I’m a sucker for the retrospective photo series: Halloween 2005 Halloween 2006 Halloween 2007 This year was Sam’s first time participating in the ritualized banditry known as “trick-or-treat.” She also got to have her first taste of candy. Here she is, pondering her plunder. AC tells me that cherry won out over grape. …

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One of Sam’s favorite activities is to flip the pages of her nursery rhyme book and sing along. In fact, if she’s ever at a loss for words, she’ll just start reciting “Mary had a little lamb,” or “Pop goes the weasel.” Incongruous, yes, although sometimes “that’s the way the money goes” is a great conversation filler. …

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Coming up: a video series of Sammy singing. But first, here she is playing the harmonica on her birthday. She plays as well as I do!

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Sam and I spent the morning cleaning the house. Well, I cleaned, and Sam mostly created things for me to clean up, or tried to prevent me from cleaning, like when she grabbed an empty bucket from my hands and immediately filled it with toys and books. I felt like I was on one of those reality-contest shows. Steel …

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Sam and I just returned from her 24-month wellbaby visit with her pediatrician. The exciting news is that Sammy weighs 24 and 1/4 pounds and is 33 inches tall, which puts her in the 25th percentile for height and almost the 25th (22) percentile for weight. This is the highest she’s ever been on the weight scale! So …

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Happy 2nd Birthday to our beautiful daughter.

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What a difference a year makes.

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On Labor Day we went to the beach where Sammy jumped a little bit in the gently rolling water that waved ashore. Before we left, she practiced her jumps in the house. Sam’s bikini: courtesy of her Newport News aunts. Off-screen jumping jacks: courtesy of Mom.

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Mom and Sam are walking up to Tassajara playground when they pass a place where there used to be an apple tree. Sam: Apple tree? Mom: Oh yeah, it’s gone, honey. They cut it down. Sam: Sammy cut it. Mom: Oh you did? Sam: Yeah. Mom: What did you cut it with? Sam: A knife. Mom: A knife?! Sam: Yeah, a little knife. (Nota …

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Two anecdotes about creatures popping up in the house where I do not expect them to be: I got out of bed on Saturday morning to feed Camus, only to discover that he had had several “accidents” in various places on the living room floor. I gather my cleaning supplies (would that such accidents were a rare occurrence) …

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