Uncle Ryan's Visit

A few weeks ago we had a visit from Uncle Ryan, who had traveled to Kansas City and took the bus north to Iowa for a couple of days.  It was really nice to have him here, and great timing because the futon I had bought arrived just a couple of days before Uncle Ryan.  When he was in the planning stages of the trip, I told Ryan that a couple of days would probably be enough to spend here with us and our boring days but I wasn't ready for him to leave when he did. 

Neither was Lucy, who readily accepted Uncle Ryan as the fifth member of our family, even going so far as to make up a song just for him: (to the tune of Frere Jacques) Uncle Ryan, Uncle Ryan, on a roll, next to me.  This is actually a modified version of a song that her training potty sings when she pees on it - Uncle Ryan replaced "toilet paper" - a great honor.

Uncle Ryan was a great sport, participating in such fan favorites as swinging for hours.  He even perfected the under-swing-push, a remarkable technique that went back to Maine with him. 

And toys galore.  Though not matchbox, Uncle Ryan plays a mean farm ... or ... I think that Lucy and Uncle Ryan are really engaged in some parallel play here.  I guess I know who's getting the Little People building blocks for his 29th birthday this year!

 

Thanks for coming, Ryan.  You're welcome again any time!

Sweet Valentine

I finally feel as though what I've been waiting for as a parent is here - the age where it's not weird any more to bring Lucy to different activities (that I secretly want to go to) and where we can do fun stuff together for holidays, etc.  I made kind of a big deal of Valentine's Day this year in the lead up, talking about Lucy being my valentine, buying ingredients to make cookies, looking at heart-shaped things, and on top of that we have Grandma who (of course) sent a package, a card, some stickers, and even some "heart-shaped clothes" for Lucy.

Lucy did some decorating with the stickers that Grandma sent, mainly on the family.  These photos are from about a week ago, and even though I told her not to put stickers on the dog, it was great because one of those hearts stayed on Shorty for almost 4 days.  Baby brother, a.k.a. Buddy, got one too.

 

 

 Daddy wanted some craft supplies so he and Lucy could make Valentine's cards together.  We sat down after a long day to do some crafting and after about 10 minutes, Lucy disappeared, leaving Eric and I to sit and make cards together.  Not exactly what he had in mind.

 

 We also did some heart-shaped sugar cookies, which were a big hit with the two-and-under crowd.  It was my first attempt at homemade cutout cookies, and they turned out pretty good.  I've definitely been on a from scratch baking kick in the past month or so.  Favorite part for Lucy?  The frosting, for sure.

 

 

 And as usual, I had some nude baking help.

 Finally, on Valentine's morning I was really excited to make Lucy some heart-shaped pancakes.  I guess by now that when my feelings start off with "I was really excited" that I shouldn't necessarily expect anyone else to follow through with the thrill in my plans.  I worked to get these three reasonably heart-shaped pancakes and presented them to Lucy who was wearing her "heart-shaped clothes", took pictures, talked about how she was my special valentine, the works.  Then I cut them up with butter and syrup, she had one bite, announced she was finished, and walked away.  Umm, hello?  Don't you know that this was supposed to be a special breakfast?  So I ate my pancakes and hers alone at the table.  Happy special Valentine to me. 

 

 Likely sensing my disappointment, Lucy kindly offered to do the morning's dishes.  I bought her a step-stool a while back and it's opened up a whole new world of possibilities, including, apparently, household chores.  (Do I sense a window washing in our future?)  It was hysterical to watch her mimic how I wash and rinse the dishes, even finishing with a vigorous wipe-down of the counter next to the sink.  Totally worth re-washing everything in that drainer to see the show.

 

 

We hope that our heart-shaped friends also enjoyed every moment!

Friend Silas

So here in Iowa, Lucy has 2 good friends, Friend Gabe and Friend Silas.  Silas's mommy, Sara, joked that she thinks of the three of them as one big happy couple.  We decided that Lucy is either the luckiest or unluckiest girl in the world.

