A busy start to fall...and taking it easy

Fall is only half-way through, but already it has been filled with vacation time and new activities and milestones.

At the end of September Andrea completed her second race, the Omaha Half-Marathon. She got the chance to run with her brother, Chris, yet again, which made the experience really fun. How often can you say running 13 miles was enjoyable? No new races on the calendar yet, but Andrea's looking forward to getting back to the gym again soon.

Then we took off for Florida at the beginning of October and spent a few days immersed in all-things-Disney. At Disney World, Taylor got to meet tons of Disney characters, including Minnie and Princess Aurora (her favorite). It was a totally new side of the theme park that we'd never experienced before - waiting hours in lines to get just a couple of snapshots with a character. Taylor loved it.

We also got to ride on Dumbo as a family of four (a tight squeeze!) and get a taste of the annual Food & Wine festival (yum!). Rory slept for a good portion of our outings there, but enjoyed touching all the fuzzy characters and riding the boat through It's a Small World.

Now that we're back home, we've been trying to take things more slowly and just organize our lives. Taylor has moved up to a Junior Gymnastics class, filled with 4- and 5-year-old girls. She's so much smaller than them, but makes up for the lack of height with her incredible strength. The teachers are continually impressed with her abilities at such a young age.

Rory has been making big developmental leaps these last few weeks. She's giving us huge, toothy grins all the time now. She eats nearly every kind of food we put in front of her. And she learned a bit of Ariel-style singing from Taylor, so she breaks into song whenever she see or holds one of the Disney princess toys.

Though she still isn't walking, Rory has been working hard at cruising, climbing stairs and furniture, scooting around on her ladybug wheelie toy, standing on her own, communicating with some simple sign-language, and using the potty more regularly.