Happy Halloween!

Halloween was spent at Grammy's house this year with cousin Kyan, who quite coincidentally showed up wearing the same shirt as Q. They were not at all cooperative when it came to having their photos taken, but we managed to get a couple with them together. Here they are early in the day strapped into the wagon together (the ONLY reason we managed to get them in the same shot!)

As night falls out come the goblins, including one cute little horse.

And one happy cowboy.

The horse was happy too.

Another moment of the two of them together.

Quinn even tried his hand at trick-or-treating when we ran into his buddy Claire. She showed him the ropes and took him up to a couple of houses.

When we arrived back at home Quinn was greeted by Gloria and her friend. We're a little bit bummed that we missed greeting the kids we know in our neighborhood, but the boys had a good time at Grammy's. Next year we'll be ready, Soria Drive!

This is what I looked at most of the evening...a horse tail moving rapidly away from me.

Wild Animal Park

We spent the morning with Kyan and Aunt Jaime today at the Wild Animal Park. Funny that the only pictures I got were at the playground, but the boys enjoyed the sculptures. :) We're really hoping that Quinn will grow up with an appreciation for all animals and so far I think we're doing okay. While waiting in line for the safari train he was fascinated by illustrations of animals at the park. I started asking him to identify various animals (Pelican, flamingo, giraffe, etc) and to my surprise he got them ALL right. Now he couldn't tell the the various antelopes, but we'll forgive him that one for now. :)

The boys ride the rhino

Lion hugs

And a video of some enthusiastic greetings.

Bates Nut Farm

We learned about a San Diego tradition this weekend with a trip to Bates Nut Farm's pumpkin patch. The boys got to enjoy their first wheelbarrow ride to the pumpkins.

Picking out the perfect pumpkin was really hard work. Quinn preferred the rotten pumpkins, like this one, which had a nice hole full of squishy pumpkin guts just calling to the toddler's fingers.

Why oh why are they making me sit on this thing?

Cousin Kyan preferred to climb all over everything.

Finally found a keeper!

Yay! Happy Day!

The Boo Parade

What a fun surprise to learn that there is a cool little parade in our neighborhood...the Boo Parade. We met Q's girlfriend, Gloria, on the way down to the parade route.

A sample of the action

The coolest costume I've ever seen

Our little sharky

Camping Adventures

We've been wanting to take Quinn camping again for a long time. After our last trip with Andy and Colleen back in March we purchased a new, big, shiny 4-person tent and have been waiting for the opportunity to break it in. Well the opportunity finally presented itself. We've been planning for weeks to camp with the Seminoffs and were excited to experience group family camping. Unfortunately a bout of something flulike struck the family and they needed the weekend to recuperate at home, so we were on our own. Lucky for us half the planning was done and all we had to do was show up at the campsite.

Not a bad place, eh? The campground (Boulder Basin) is a real hot spot for climbers...if you look closely you can probably see white chalk on almost every boulder in the photo.

Even Quinn got in a bit of bouldering practice (and on this trip he also learned how to identify and say boulder - though it sounded more like boo-ba).

This was the preferred method of coming down.

We took a pre- and post-nap hike on Saturday. Our first hike took us up to a fire tower which offered splendid panoramic views of the surrounding mountains (and of our cute dog tied up below).

Sugar Pines

We also spent a lot of time hanging out at the campsite

and napping

But we could only sit still for so long before Quinn's desire to find more big rocks overcame him and off we went.

Our afternoon hike amongst the boulders

A rare family portrait (with San Jacinto in the background)

There were some fun activities around camp too, like throwing around the water jug.

And walking along the tree trunks

In action:

Merlin had a fine time and got a couple of nice off-leash walks

On our final hike of the trip Quinn steals the only thing that is keeping mama semi-presentable

The boy learned a few new things on this trip. He discovered the moon, that a fire is really, really hot (and he has the scars to prove it), that sand and rocks are better than any toy, that pine cones are sharp "ouch". He also picked up a few new words: ouch, moon, trees, grapes, boulder, slide, mama. And he learned how to eat an apple like a big boy:

Our parting shot: "I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse"

17 Months

I can't believe we're almost at the year.5 mark already! My how time flies...now if he would just learn to communicate already!! We're beginning to experience tantrums. Luckily they're usually short-lived. He's saying more and more words every day, but still no "Mama"! It's making me crazy! He says Dada, up, yes, no, uh oh, hi, bye, turtle, hot (favorite word right now, but with an "s" on the end - "hots"), go, boat, bird, ball, all done, whoa, outside, ice, balloon. He also makes a multitude of animal noises (snake, cow, cat, dog, rooster, lion, tiger, elephant, duck, monkey/gorilla, owl.)

He's also learning to climb. That would include climbing into things like the dog toy basket. He got stuck.

The cat scratcher is another current favorite

Here are just a few photos that I took the other day when we were playing outside. With the exception of the butcher job I did on his bangs he still has not had a real haircut. It may have to happen soon, as the mullet is getting pretty long!

Wet Days

We got some rain in sunny San Diego recently, so Quinn finally had the opportunity to dig out his rain coat and go jump in a few puddles! What a fun day we had!

Getting ready to make a break for it

Today we had a visit from cousin Kyan. What a stylin' little guy. In addition to having some fashion sense, the kid also has a great batting stance, can hip hop dance, and has a stronger arm than most major league pitchers (I know this from first hand experience as he got me in the face with a wooden block! :).

It didn't take long for them to end up in the pool together.

This was a favorite activity

Airplane???

When it was time for Kyan and Jaime to go home Quinn gave his cousin some love. Sweet boys!