Thursday morning we left on our last jaunt before the un-official end of summer. 9am, we were on our way to the wonderful state of New Jersey for Jennie's great-uncle Arthur's 90th birthday party. He's a dear friend of the family and we were all very excited for the trip. Arthur has recently moved into an assisted living home that has been a little hard on him (he refers to it as "his incarceration", to himself as "one of the inmates"). His mind is very sharp but he can't see, hear or walk very well and his family thought it would be best to have more supervision.
About 30 minutes prior to our 1st stop of the day, the kids decided they couldn't wait another second for some lunch, so Jennie maneuvered her very pregnant self through the van to get to our cooler for sandwich fixings. About the only item from our house that we forgot to pack was a knife, so she was forced to improvise with the handle of a plastic fork. The kids have gotten accustomed to having the crust off their sandwiches, even though I swore I would never do this, so it seemed fitting that I had to eat the crust off of 3 sandwiches (remember, no knife in the van). The positive side is that I wasn't hungry after my crust lunch.
We made one pit stop in Schuylerville, NY to drop off Cocoa and Ella at Jeremy, Stephanie and Emma's house, as they were dog sitting for the night. The kids were disappointed to not see Emma, but took it in stride as they played with her toys for 10 minutes before we hit the road again.
Back in the van, an few hours later, Baxter announced that he had to "pee badly". At this point in his potty training days, we don't really want to test his resiliency and thus, hopped off the thruway at the 1st chance. It wasn't a great spot and we needed to pay our toll ticket before finding a gas station. I hurried him, locked the door and sat him on the toilet. After 5 seconds, he said, "Hmmm, I guess I was just kidding." I went myself to make it worth the while.
Dinner was nice, saw most of the Neuhauser clan, including the Kentucky Neuhausers (I just love that name, it sounds like a country band from the 70's. And now, please join me in welcoming to the Grand Ol Opry Stage......the Kentucky Neuhausers!!!!!")

Arthur was not entirely surprised, although I'm sure he was pleased. His daughter broke the news of the gathering to him about a week prior to make sure it would be OK. As he told me later that night, "You surprise a 90 year old man with something like this, it might his last!"
Breakfast the next morning at a Perkins with a smaller gathering and then off to one of the highlights of the trip. A few days before the trip, I was thinking of ways to add value to a 800 mile journey to NJ and came up with a cupcake pit stop in NYC. There's a special place near the village called Magnolia's where they make delectable treats, and famously, cupcakes. These cupcakes, freshly made each day are topped with about 2 pounds of the richest frosting and should probably be considered a WMD with the artery busting butter and shortening that must be in each one. For those who don't know me that well, I'm practical and don't have much of a sweet tooth, so to trek into NYC on a Friday morning for cupcakes was a significant event. That and the fact that we had my parent's GPS unit and I wanted to test how easy it could make navigating the city on a weekday morning. Plus, it was an educational trip for the kids (look to the right, that's the statue of liberty. No time to stop, we've got cupcakes to buy!)
Drove into the Hudson Tunnel, double parked on Bleeker street so Jennie and Baxter could run in for the booty. Magnolia's limits each customer to 1 dozen( the absurdity, only a dozen?!), but Bax rightfully counted as 1 person and got his own dozen.

I ran in for my dozen after they came back, and then back out through the Lincoln Tunnel. Using a towel to keep the sugar sweats from interfering with my driving, we continued on to Star Lake!!

(Baxter waiting patiently for his frosting to be removed so he could eat the cake 'cause it's too sweet. Just like his dad!)
Actually, one more little interesting stop to pick up the dogs. We let them into the backyard to use the dog restroom one last time after arriving at my brother's house and loaded up their stuff. Only Cocoa came in from the backyard however and a search up and down the street commenced for Ella, who is.....shall we say challenged. She gets nervous, vomits almost daily and runs away from all males. After a few minutes, we located her down the street. I tried to get to her, but again, the maleaphobia kicked in and she took off like a 3-legged bat outta hell. Jennie, moving faster than recommended in her condition ran her down and grabbed her, only to recoil in horror. It seems that in the 2 minutes it took us to load the car, Ella vomited, took a rollin it and then embarrassed by her behavior, decided to follow the advice of the littlest hobo and run away. We hosed her down in the side yard after finding some dog shampoo in my my brother and sister-in-law's house. We couldn't find where they keep the dog towel stash though and not wanting to chance their good natured generosity by using good towels, toweled her off with 19 paper towels. Again, keep in mind that she is a special creature. Our next mission was driving as fast as possible so we could deliver her permanently to her mother who was in front of us about 20 miles.
Star Lake was as usual, awesome. Boating, swimming, hiking, camp fires with a neighbor musician providing free music at nights, etc. It was sad to leave knowing that our lake visits were finished for the year. Till next year, when we'll be a family of five and stretching the space limitations of the little cabin even more, bye beautiful little lake!

