Halloween

Last year Cara was too young to much appreciate Halloween. But this year we decided to start her Halloween tradition, introducing Cara to the joys of pumpkins, ghosts and costumes, skipping only the gut-busting candy consumption. She'll have plenty of time for that later.

We started with the pumpkin, and Cara was very happy to help her mom scoop out the seeds and pulp. She was intrigued by the slippery strings but was mostly happy to use a spoon for the task at hand. Given her penchant for smearing food around, mom was surprised at how little mess resulted from the process!



We weren't sure how Halloween night itself would go, since Cara had been resistant to previous attempts to put her costume on. She definitely wasn't thrilled about having the lion costume pulled over her head. Some tears were initially shed. We considered aborting the whole attempt, with a backup plan of having Cara go as a lion tamer, carrying the lion costume. But a little distraction in the form of a basket and some of our own candy supply to go in it and the tears dried up. Soon Cara and mom were ready to join the neighborhood kids for some trick-or-treating, with a rendezvous at the street.



Cara wasn't quite sure to make of all the kids (and some adults) dressed up in funny costumes. She was willing to walk to a few of the houses, but mostly wanted to be carried. Taking a piece of candy from the proffered bowl was not, however, a problem. She even managed to say "trick" a few times and always said "thank you"! Her little basket soon filled up, and given that we were rapidly approaching bedtime, mom decided to end things on a happy note and head home. Once at her own front door, Cara thought she should get some more pieces of candy from the bowl Daddy had!





The biggest surprise of the evening was how attached Cara was to her basket of candy. She hasn't eaten any yet, so it wasn't even the anticipation of the sweets. But she loved the brightly colored, crinkly packages and kept the basket close for her bedtime routine of stories and teeth-brushing. It took a little gentle persuasion on convince her to relinquish the basket, and last bag of M&M's, to get int her crib, but fortunately no tears were shed.

Breckenridge Part 2

We had a mellow day on Wednesday, with grandma and J's aunt going to pick up some bikes in the morning, leaving grandpa and J to take Cara out for a walk along the river in town. Cara and her grandparents bonded over playdoh and cookies in the afternoon, while J took off for a short run, exploring some of the local trails. At dinner in a local Mexican restaurant, Cara stole the show and was remarkably well behaved. Tortilla chips were a huge hit.


On Thursday we decided to try for more excitement, a nearby hike on Spruce Creek Trail. Cara slept for most of the hike it and, finding ourselves less than a mile from Mayflower Lake with Cara still in good spirits, we decided to make it a somewhat longer than expected trip. The extra time and considerable extra effort was well worth it, as we had Mayflower Lake and views of the surrounding peaks to ourselves. Luckily J's aunt brought extra goodies, since we had only packed snacks for our supposed morning outing!


After some food, the adults rested, enjoyed the scenery and watched Cara's delight in exploring the muddy shore of the lake. She pulled up rocks and happily splatted mud everywhere. What could be a better reason to hike! The only complaint was when Mom finally decided it was time to go and took Cara out to a slightly deeper spot for a good rinse. But Cara soon recovered her good spirits and consented to start scampering back down the trail, holding Mom's hand for the rough spots. Throwing sticks for the two dogs, and chasing the sticks herself, helped keep Cara amused for much of the return trip down the trail.


No trip to Breckenridge with children is complete without a hike up to the visiting horse camp. Cara was definitely impressed but couldn't decide if she wanted to pat them or not. She prefers animals a little more on her own scale.



Too soon we had to head back to Denver for our flight home. We gave ourselves time to take the scenic route, heading over Loveland Pass and getting out for a brief walk to take in some of the spectacular views. Unfortunately the wind was as breathtaking as the scenery, so we didn't get as long a walk as we had hoped for. Next time!