Here is Nathan meeting Hannah for the first time.

Nathan kept asking for a “big brother bed”, aka twin sized, so we finally decided to get him one. He was definitely looking very big in that little toddler bed and we figured it would be a fun “big brother” kind of gift. He loved it!

From what I remember, November was full of football games, play dates, Sunday School…oh yeah, Nathan started Sunday School! Hebrew School actually. He goes about every other Sunday for a couple hours. We wanted to start him in a program now since there aren’t other Jewish kids in his current daycare and it would give him good exposure to Jewish Holidays, etc. He’s a little shy about going because he doesn’t know the kids well, but he seems to have fun and the teacher is really nice.

Otherwise November was kind of exhausting…I was coming to the end of my pregnancy, but I also had bronchitis, and then ended up coughing so hard I broke a rib. Not fun when you’re 8 months pregnant. I also had a lot of swelling in my feet and legs, which was getting uncomfortable. Here I am at 37 weeks…exactly one week later, I had the baby! (But that will be for another post)

We’ve gone to the Maryland Zoo’s Zoo Boo event every year since Nathan was born. They set up booths with food and games and some local sponsors and then the kids can trick-or-treat at each place, and then you get to enjoy a day at the zoo in costume! Some years we’ve gone with friends but this year it was just us.

Check out Nathan at Zoo Boo over the years…

A Cow (6 months)

A Lion (18 months)

A Dinosaur (2 1/2 years)

Woody! (3 1/2 years)

Here are pictures from our visit this year.

After trick-or-treating and watching part of a puppet show, we headed down to the zoo. It’s a little bit of a walk from the entrance to the zoo itself, but we opted not to take the tram, so Nathan got a ride.

We opted to skip the main part of the zoo this time and stayed in the Maryland Wilderness and petting zoo areas. Lots of stuff to climb on, and in, and Nathan always loves the goats.

(He’s got a brush in his hand in this picture)

More pictures from Zoo Boo here

We’ve gone to Webers Farm every Fall since Nathan was born and I always try to get pictures of him with their pumpkins. For some reason I don’t have any from 2009, but I know we went!

I just love seeing comparisons like this…

October 2007 (6 months old)

October 2008 (18 months old)

(Couldn’t you just eat him up???)

October 2010 (3 1/2 years old)

Fall and Halloween galore! Pumpkins farms, Halloween celebrations, costumes…October was full of all that.

Nathan’s school went on a field trip to a pumpkin farm. Here he is with two best buds, Phoenix and Caitlin. (Gary and I didn’t go, but one of the other parents snapped this for us)

Then we took our annual trip to Webers Farm.

He was mining for gemstones here

Hayride!

On the front steps of our new house

Nathan trying on his Woody Halloween costume for the first time. He was SO excited about it. We ended up with Woody two costumes and he actually wore a different one for trick-or-treating.

Here we are at a different pumpkin farm, on their hayride. If I’m remembering correctly, Nathan took this photo, and I love it!

This pumpkin farm had a couple corn mazes and a big pumpkin patch that you could walk through.

We painted pumpkins for Halloween. The paint pretty much all peeled off once it dried, but it was a fun project anyway!

Here’s me at 33 weeks pregnant. By this point I was getting lots of comments from people I didnt know about how big I was. and amazement that I wasn’t due for another 7 weeks. Gotta love random stranger comments like that…

Toward the end of October a friend of mine gave us tickets she had won to see Toy Story on Ice. We took Nathan’s friend Phoenix, another hard core Toy Story fan, and they had a blast.

We also did our annual trip to Zoo Boo which we’ve been doing since Nathan’s first Halloween, but that will be a separate post because there are already too many pictures in this one!

And what October is really about…Halloween! We loved walking through our new neighborhood with all the other families and young kids. Nathan was a little shy about going door to door, but was doing well until about 3/4 through when one of the houses had dry ice at the door and he got a little scared. We did a few more houses after that, but he was telling us he had enough candy and was ready to go home

Checking out the loot.