If this van's a rockin'.........

As I've mentioned previously, we've had lots of opportunity for road trips in the new minivan this summer and have have fallen into a nice routine of blasting rock n' roll. Either of the kids will at anytime request loud music to "rock out" (their words, not mine). I tell you, I thought the arguments over volume level of music wasn't going to commence until they were at least in middle school. Not so....

"Turn it up dadda, I want it loud!"
"No, it's loud enough"
"But I want to rock out, I can't hear it good!"

Quick side story--A few months ago, we heard some banging footsteps coming from Baxter's room about an hour after bedtime. He has one of those cheap little ipod docking station radios where he listens to soothing music at bedtime, mostly James Taylor. Jennie walked in to find Bax dancing. When asked what was going on, he answered, "Well, I heard "Beat It" on the radio so I had to get up and dance". It turned out that Jennie mistakenly cued up a play list that had Michael Jackson's greatest hits after JT.

Back to the van---Jennie is a fan of Nickelback, perhaps because their style is a bit of a throwback to our heyday in the late 80's with big hair rocker bands. We were traveling down to the farmers market on Saturday morning (nice piece of irony, farmer's markets and hard rock don't usually go together). We had the ipod plugged in, volume turned up to 11 (shameless Spinal Tap plug), and "Rockstar" blasting away. All 4 heads in the van were bobbing, the windows were down and we were stopped at a stop light near UVM, which was receiving the latest batch of freshman students (do they still call them freshman? Seems sexist..). I started to chuckle at what our traffic neighbors must think of us. Either they were questioning our parenting skills and calling SRS on their cells or mocking us ("dude, you are in a minivan!). Yeah, but it's a minivan with a spoiler!

lipstick on a pig (THIS DOES NOT REFER TO MY SON!)

The kids recently discovered Jennie's make-up bag, which is impressive because Jennie herself rarely finds it. I'm not complaining, in fact I have a rather negative opinion regarding makeup. The title of this post is a favorite saying of mine and is used when a ugly or messy situation is artificially(poorly) remedied with cheap cosmetic changes. I think what you are saying when you wear make-up is that your own natural skin/face can't stand on it's feet without the crutch of clown paint, markers and colored dust. So when Baxter & Paige recently came downstairs with lipstick and eyeliner on, I had two reactions: 1: they're playing and having a good time, thus this is not a problem and 2: Am I being a good dad to let them dabble in something that I find repulsive? They will all too soon face the challenges of looking the part in a world filled with pressure from marketers saying they need to buy something to make them better people. Baxter got into the makeup again yesterday and asked the question, "Do I look pretty?" We played along but I stated that I love the look of their clean skin most of all. Still, it's kinda funny...

