park so that they coincide with Emilie's nap, and she sleeps peacefully in her bassinet stroller.
The best part of fall might be leg warmers. Or is it curling up with your sister on the couch?
Sometimes we just sit around and crack each other up!
We take two walks every day at the very least, and stop to find many treasures along the way.
Marin loves to stop and see the fishies and sometimes makes a wish in this pond. (Not sure you're supposed to do that, but one time she saw some pennies in there and asked me why there was money in there, and from then on, we've been throwing wishes on in.)
The three of us have a grand time stopping to pick up leaves, acorns (once we gathered enough to have an acorn party!), flowers and sticks- which Marin uses to conduct a pretend symphony.
Today is Norah's 7th birthday. (That's right; she was born out of wedlock- how very modern of her) We love our Norries and we love a birthday!
Sometimes we have lunch dates with Grandma. These are especially fun, and a great time to snuggle.
A few weeks ago we went to the Sandwich Fair with my parents and grandparents. (Sandwich is
the town, its not a fair with only sandwiches.) It's an enormous fair and has as many exhibits as I have memories of going there as a child to see if my grandma won a ribbon for her flowers, or pies. It was especially special that at 91 and 93, my grandparents could go- they have been going for 90 years! But because of its size, we borrowed two wheelchairs and my parents pushed them. We had to take a picture of our two wheelchairs, and double stroller. Quite the site- but so fun to have four generations together at the fair!
A few weeks after the fair, we headed to Champaign for our first football game of the season! It was a night game against ASU (and a victory), so Emilie stayed with Great Aunt Vee and Great Uncle Bob, and the rest of us sat under the lights at that game while Marin cheered, "Go Illini!" and sang the fight song like her blood ran orange and blue. By the time we made it back to Emilie, Marin was fast asleep, gripping her stuffed football and her ticket.
the town, its not a fair with only sandwiches.) It's an enormous fair and has as many exhibits as I have memories of going there as a child to see if my grandma won a ribbon for her flowers, or pies. It was especially special that at 91 and 93, my grandparents could go- they have been going for 90 years! But because of its size, we borrowed two wheelchairs and my parents pushed them. We had to take a picture of our two wheelchairs, and double stroller. Quite the site- but so fun to have four generations together at the fair!
On Saturday, Marin took her first steps! Granted, I was holding her up, but she moved her little
legs forward and took her first steps none the less! It's not "real" walking of course, but we got excited about it none the less.
She still hasn't crawled on her knees. She crawls all over the place on her belly, like an army crawl, however. My Grandma said that my dad never did crawl on his knees; he opted for the army crawl, too. And the first time I crawled it was to the coffee table, only to pull myself up and walk across the room. I just skipped crawling all together. 