We had the pleasure of spending most of the afternoon with Friend Silas today, while Sara played violin in DSM and Jane saw her concert with their neighbor (and believe it or not, then got to have dinner and a drink out.  Mommy what?)  We believe that life is always better when you've got friends, and today was no exception.

It's more fun to ride in the car and sing songs, especially when you both know the words.  Some singing, some dancing, some good old-fashioned noise making.

 It's more fun to stare out the window at the .... sunset?  traffic?  trees? 

 It's more fun to take a bath, especially when there are plenty of toys and matching towels to dry off with.

 Finally, it's more fun to drive in the car after having picked out complementary pajamas.  Actually, this adorable car squeeze only lasted for about 10 seconds.  Right after I snapped the photo, Silas stopped the coupe and kicked Lucy out.  Typical man, Silas had to be in the driver's seat.  Typical woman, Lucy got behind the car and pushed him wherever she wanted to go anyway.

Fun day friends!

Reflections on a Journey

20 days, we took from December to January to drive to Maine (home to Maine? back to Maine?)  Eric and I had decided that given our present circumstances - short on money but long on time - a drive with an extended stay would be our best course of action for a Christmas with families.  When we decided this, sometime in early November, it seemed far enough away not to be daunting, but as our expected departure date drew close, we began to think we were a little bit crazy.  It's one thing to get in the car and drive 1500 miles once, as we did to move here to Iowa.  It's another to look at the prospect of driving the same 1500 miles both ways in a relatively short stretch of time.  Crossing fingers that we wouldn't hit any winter weather and armed with the new DVD player Grandma had sent to save us from our older and tempermental model, we loaded our gifts, luggage, aging dog, and Lucy into the car.

Trip Statistics:

20 days away from home including
4 days traveling
2 days snowed in at Grandma and Grandpa's

4628 total miles including
1542 miles Iowa to Maine
1544 miles Maine to Iowa
1596 miles driven while in Maine
     (10 trips between Waterville and Bangor and 1 trip from Waterville to Portland)

165 gallons of gas
$495 (at $3/gallon) spent on gas
231 miles averaged per day
$25 average gas cost per day

I contemplated going online and looking at the pounds of carbon each gallon of gas burned puts in the atmosphere and trying to compare that with the carbon released per passenger on a commercial flight as to look at how we did on overall environmental impact, but decided against it. 

What really surprised me while we were in Maine was that the number of miles we drove while there exceeded that of our cross-country trip.  We worked hard to coordinate seeing all the people we wanted to see with as few trips as possible, but no matter what we did the snow or people changing plans on us seemed to thwart our efforts.  Next time we go home, we'll park ourselves somewhere nice (hopefully at camp this summer) and let all our friends and family come to us. 

All in all, for the amount of time we spent in the car it didn't seem too bad.  After 5 years will this drive be just another - ho hum - couple of days in the car?

Maine Fun

 The last of the fun we had while we were in Maine was a super art project with mommy and Grandma.  Auntie Crystal was kind to give Lucy some finger paints for Christmas and boy, was she excited to try them out.  Quite the artist, too, if I may say so.  I'm just not sure if Lucy liked the paint better on the paper or on herself.

 

I do have one more fantastic picture of Lucy playing piano with her backside wearing nothing but some socks and a smile, but in the interest of her future dignity, I'll leave that one to the imagination.

Maine Friends

Oh, what an action-packed trip to Maine we had.  In addition to our fabulous Christmas celebrations, the snow play, and all of our family fun, we managed to squeeze in time for almost all of our favorite Maine friends.  Unfortunately, due to time and travel constraints, we didn't get to visit everyone we wanted to see, but we certainly made our rounds (not to mention everyone we did not take pictures of).

One of our trips was to see our old next-door neighbors, Martha, Sandra, Glorene & Dave, who we miss terribly and know they miss us as well.  Who am I kidding, really, they mostly miss Lucy, but I'll survive.  Though Matt's a great guy, they tell me living next door to him is just not the same.  We've been gone so long they don't even have the cabinet stocked with juice boxes! 