Ode to summer's end

Continuing in the theme of "goodbye summer", we made what was most likely our last trip to the blueberry farm for 2008 last night. We frequent a place called Owls Head Blueberry farm in Richmond, VT, which features musical acts on Tuesdays and Thursdays during the picking season. The kids do a passable job of picking, Baxter on occasion has filled a quart, while Paige only picks enough to fill her belly (and not her basket). Last night, were greeted at the gate with a petition that supports the farms use of integrated pest management. It boils down to this: the birds want the berries and the owners need to stop the birds so they have something for us to pick each year. The local press recently highlighted a dispute between the farm and it's neighbors who are complaining about one device used in the battle against the birds. They use a propane fired cannon, which immediately reminded me Caddyshack and Bill Murray's overhanded attempt to rid the golf course of gophers. Then I quickly learned that cannon only shoots noise, not cannon balls. I read the article over breakfast this week and Baxter was all ears when I mentioned cannon, birds and blueberries. I think he initially thought they were shooting the birds with blueberry cannons. Last night near the petition table was the cannon, all plugged into a propane tank and looking for bird vermin. My opinion of this is in a similiar vein of the "living near the airport" complaint. If you buy a house near a airport (farm), you lose the right to complain when airplane's (normal farming operations) bother you. We live very close to the airport and the F-18's create some unbelievable noise, rendering any activity involving your ears impossible until they leave the zip code. This looks like complaining, which I'm not. As long as I'm not on the phone, I'm amazed at the power these machines generate.
Back to blueberries-the kind owners of the farm provide 2 portapotties for customer use on site. We were on our way past said potties when Paige started a funny little conversation.
"I smell poop!"
"Really? You smell poop?"
"Yeaaahhhh...........maybe cow poop?"

This is a recent development for her and is another Cosby-ish example of how kids say the darndest things. The only drawback is if you are the perpetrator of said poop smell and she outs you in public. Sometimes, on the extremely rare occasion that the smell is coming from me, she'll chastise me about being a big boy and that big boys should go poop on the potty. If it's not you, then just sit back and enjoy the comedy. On the way home, she struck again
.
"I smell poop!"
Baxter replied, "It's just me Paige, I tooted."
I wonder if potty humor will ever get old.

Seasons change

I often describe our friendly little neighborhood by asking people if they've seen the movie Pleasantville. I don't mean in a creepy, sanitary, lacking of individuality way, but more along the lines of quiet streets filled with friendly neighbors, impromptu chats in the street or someone's driveway. One other example drives up and down the streets on Tuesday evenings, ringing a little bell that can only mean one thing: Ice Cream!! The ice cream lady announced this week that she would be back for only 2 more weeks before shutting down the scooter for the winter, which means summer is almost finished. We've had other signs, like 50 degree air temperature by 10pm and not being able to sit outside with the paper at 6am, and the tomato plants showing signs of aging. We'll be ok though, fall brings apple picking, awesome leaf peeping and homemade soups from locally grown squashes. Here's a few fleeting images of summer before we get to the next season.

But it's a good kind of pain...

This is slightly off target for I'm not a manny, but significant enough to be posted. I recently participated in a truly interesting athletic event right here in Vermont. It's called the 100on100 road race, a long distance relay that covers 100 miles on Rt. 100. I was 1/6 of a team of runners, mostly comprised of St. Lawrence University alumni. The lone dissenter was a Rochester grad, but we gladly let it slide because she was lovely company and solid runner to boot. All in all, SLU alum were part of 4 separate teams in the race, showing once again that SLU runners are in this for life and we mean business.
The weekend started out Friday night when Dwight Raby, a fellow teammate and class of '96 graduate arrived at our house for dinner. Dwight flew in from Georgia, showing his world-class commitment to our objectives of simply fielding a full team. Several more runners arrived a few hours later, with the last coming in on a delayed flight from Philadelphia, which arrived painfully at 2am in Burlington.
Saturday morning, we were off to the starting line at Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe at 7:45am. The organizers collect estimated pace times for all teams and stagger the starting times accordingly, so that the gracious volunteers who support the race are not stretched all over the course for 14 hours. Our team was to start at 10am, and finish roughly around 8:30pm. I'm not sure what I was thinking 6 weeks ago, because I gave them a 6:20 pace time/mile, which is a little exaggerated (we decided to use aggressive instead of exaggerated for the remainder the day) Our team roster and order of legs was as follows :Amy Farrell (she of top-notch speed and endurance, clearly in the "good people" category and most importantly, Ruby's mom), Peter Cutler of Norwood-Norfolk fame( he's fit, fast, funny and a college coach), Becky Dwyer (the previously mentioned UR grad and our official on-staff physician for the race), myself (nothing to add here), Dwight Raby (the georgian musician whose claim to fame is getting smoked in a song-writer contest by John Mayer) and last but not least, Chris "Sammy" Wilcox (our captain and unofficially, SLU's greatest alum).
The race kicked off from Trapp and we soon found ourselves as the last team on the course. Not necessarily the slowest mind you as I mentioned the staggered starts, but still the last. Our motto for the first cycle of runners was "don't stress the support team!" The organizers explain that if you fall significantly off your predicted pace, they will move a team up along the course with the van and adjust the total time accordingly and most importantly, said team is no longer eligible for awards. I should explain a little bit more about the structure of the race. Teams of 6, taking turns or "legs", each member running 3 separate legs over the course of 100 miles. Each leg is a different distance, the shortest being 2.5 miles, the longest being 7.3. For example, I was the 4th runner, I didn't take my 1st run until about 11:45. I then would wait until my turn came around again or in this case, started my 2nd run at around 3:45 and my last started at 7:50pm.
In between legs, we would cheer our runner at the moment, provide water along the course and knosh on whatever food we decided would supply all-important nutrition but not make us sick while running (mostly GU's, powerbars, gatorade, bagels with PB and J and twizzlers. We finally started catching teams at around the 50 mile mark and then it was on! Spotting slower runners while driving the support van, we would shout encouragement to our runner along the likes of,
"Run like you stole something!"
"Low hanging fruit coming up!"
"Don't stress the support team" (our favorite)

