The Oranges are Ripe!

Ever since we moved in, Andy and I have been waiting for the oranges on our seven orange trees (three naval and four clementines) to be ripe and they are now ready. The clementines are certainly ready, but I think the navals have a little while to go still. In any case, we will soon be swimming in oranges. I've already started making myself OJ in the mornings, but I'm worried I soon won't be able to keep up.


Claire, who has always been passionate about fruit, loves the oranges. On most mornings there are one or two that have fallen and she loves to pick them up, but there are also a few of the clementines that she can reach an pick herself. She's gotten to the point where she doesn't even want to wait for me to peel it for her, she'll just peel it herself. We were out there on Friday afternoon and she was having a great time picking and eating the oranges.

Claire Meets Santa

Santa and Mrs. Claus arrived today in style on the fire trucks on the base.


After their grand entrance, while passing out candy to the kids, they came into the base mall to do a little meet and greet.



I was worried that Claire would be freaked out by the scary guy in the big red suit, but she did really well... I think at first she was most interested in the candy.


Later, Santa moved to his proper picture taking station and she sat on his lap like a champ. My pictures turned out blurry, but hopefully the professional ones turned out better. I'll be able to check on them later this week.

Hands in Pockets

Claire has discovered her pockets!

We were hanging out with my friend Kara today and she kept putting stuff in the pockets of Claire's track suit for her to find. Later in the day, I noticed that she was putting her hands in her pockets and loved it! She was so cute running around saying, "hands, hands!"

Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving here in Italy. A few friends came over to share dinner with us and later that night, Scarlett flew in for a quick visit.

She was literally only here for two full days and left on Sunday morning, but we had a blast. On Friday we went to downtown Naples and took the big red bus tour and went shopping. On Saturday, we went to Pompeii. Andy watched Claire, so she and I could run around and have some good "girl" time.

On Sunday morning, both she and Andy drove to the airport. Scarlett flew back to Seattle and Andy went to the states for 1212... oh, I mean for "important business."

So, it's just me and the Claire Bear for three weeks....

Playdates, Shoes, and Make-Believe

Claire can now say, "play," and boy, does she love to do it! A week or so ago we had her friend Elizabeth over for a play date and they had a great time. For some reason, they wanted to both get in Claire's crib to play with the stuffed animals. It was bit tight, but they seemed to have fun!


Claire has also become a big fan of shoes. She loves all kinds of shoes.... she loves her own shoes, she loves pictures of shoes, but mostly she loves trying on Mommy and Daddy's shoes. She found Daddy's sandals the other day and was able to even take a few steps.


Today, I had a very funny experience with Claire. I was talking on the phone to a friend and as I was wrapping up the conversation, I noticed that Claire had picked up on of the TV remotes (that looks a lot like our cordless phone). She was babbling away at the remote, and after a few minutes, said, "bye" and hung up. It was too funny!


Claire is also fascinated by the computer. Before bedtime tonight, she was having a great time sitting in Daddy's lap, banging on the keyboard, clicking the mouse, and listening to country (Andy's choice, not mine) music. She loves that she can make the screen do things by pushing buttons and moving the mouse. Whenever Andy or I are on the computer, she always wants, "UP!!"

Trick or Treat!

Claire had a very fun and very busy Halloween week. It started with an extra special Kindermusik class on Thursday where the kids got to wear their costumes. Claire and her friends, Sadie and Elizabeth had a lot of fun in the class with their costumes on. Claire was very good at identifying Elizabeth and Sadie as a duck and a bee. She would frequently point at them and say duck or bee.

On Friday we went to Carney Park for their big Halloween party. We met up with Sadie and her family and the girls had a good time riding the Halloween train around the golf course and they had their first taste of trick-or-treating. The best part of the evening was certainly when the parents were hanging out eating dinner and the Sadie and Claire spent ages taking candy out of each others' trick-or-treat buckets and putting it back in. They had a fantastic time re-arranging the candy and taking it and giving it to one another. I think in the end, Sadie ended up with more candy, but Claire held her own.



Saturday was a very busy day. In the morning we went to see Elizabeth and for a fantastic brunch with her family and Sadie's family. They live closer to downtown Naples and they have a fantastic view. The girls had fun playing, as usual.


Saturday evening we went to the support site to have dinner at a friends' house and then we went trick-or-treating. Claire had a great time walking around, holding her daddy's hand and her pumpkin bucket. I'm not sure she really "got" what was going on, but she loved seeing all of the kids in their costumes and running around after them.


She especially fell in love with a little boy dressed as Elmo and as he walked away, she promptly followed after him. I'm sure she would have happily joined that family if I hadn't run after her.


Now, she is peacefully sleeping after a long couple of days and I am doing what I'm sure every parent does on Halloween night after their kids have gone to bed.... eat their candy!

Little Walks in the Parco

In the evenings, Claire loves to go on little walks around our 10-house parco (gated community).


She likes to stop and check out the leaves and flowers along the way and stick her feet and fingers in the puddles.

Mostly, she loves to visit Ginger, the very old dog who lives at the end of the row of houses. Sadly, Ginger was not at the gate today, but normally she sits very calmly on the other side of this gate as Claire pets her and pokes her.