Anna Grows

Anna spent Thanksgiving visiting family on Long Island. In order to avoid the traffic and maximize the amount of time that Anna slept in the car, we left at 3:15 AM Thanksgiving morning and arrived in Oyster Bay in time for breakfast. That is the way to do a long road trip with Anna! Anna enjoyed playing with her aunts as well as Casey, her Aunt Mary's golden retriever and her cousins. She is pictured here with her cousin Andrew. They are the youngest Fagellas in the family. She also celebrated Aunt Mary's birthday and visited Santa Claus for the first time. We departed Saturday night at 8:00 PM - Anna's bedtime.

Anna was able to visit her Ohio relative Veteran's Day weekend for an early Thanksgiving celebration. Anna lost her only grandchild status with the arrival of Aidyn Kohler on September 13. She is looking forward to the day that Aidyn is big enough to play with her. Other highlights of the trip included an airplane ride, an enormous Thanksgiving potluck at the Kent family dinner (including lots of mashed potatoes...one of Anna's favorites) and non-stop attention from Grandma and Grandpa Kohler.

Today Anna experienced her first night of trick-or-treating. She had a practice run yesterday at the daycare. Ms. Be had all of the kids wear their costumes (Anna was a puppy) and go "trick or treating" around her neighborhood. We are told that Anna was the first in line. When Joe picked Anna up, she did not want to let go of her orange plastic pumpkin, which led to what can only be described as a tantrum of epic proportions (she has learned to say "mine" and is very vociferous about it). Tonight Anna visited some of our neighbors, but was a bit shy about taking candy. We are sure she will get over that. We were especially appreciative of our neighbor Veronique who had raisins and pretzels (a Mom's trick-or-treat dream). She enjoyed the pumpkins most and stopped to look at those rather than getting candy. She is a bit scratched up after running with her plastic pumpkin, tripping, and falling on the sidewalk a couple of times. Overall, we think she is a fan of Ha...

The weather has been beautiful and we took advantage October 14 with a trip to Riverbend Park on the Potomac River. Anna had a whole new place to run. She enjoyed playing in the dirt, watching the birds, and petting any dog that would let her as we walked along the trail.

It is hard to believe that Anna Grace is 1 -year old. After repeated requests from family members for photos and Anna updates, we finally decided to use technology to provide regular updates She is an avid walker, runner and well....a toddler. She loves books and talking on the telephone. Her favorite words are "Uh Oh, " Wow," "Daddy," and "Mamma." More recently she learned to say "no," but that is not one of our favorites. She is curious about everything and is a constant source of entertainment for us.