I took a couple of breaks after runs to soak in an icy cold stream that ran along parts of Rt100, which was very helpful once I got past the creepiness getting bumped into by fish and eels.

We finished around 9:30pm, tired, sore and happy to be done. Food was supplied (real food, not the athletic bird food we ate for 11 hours) I was able to catch a ride home with some friends and was finally taking a much-needed shower at 1:30am back home. The last 36 hours have been very achy and sleepy, but I'm getting slowly better. I mentioned to Paige yesterday morning that I couldn't carry her down the stairs because my legs were hurting. She planted a kiss on my thigh and declared that I was" all better"! Not quite, but I certainly appreciated her sweetness.
All in all, it was a completely awesome event, I recommend anyone needing to run 16-18 miles in one day to give it a try sometime. I ran 15.9 miles in a total time of 1 hour, 46 minutes and 11 seconds and it may take me 15.9 days to completely heal, but I'll be anxiously awaiting the next race once the recovery is complete.

800 miles of fun:The official van stamp of approval...

Just got back from a whirlwind, week long tour of upstate NY -for years I've disagreed with most southern NYorkers on this term. Most folks near the big apple refer to anything north of the Poughkeepsie-ish area as being "upstate", while I, with an origin 15 minutes south of the Canadian border, thought upstate started in Lake Placid and went north. It's simple folks, just look at a map, upstate would refer to the top.
We started out on Saturday morning, after a rambling stuffing of the van with everything from the attic and headed west to Malone for a visit to the county fair in an effort to cinch the parent of the year award by submitting our 2 and 4 year old (almost) to the demolition derby. It started out being pretty cool, but quickly reached a toxic state of burnt rubber, oil and metal, not to mention deafening ear pollution.

We then searched for fair rides that both kids could ride on, Paige with her dad's short genes prohibiting her participation on several of Baxter's choices. The Ferris wheel was a hit, we got a ride all by ourselves.



Next, it was off to Star Lake and G'ma L's cabin. Great fun all around, Jen and I took the kids on a paddle boat ride around the lake, showing them all the cool secret passageways. Tuesday was a picture perfect day, gorgeous sun, plenty of swimming on the new swim float.



Left Star Lake on Wed. @ noon for Skaneateles, NY, a cute little Finger Lakes town where Jen's Grandmother, Aunt and Uncle live. We stayed in a B&B in town, neat old house (c. 1805) and toured the town and lake. With some irritating irony, we choose to stay in the B&B because Grandma T's house has cats and some smoke, and we were worried about fits of asthma for both Jen and Baxter. Well, the B&B happened to have some cats (mostly outside, but probably inside during the harsh winters) and the man of the house did some smoking as well. from now on, we ask about cats and smoking when choosing a place to lay our heads while on a trip.


