Thankgiving

We celebrated Thanksgiving with friends last night.  Nathan and Ruby hosted the annual potluck.  It's an ever-shifting group of friends, but we get together most holidays to share food and drink.  As usual, all the food was delicious. 

Ole and Arlo finally meet.  They're just two months apart--Arlo turned six months and tried his first real food today.  Ole was pretty interested in that other baby.  

It turns out that leftover cheese grits and pumpkin pie make an excellent Black Friday breakfast. 

These grits make me wonder if I have some secret southern roots.

Cheese Grits

Boil one cup of quick-cooking grits with 3 cups of milk and one tsp salt.
Add 2 beaten eggs and 3/4 cup milk, cook and stir over medium heat until thickened.
Remove from heat, stir in 1 1/2 cups of grated sharp cheddar, 1/4 cup of parmesan and 2 Tbsp butter.
Mix and fold into a buttered casserole dish.
Bake 1 hour at 350 degrees.

Foggy morning

Fog settled in this morning.  I love how quiet and private the fog makes everything feel.

And I really tried to get Ole interested in the size of this leaf, but he just didn't seem to care.

Jumperoo!

My little jumper...

Splish splash

Ole takes after his old Mom and loves his bath time.  It's getting tough to take him out of the water as he just wants to splash and splash even after the water has gone cold.

Even drying off is fun.

The littlest pubster

I hadn't been to town in a while, so I drove in to meet Alex after work.  We ate a quick dinner and Ole had his first awake visit to the Lucky Lab.  He bellied up to the bar and jokes about putting him to work at dad's pub quickly ensued. 

I also drove downtown to Powell's to show off Ole to former co-workers.  On the way, just over the Hawthorne Bridge, I drove right through the Occupy Portland protest.  I'd seen coverage on the news but I was truly blown away by the scope of it.  It's at least two full city blocks, hundreds of tents clustered together with sidewalks serving as main street through the miniature city.  Tarps were strewn everywhere (it is Oregon after all...rain!) and there were hundreds of signs.  It has been pretty cold by Portland standards lately and not exactly camping weather, but people continue to rally and march. 

Growing boy

It was so nice to get a visit from Mom this past weekend.  Ole showed off his new skills (reading! bouncing! cooing!) and had some quality time with grandma.  She even babysat so Alex and I could have a nice dinner out.

A quiet moment.

Ole reading his current favorite.

We visited the Fall Carnival at the elementary school across the street and enjoyed seeing all the kids dressed up.  Turns out we were all too old or too young for the games and the haunted house, but we checked it out.  Ole founds lots to look at.

Happy halloween!