 Next on the list?  Kimmie, the most wonderful/amazing/fabulous babysitter we could ask for.  I've joked that I'm not working here only because I know nobody will live up to her standard of care (unfortunately for Lucy I don't either) and that she had to move with us (ironically Kim does have family in Iowa).  When we left Lucy called her "Mimi" and now she's "Timmy."  Maybe those K's will come soon, but Lucy loves you either way!

 

 A girl's day in Portland with my friend Katy.  The great thing about Katy is that she's always up for something coastal.  She's actually always up for anything.  We went to the waterfront to have some breakfast and then spent a gloomy hour walking around in the cold and gray fog.  Whatever, I say.  It was great to see and smell the ocean.  Water is one thing that I definitely miss in Iowa, lakes, rivers, ocean, all of it.  Aside from some September rain, the last water we saw here was the flood when we first arrived, and that was not the kind of water that made me want to dangle my toes.

 And Lucy's beautiful friend Chloe.  Chloe and her mom Stacy were more neighbors in Maine, recent friends that were just too good to be true.  I wish we could have taken them with us too, and if I told Stacy what we pay for heat and hot water here, she might have abandoned her humongous old house and come, too.  Lucy and Chloe get along famously and didn't miss a beat playing together after a 5-month hiatus.

 

 

 Finally, in order to see as many of my mommy-friends as I could, I sent everyone a facebook message that said I was parking myself at the Broadway McDonald's playplace and they could come to me.  And they did!  Though I have some really great friends out here, I still miss the network of people I had built over my time in Maine, both old and new friends.  We missed all our wonderful little buddies that couldn't make it but had a lot of fun with those we saw!  Here are Kate, Chloe, Marin, Lucy, Ben, and Ellee.  Kate's the big sister of the crowd but less than 6 months separate the other 5 kiddos.  Had to take a single picture of Shannon in her seat, as she's not walking yet to enjoy the fun and wonder of the playplace.  We'll miss seeing all of our friends grow up.

 

 Yes, Lucy, after all the visiting and traveling, this was kind of how I felt too.  Just need a rest.  Phew!

Maine Family

While we tried to do everything (and I mean everything) during our 2.5 weeks in Maine, much of our focus was on seeing our families.  My dad's birthday is right after Christmas, so we got to celebrate with him this year too; fun, but his favorite cake is a german chocolate. 

 Grandpa, likely making some ridiculous or overly modest statement, or perhaps just posing for the photo.

 Note the balloons were a much bigger hit than the cake.  It seems I'm not the only one who doesn't care much for german chocolate.

 

The in-law shot.  Not sure how I got Eric looking at the camera and actually smiling for this one, but I'll take it.

 

I think for once we really outdid ourselves on birthday gifts for Grandpa.  I always feel like it's a scramble to get something for him the week after Christmas and that my good idea was already used, but not this year.  No 30-pack of golf balls in this stack!  Dad is the proud new owner of a gorilla torch, by LL Bean, a powerful flashlight on bendy magnetic legs, good for positioning to light a work space, not so good at sitting on top of your head.  It's something I spotted a while back and had been planning on buying.  Happily it lived up to my expectations.  In this picture it's on the end of Dad's new automated caulk gun.  Boy, did we get a lot of mileage out of the electric caulk Ryan and Grace got for him this year!  At 62, it's what every man needs.

On to other family-related fun.  We said a quick goodbye to Eric's Mum, Aunt Pam, Sara and Jacob over a dinner at Governor's in Bangor.  It's not easy to take good family photos in a restaurant, so this was about all I got.  It was nice to see them one last time before leaving.  I think next time we're in Maine we'll probably rent a hotel in Bangor for a few nights and have a bit more time with family and friends in the area, rather than trying to drive back and forth so many times, but who knows.

Finally, this is how Lucy spent much of the lazy week after Christmas, propped up on her "prapoline" watching movies.  I'm surprised she doesn't have a bowl of chips and a sippy with her selection of toys and books Grandma kept close at hand.

Isn't it nice to be loved so much?