Friday at noon, back to Malone for more fair fun. Saturday night, we were shakin with the Money man. That's right, Eddie Money. We being delightfully surprised as we age,our home town fair brings in acts that we grew up with and thus, have a little cheap fun during the summer on a visit home. Last year it was Loverboy, this year Money. The old hits were played and they sounded the same as they did 20 years ago. His 20 year old daughter, Jessie who didn't win(lost) on the Rock the Cradle reality show this past year is on tour with him and she sang a few songs. She wasn't bad, decent voice but some immature stage dancing (nothing inappropriate,, just silly looking). The Money man sang a few songs from a charity CD and the Malone folks got pretty restless. We overheard one funny exchange from behind us:
(Woman) " Look at all the people leaving!"
(Man) "Well they should, 'cause he sucks!"
The trip to Malone also allowed us to visit with cousin/niece Emma (my brother and his wife were also there but they know their place;) Paige and Baxter really like her and they all seem to play nicely together.


By Sunday morning, we were ready to head for VT and home. The kids have fallen back into their routines and so have we. I have a big race this weekend, the 100on100 6 person relay from Waitsfield to Killington. (www.100on100.org) Hope I still have legs at this time next week!

Quick update

Ok, so we're having a baby. Another one. While our 1st two charges run us ragged and sleep is still a premium, we'll delve into infant land once more sometime around 11/22 of this year (well, obviously this year, Jen isn't an elephant). We're happy, excited to meet a new human that we created but have a little trepidation mixed in with that happiness. As I've stated before, being a parent is just plain hard. They give us joy, make us laugh and I couldn't imagine life without them, but it's still hard. We've had a hectic year so far: formed a little real estate company, built a commercial office building for Jennie's practice and will close on the purchase of this building next week. Jennie has moved to a spanking, sparkling new building and all the little hiccups are starting to get a little easier to swallow. However, her practice is busy, busy, busy! So we're both a little nervous with the prospect of adding a brand new person into this mix. It always works itself out, so I'm sure it'll be fine. Here's a couple of pics of the fam, while we are still a family of 4.

Van people

Well, it's been literally months and months since I've last posted. Perhaps this isn't for me, but I'm making another attempt to get back on the horse.
We've made the leap into minivanville, purchasing a Toyota Sienna this morning. Baby #3 is on the way (more on that later) and the Subaru just wasn't going to make the cut. The van is nice, pre-owned (06) and the kids seem happy to each have their own seat row. The purchase was interesting; the local dealer lets you put a bid for any car via their website. Most people know I love to embrace technology and felt motivated to give it a try. Plus, the bonus of not having to talk to a car sales rep was too tempting. So I bid $1500 less than asking price, thinking no one would get back to me. 6 hours later, I was notified via email that my offer was "accepted", which immediately left me wanting more. Did I say 18,500? I meant 16,000......At any rate, we then proceeded to make an appointment to test drive. The fun part happened when we discussed the price of our trade-in car, the 02 Suby. For visual fun, picture 2 pounds of crushed goldfish crackers, a rogue dirty diaper, a pile of sand from the beach, along with assorted pieces of toys, junk mail, etc. They came is a little low, but after reading the above, maybe not. We pushed the rep a little bit and he mentioned a small dent on the door. Hmmm?? I don't remember, but is it about the size of my left shoulder? (I tripped while carrying baby Baxter about 3 years ago and turned my body to take the hit and protect Bax, denting the door with my obvious rock-hard body). Most book value companies refer to a "good" condition requiring "some reconditioning". I think they may want to revisit their description after cleaning up our car!

