Coming soon ... vacation!

Dear Blog Readers,
It's been a few months and we will soon be going on vacation! The original purpose of this blog (sort of) was to share our travels, so I'm going to do that again. I'm not sure how much Internet access we will have, and this will be an easy way to update everyone on our whereabouts.

So, first, an introduction.
What? A cruise through the Panama Canal, starting in Acapulco and ending in Fort Lauderdale.
When? Coming soon in March
Why? Um, it's a vacation. Do you really need a why? :) Seriously, though, this is a baby-moon, and the first international vacation we've taken in over 5 years. Back in the day, we loved a good trip and have traveled all over Europe, a little bit of South America, Egypt, and have seen quite a bit of the U.S., including the cross-country drive and trip to the Southwest that we blogged about on here. These days, most of our traveling involves going to Buffalo.

See you back here soon with our travel log!

A note

Dear Blog Readers,
You'll notice that I haven't written a blog in a while. The truth of the matter is that between this and Facebook, I'm getting awfully tired of monologues. I much prefer dialogs. Is the current "social networking" technology such that we don't talk to each other anymore? We just all post things about ourselves in separate spheres, and then "cyber stalk" all our friends?  At this point, I'm done with that.

I hope that I will come up with another use for this blog in the future. I feel that blogs are successful if they inform the world about something greater than ourselves.  A cooking blog.  A blog about economics. Etc. But, if you want to know how I'm doing or what I'm up to, please call or e-mail. I would love to hear from you.

Dad

I would like everyone to take a moment today and remember my wonderful Dad, who died three years ago today. I will always remember the twinkle in his eyes when he smiled, his wonderful sense of humor, and his guiding wisdom. People don't truly die until they are forgotten, so remember him today.

Clumpy travel

Why is it that traveling happens in clumps? It feels like we either have a month packed with travel, or nothing at all. Maybe the "nothing at all" periods are the times we need to rest up for the month that is packed with travel. Sometimes it really does take weeks to get caught up, it feels.

This month, we had my mom visiting, and my sister had her big flight back from Europe. She made it in safely very late last night, and made it back to her actual home a couple of hours ago. Amazing to be able to call her up and talk to her on the phone! With one exception, we'd had no phone calls since May!

Tomorrow, Jim goes on a business trip to Florida for a couple of days. Leaves at the crack of dawn, as usual. Hopefully Miss Annika will stay asleep.

And next week, Annika and I are off to Buffalo for a short trip, and our third joint airplane ride!

Then, finally, a week later, we have our annual family trip to the Adirondacks - and everyone is traveling for that. Laurie is coming here. Mom may meet us there or may fly to Boston - still figuring that part out. We'll be spending the weekend in Keane Valley ... hopefully lots of fall colors, perhaps some hiking, puzzles, reading, and lots of relaxing. So it's good that this last trip is at the end of everything else. It will be our time to get caught up again.

And, for strictly gratuitous purposes, here's a cute photo of Annika with her daddy:

And a bon voyage to all.

Babyese to English

We have returned from our sooper sikrit tour of Quincy Point to analyze an old species, termed "The Baby," in her natural habitat. We discovered that she has her own language, which we will call Babyese. Here are the first words we have discovered.

Mama = Mama.
Dada= Daddy
Yaya = Annika
Mou = more or "I'm thirsy" or milk or "all done."
Up = up or down
Hi or hi ta = hi or hi there
Buh-bye or bye ta = Bye
No, or nononononono = No
Yesh! = Yes
Ish = Shoe or cat
Meow = cat or the sound a cat makes
Moooooo! = the sound a cow makes
Woo...Woo = dog or the sound a dog makes
Moo = Moon
Row, row = usually sung, the first two words of "Row, Row, Row Your Boat"
Eyes = eyes or ears
Ouk = Work (as in Daddy is at work)
Boa = Boat
Ace = sheep
Ba = Ball or belly button or balloon
Ca = Car
Vroom! = the sound a car makes
Da = an all purpose word, loosely translated to mean "that." Sometimes used to mean "I want that," or "Look at that!"