More pictures from October here

September was a big month for us. Besides a trip to the State Fair, Rosh Hashanah, and a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Bob, we MOVED! Here’s another month in pictures…

We spent a day at the Maryland State Fair checking out farm animals, riding rides and playing games.

Nathan played a bunch of carnival games and did really well! His first win was busting a balloon with a dart. They give all the kids prizes, whether they break the balloon or not, but Nathan actually broke one!

The first prize

He did two different fishing games. The first time he needed Gary’s help, but this time he did it all by himself.

All his loot- a panda, a lion and a bright orange dog.

We did quite a few different rides…cars, merry-go-round, bananas, trains, tea cups with random strangers…whatever seemed age appropriate.

Grandma and Grandpa Bob came to visit around Rosh Hashanah.

The goofball really liked apples and honey

Moving Day!!

Random pictures of plants I’ll miss this summer.

Nathan in his bed, in his new room, in the new house. He slept in the 3rd bedroom for a couple nights so Gary could quickly paint his room, then we moved him in.

Random cuteness that Nathan made at school. It hung on the door to the room that would eventually be Hannah’s, and now resides on her photo board.

This was the month were we also took Nathan to a Sibling Class at GBMC, where Hannah would be born. He got to tour the recovery rooms, learn about babies and how to hold them and get a little extra “big brother” attention. Here he is peering into the baby nursery.

He let me take some good pictures of him in his Big Bro To Be shirt too. I was so happy he finally let me do this! I think he was a little more cooperative than usual because we played a game where I asked him to show me different faces.

His sad face

His silly face

Eventually we got to some nice faces

And then back to silly faces of course

I got Nathan to take a few pictures with me and my growing belly at 30 weeks pregnant. My stomach is not as big as the shadow on the wall implies….

….though it’s definitely getting there (self portrait without flash)

More pictures from September here!

Lots of fun with friends in August…

We went to on a Pirate Ship adventure in downtown Baltimore. It was lots of fun, and we hope to do it again this summer.

Enjoyed a birthday party at Clark’s Elioak Farm

(on a hayride)

And met a friend and her daughter at the beautiful Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania.

(Caterpillar in the treehouse)

(Show me if you can curl your tongues!)

(Same fountain, same friend, almost two years later. Other picture is from November 2008)

(Same fountain, almost two years later. Other picture is from November 2008)

This photo of Nathan from August makes me think of my Dad. We were on the little playground near our house.

I had to get this picture since I knew we’d be moving soon and it’s Nathan’s first house!

And I was finally able to get Nathan to let me take pictures of him in his “Big Bro to be” shirt. Yay!

For some reason he insisted on holding up this (totally awesome) book that Uncle Ethan gave him.

We also took some of the first belly pictures of this pregnancy. I was 26 weeks.

More pictures from August here

In July we took a trip to Ocean City, MD with Gary’s parents. As usual, the trip was packed full of activities…beach, water park, mini-golf, the boardwalk carnival, and of course feeding ducks in the canal.

(You can always count on Oma for M&Ms on the beach!)

(I think maybe he’s explaining how to mini-golf to Ava?)

Family Picture time!

More pictures from our trip here

By July we had announced that we were pregnant with Baby #2! And we were also actively trying to sell our house since there wasn’t much room for another kid there. The house selling was a bit stressful since the market was bad and we had a deadline called New Baby that we really wanted to meet.

Besides that, July was full of the usual busy fun of summer…

Relay Race day at school

S mores and Fireworks for the 4th of July

(We lit some firecrackers in the yard and Nathan wasn’t a huge fan of the noise)

Silliness

A trip to the zoo

And of course a trip to Ocean City…but I’ll save a separate post for that.

More pictures from July here

Summer is always super busy…day trips, birthday parties, time outside…here’s our June in pictures..

Birthday party

Trip to the National Zoo in DC with friends

A neighborhood carnival

Pool time at home

(Water gun fight!)

Roasted marshmallows on the deck

Nathan’s first movie in the theater (Toy Story 3!). He loved it and we can’t wait to take him again.

Nathan gathered all his stuffed dogs for Fenny and laid them out around him.

More pictures from June here