Baxter turns 3

Baxter turned 3 last week and is wise and all-knowing. Or at least he's got a good comic vibe about him.
We visited the wonderful northwest last week, staying with our good friends Eric, Sarah and Maya in Seattle. Eric has a great blog supplying the masses with political insight not found on the major news networks, along with top-notch pop-culture and parental information. Incidently, we learned during this trip he also has a not-so-secret fascination with the new and improved Britney Spears.
At any rate, Seattle was great, we saw the woodland park zoo, trained almost daily at Greenlake park for the Leaf Peeper half marathon (see details at my sister-in-laws blog), and enjoyed a comfortable family atmosphere at the Magnuson/Prager home. Oh, and Bax turned 3 years of age during the week. It's truly amazing how significant development is on only three short years. I remember vividly watching the Sox march through the playoffs three years ago and Baxter was nothing more than a puking, eating, sleeping blob (I type that sentence with love). Today, Baxter possesses verbal skills unmatched by many adults, has developed a taste for local artisan cheese (blue and chevre), regularly looks forward to mixing it up at the local farmers market and will chat it up with strangers about farming and firetrucks. A newer development is a strangely delightful imagination.
His mother discovered his crayon creation on our friends coffee table (sorry Eric and Sarah) during our last day in Seattle. Frustrated by this and several earlier episodes of toddler mischief, she exclaimed, "Baxter, what am I going to do with you?!"
To which he replied, " I guess you'll have to put me in a cage with kitty cats, 'cause I'm an animal!
Neither one of us has any idea where this line of thought originated from, we have no cats and have never threatened either child with a cage. The beauty of this is that it breaks the mood instantly and acts like a deodorizer of parental frustration.

We're back home now for over a week, ran 13.1 miles yesterday in a lovely race in Waterbury, VT. Fall is upon us, which is a good time in Vermont with the apples and great local harvest of the earth. May all your root vegetables be be tasty.

Hello....it's me

Five months since writing seems like a death sentence for a blog, but things last forever on the internets. Other than the gap between seasons of "Lost", not much would rival my hiatus. Since we last talked, Paige started walking, kissing, hitting and recently, talking. Her words are limited, not unlike other 15 month old kids, but she doesn't let this limitation keep her from starting discussions with everyone she meets. Both kids actually, don't seem to have a shy bone in their bodies. Our local health food store, which sees us quite frequently, is a popular spot for Paige-related discourse. She waves at the cashiers regularly and babbles small talk while I pay for the goods. I think they enjoy the moment and aren't being friendly out of requirement of their customer service policy. Lately, she also will kiss anyone within reach, which can be a problem for the kids who do seem to mind the approach. We've started talking to her about personal space, but I don't think it's sticking quite yet. Several children have recoiled and started crying when Paige butts in for a chat and smooch. She hasn't taking this personal yet though, she moves on to the next child or dog for smooching, whichever is closer. She still is a pipsqueak, weighing in at 19 1/2 lbs as of last weeks 15 month check. Should anyone worry, I remind them to take a look at her father, all 5 feet of me. She's happy and thriving and we are too.
Baxter is doing great too, even though he still needs diapers at this point. I always thought 3 years was going to be the magic number for big boy pants, but as that momentis occasion is about a month away, I may have to adjust my expectations. We have the books, the potty's and we even negotiated a reward system for toilet use, to no avail at this time. About a month ago, I tried a different approach. I said to him, "Baxter, I have a feeling that you are going to use the toilet real soon." He replied, " Dadda, I'll use the toilet when my butt gets bigger." Tough to argue with that logic. This reminds me of something I saw in the newspaper recently. There is a new store opening locally that sells natural cloth diapers, and other hippy-like baby gear. One of the owners was talking up the benefits of cloth diapers and the quote that hit me went something like this. "I don't wear padded paper undergarments, so why should my baby have to wear them." That may be true lady, but I can't remember pooping or peeing in my underwear since college, so I'll need a better argument.

Paige turns 1

After a harrowing start to life, Paigey turns 1 today. We celebrated a couple of times last week; once with the MP playgroup gang on Thursday and again with the family this past Saturday in Malone at Grandma & Grandpa Lowell's house. Attendance was solid with both greats (Trani and Lowell) from Jen's side of the family making the trip. Baxter was front and center for cake and presents, playing the role of "supportive" big brother. His sharing traits are improving rapidly, as he is always willing to "share" other people's things.
As with most early birthdays, this time presents a perfect mental environment for reflection. A year goes by quickly in the grand scheme of things and it's always amazing to see the development of young people. We watched a couple of home videos from the archives from last spring on our nostalgic tour and the comparisons are a blast. Baxter still looked like a baby and couldn't be understood verbally. This is stunning because he can now carry on a conversation about the weather, sporting events and food. Paigey's difference were obvious, as she was a wrinkly uncoordinated blob. Now.......just judge for yourself!