We will continue to study this intriguing new language and report back on new understandings that we reach.

Date night

Tonight was date night. And it was a special date night because it was the first one in which we were completely independent - no relying on family for babysitting.  But even that aside, we hadn't had a date night in a long time, and since we finally found a babysitter, we decided to go out tonight.

We drove to Cambridge on Jim's motorcycle. I hadn't been on the bike in at least 2 years. It was fun. It's one of those things that you just can't do with a baby in tow.  Then we had dinner at Legal Seafoods, drove around Boston and Cambridge on the bike to see the sights, and then bowled three rounds at Olindy's. It was really nice to be out. We were gone about 3 1/2 hours.

Annika had a remarkably easy time with the whole situation. When the babysitter first arrived, she did her normal "Mama! Mama!" routine, and I was getting nervous. Additionally, about 30 seconds before the sitter arrived, she had fallen and bumped her head on the table in our porch - so she had the start of a goose-egg/black and blue mark above her eye and was obviously upset.  (Why is it that Annie seems to be the only toddler I see with bruises on her head? Is she the only one who falls? Or do other parents use cover-up makeup on their children?)  So I was really worried that we were in for it.  But then I kissed her good-bye and sat her down with her crayons and our sitter, and she suddenly seemed OK with everything. She said, "Buh-bye! Buh-bye!" over and over again, and waved to us from the window when we drove off on the bike.  Totally unexpected. The babysitter said that she was very happy the whole time, and went to sleep at bedtime right away, without a fuss. Wow.

And, in a sign of how cool our neighborhood is, our neighbor George saw us drive off on the bike as he was walking Buddy the dog. As we drove past him, he yelled, "Where is she?" (meaning Annika, of course). He loves Annika. So he actually stopped by the house shortly after to check in and make sure she was OK. We have really nice neighbors, and they all love Annika.

Tomorrow we are going to a birthday party for the little boy across the street who turned 1 last week. Should be a lot of fun for everyone.

Day care

Today was Annika's last day at her current day care.  On Monday, she is starting at a new place.  It was a remarkably sad day for me.  I have grown to really like her current day care, and although I really like the new place too, it will be a change in the routine and it's quite a different type of day care. While up til now, Annie has been at a fairly large day care center, we are switching to a family day care - more affordable, and it's also the day care where our next door neighbors go. I was sad to say good-bye to all the women who have cared for Annie over the last year, particularly those in the infant room. It felt very safe there.  I also learned that they have been keeping a little "journal" for Annie since she started, writing a note to her every week or every 2 weeks since she started last September. It made me sad to read it and realize the time that has passed and the love we're leaving behind.  A year ago, Annie wasn't even sitting up by herself yet. She was still exclusively on bottles. Now she's walking and talking!

But I felt better about our decision to switch after we stopped over at the new day care tonight to start getting Annie acclimated. It's a very welcoming place, and the teacher is really, really nice - very nuturing and loving. I have no doubt that next week is going to be pretty hard.  Annie is extremely clingy anyway, and usually made a scene at "drop off time" at the old day care. I'm not sure how much worse it can get, but I worry that somehow it will be. Jim is coming with me next Monday for the first drop off, since I'm going to have a rough time. But I hear that it gets easier eventually.

We also are trying out a new babysitter this weekend. Imagine this - we go out on a date! Seriously! But I'm not sure how Annie is going to do with that either.  She is in such a "mommy" phase right now, where she wants to follow me around and be with me all the time.  In a way, it's sort of flattering, and makes me feel like maybe I'm doing something right, but in another way, it's not good at all. She needs to be comfortable with her surroundings and the people in them, even if they're not Mommy.

Last year at this time, we were going through the big transition from maternity leave into day care.  This year, it feels like we've started all over again in some ways.