October 5

Every year, we pick a Saturday in October and drive down to Pastorino's Pumpkin Farm in Half Moon Bay. Every year, dating back to 2004 when I was nine months pregnant with Abby and looked like I was trying to smuggle a huge gourd out of the patch, we've taken the same picture of me and the kiddos in front of the entry gate. This is the 2013 incarnation:

It was a beautiful, warm, bright afternoon (hence the squinting and blinking and eye-shielding) and we had a lovely time picking out our pumpkins.

But it's hard to go without Logan. It's hard to take this photo without him (though Lambie does serve as his stand-in). But, ironically, I guess, it's a good kind of hard, because we can go and remember the times he went with us. That's the blessing of going to the same place just one time a year: you can remember previous trips with a good deal of accuracy and detail. Those moments become sparkling crystals in the mind that you take out and polish and enjoy and cherish just one day a year.

And in those moments, I can see a lot of God.