New developments

We just returned from a family vacation/conference for Jennie in Park City and it was a busy, fun and exhausting week. Jennie and I went skiing in the Canyons 4 days and the kids went to a drop-in daycare called The Clubhouse. It was a clean, well-run joint for the kids and allowed us to partake in the "Greatest Snow on Earth" (Utah ski industry tourist motto). In addition to the usual (kids can't sleep because of the timezone issues, strange beds, etc), we had some new stuff to brag about. Firstly, within an hour of check-in, Baxter declared that he wanted to poop in the potty. And he did, 2 times within the hour. This is an absolute first for him and we rejoiced later that evening with an ice cream. He tried to negotiate some extra "cake treat and pie treat", but we kept things from getting out of hand and stuck with the ice cream.
Paige was not to be outdone and started crawling a few days later. And at 9 1/2 months, she beats her brother by about 2 weeks. She's got two modes, regular crawl and a modified version that looks like some sort of monkey scoot. She's really cute, still so tiny that it's amazing to see her motor herself across the floor. We'll need to start keeping the house a little cleaner now, she picks up the tiniest pieces of junk to stuff into her mouth. We call her Roomba....

We're happy to be home and are getting some sleep to recover. We even did some sleeping on the way home.

Little pitchers have big ears

This saying never made much sense to me, but I remember it fondly from our annual Christmas viewing of "The Christmas Story". The gist of it is this: don't say anything you want kids repeating. In our childless years, we used curse words like most normal non-trucker people. As Jennie was pregnant with Baxter, we started retraining our vernacular with the inevitable assumption that we would need to be curse-free for the next 20 years. For the most part, we have been pretty clean, only slipping up when faced with severely frustrating situations. Family members, especially those who go weeks without seeing the kids, will occasional lapse. This makes for a slightly funny but awkward situation that requires us, the former children to reprimand our parents for swearing. 20 years ago, I would never have thought the following would leave my lips directed at Jennie's dad: "Watch your mouth old man! Do I need to take my belt off?"
As I mentioned in an earlier post, we recently had prolonged issues with leaky bathrooms. The shower stall has just been "repaired" for the 2nd time when I took a shower. As I opened the door, I noticed a dark wet spot on the floor towel. Filled with frustration, I muttered under my breath, "Jesus." Baxter just happened to be in the room with me and repeated what he thought he heard, using the same disgusted tone as his soon to be ashamed father. Only when it came out of his mouth, it sounded more like "Pizzas". Being well-read on how to deal with these situations, I didn't pursue or prod him further, but I didn't enjoy a nice chuckle. So next time you're struggling to find a strong but clean exclamation for a frustrating situation, remember there's always pizza.

See you on the (frozen) playground!

These eyes have seen a lotta love.......

I successfully had lasik surgery this past Friday at the Vermont Laser Eyecare Center. When I say successful, I mean 20-15 vision and I went skiing the very next day. What an amazing procedure, I have a hard time putting it into words, but I guess I'll try. I have a decent memory and one of the files deep in my brain bank includes getting glasses when I was 6 or 7. Blackboard items at Ol Brushton-Moira seemed a little too blurry and I was tested for vision issues. The first (5-6) pairs of glasses were shall we say, from the geek series of eye wear. Combined with my super-cool mullet, I was able to snare my amazing-ish girlfriend Jennie during the high school days. I finally got contacts my frosh year of college and have worn them since. Recently I began having some issues with the contacts and Jennie, now playing the role of best wife on the planet, got me lasik's for Christmas and the rest is history. As I said before, everything turned out a-ok, but I must admit to a smidgen of anxiety and while getting the kids ready for the day, I had a frightful thought that I could be seeing them for the last time (irrational moment, even non-successful surgery wouldn't result in blindness, i think). So I took an extra 5 seconds with each kid, staring at their faces and soaking up their beautifulness. Luckily, I get to keep seeing those faces for the unforeseeable future. Even the outsider can admit, it's a sweet view. (Baxter "helped" with brownies, Paige just waking from a nap)

Waterworld

Those who know us have heard all about the bathroom nightmares that we've encountered. For the most part, we love our home. Or I should say "love where our home is located but would like to make some rather large renovations in the near future" (Hello Chittenden loan department?). As luck would have it, we've encountered dueling leaky bathroom issues. Downstairs kitchen bath with shower (yes, we know that's weird) had some leaky grout and rotten drywall--out of commission for about 2 months. Very shortly after we learned of this problem, we noticed some peeling paint in the kitchen ceiling, curiously enough below the upstairs tub. We find out that the upstairs grout is also shot and is as porous as a sponge. We proceeded to shower with the shower head handle as close to our bodies as possible, which in the middle of the winter tends to be rather chilling. Downstairs shower door arrives, hurrah for us! Grout is applied upstairs, we're back in business with both, right? Well, there appears to be additional leaking from the hot water handle upstairs, call the plumber. Also, the new not-cheap shower door (downstairs for those keeping track)is leaking near the bottom. Our 3rd option for cleansing ourselves is pictured below....I'll add a pic of my bath later..

I have a confession and I hope this will serve notice to other parents out there who feel like something is wrong with them, because it's completely natural (I hope). It is this: We feel a giddy-like sensation when both kids are sleeping soundly, either for naps or the evening. Early on, I didn't feel like I could release this information for fear of social services taking umbridge with this attitude. Jennie and I would confide in each other and question our fitness to be parents.
"What does it say about us that we look forward to nap and bedtimes with the same fervor as kids on christmas morning?"
Luckily, we had the same feelings so we didn't have to sheepishly admit to such truths. Lately, I'm hearing similiar themes from other parents with young children.
"I try to not to wish my life away but......"
"I got em both in bed by 7:30, it was heavenly."
"He was driving me crazy, so we started the bedtime routine early."
Guilt is a powerful and awful emotion and is not enjoyed by many. It's important to consider the facts. We have high standards for our parenting experience, whether it be enriched playgroups, organic foods, limited TV (limited meaning zero for Jennie), etc. We could spend 24 hours a day trying to live up to these expectations, without even considering work, sleep and other household duties. Perhaps it should be stated as such: Parenting is extremely hard. That's not to say that we don't enjoy it or love our children very much. In fact, I think it's hard BECAUSE we love them dearly to set such expectations. These quotes illustrate my point:
"I feel like a lousy mother, I haven't read many books to our 6 month old. I hope I haven't irreparably harmed her development."
"He's only had yogurt, fruit and some whole grains today, we're not doing a good job with vegetables."
I think you get the point. So let's take it easy on ourselves. If they're happy, healthy and mostly alive, pat yourself on the back because you're doing a good job. Besides, if we were perfect, therapists in 20-30 years would lose a lot of business.

Here's a recent pic of my brood.


See on the playground.

Yeehaw!

It was a good year for Baxter, as he received a pony from Papa and Nana. Most importantly, it doesn't need to be fed or cleaned much, aside from the occasional cracker smashed into it's plastic mane.

Our free thinking toddler

We've entered the realm of independence with Baxter. We had heard about defiance as a character flaw of other children but had never witnessed it before with our wonderful, perfect little child. well, he's created his own prefix for anything we ask or suggest for him to do. Want to get a clean diaper?" Nah, I not get clean diaper. I not. Want daddy to put socks on you? Nah, I not daddy put socks on. Sometimes we can trick him into refusing cookies, bouncy rides on my belly or other fun things but he usually quickly corrects himself. "Nah, I not want ice cream......um, Baxter wants ice cream, BAXTER WANTS ICE CREAM!"

This fun little trait revealed itself at a recent slightly public event. We hosted a Santa party for our neighbors and friends last week. Jen's mom use to host a similar party and it was a treasured memory for her. So she had long ago planned to do something similar when we had children old enough to enjoy it. After weeks of stalking mall Santa's, calling the admin offices of the local shopping plaza's, etc., she finally tracked down Santa and Mrs. Claus for our party.
Both Bax and Paigey received Santa and the missus well, no stranger fear, mainly curious and excited. But as Baxter went to receive his gift at the appropriate time, Danielle suggested that he give Santa a hug for his present and to give his parents, grandparents and aunts a photo-op, he stopped, turned to face Danielle and announced clearly and loudly for all to hear, " No, I not hug Santa." Luckily, Santa is vet and took this Heisman well.