by Heather
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Impromptu adventure

On our way home from my mom and Paul’s cottage this weekend Andy got a call from a guy he’s been doing some board layout and reworks for (as in circuit boards). He had a few questions and kept encountering a problem with the project so we decided to stop since we’d be driving right past his house. Ben and I went for a walk while the guys tried to figure out the coding issues. It was such a beautiful fall afternoon and a nice neighborhood (Park Ave). It made me really want a big old house — except not old because they’re a ton of work and not on Park Ave because there’s no breathing room between you and a neighbor :)

Anyway, Ben and I headed to Boulder Coffee for a snack. We got inside and walked up to the counter. The guy who took our order was really dark skinned and Ben just kept staring open mouthed. Mr. Coffee guy smiled and started talking to him and Ben just kept staring. The guy said “I don’t know how to phrase this, but…he’s not around a lot of…ethnic people is he?” I laughed and said “You mean do we have a lot of black friends?” The guy smiled again and said “Yeah, that!” We just had a nice conversation as he got my coffee and muffin together. He said Ben looked like a “Justin” and I told him that’s ironic because it’s actually my brothers’ name. We said goodbye and Ben (still staring open mouthed) and I headed outside to share a blueberry muffin and then walked back to the house Andy was working at.

Fun, random adventures with the Benjamin are great. And apparently we need more “ethnic” friends so my kid doesn’t think they’re such a novelty :)

by Heather
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Parking for Bagpipers Only

This weekend Andy, Ben and I headed to my mom and Paul’s cottage. It was a beautiful fall weekend and we enjoyed probably the last bonfire of the season. Saturday we all went to the Niagara Celtic Festival at Olcott Beach. I wore Ben on my back since the stroller is kind of crummy in the grass. Once again, he did great even though he missed a nap. Although, with anything baby there is a ton more work, planning and stuff involved…but little buddy travels well!

There were tons of interesting characters there, live bands, highlander games, ponies and livestock, chain mail and haggis demonstrations, activities for kids and tons of food and vendors. A lot of different clans were there too with their heritage and genealogy information. There was also plaid…lots of plaid!

While I had my camera, Andy walked around with the video camera (and his Guinness Chicken Wings). The first video is the entertaining “How to make a haggis” demonstration. The second video he pieced together after we got back and I was really impressed. For just being a spur of the moment thing thrown together by an amateur, it’s pretty nice and sums up the event well.

by Heather
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Antiquing and Air Forcing

Sunday morning in Massachusetts the girls and Ben headed to a huge antique fair a few towns over. There were hundreds and hundreds of vendors in tents. We were there for a few hours and barely scratched the surface.

Sunday afternoon we headed to Westover Air Force base for the family picnic. My dad is living in MA right now and works on the base so it was a perfect weekend for us to visit. There was food and a bit of entertainment. Ben was too little for the bounce house and face painting but we had a pretty nice time. We got to visit my dad’s office too and I asked him if he’d ever imagined himself living in Massachusetts and having his grandson playing in his office…never in a million years!

We’re a fantastic looking bunch! Oh well it was the best family photo of the day (minus Danielle who lives in PA and Christopher who was back in NY).

My dad, Leslie and Ben.

Ben in my dad’s office with a squishy stress ball grenade.

Ben was being such a ham. He started growling and people laughed, so he kept doing it to get the reaction.

My dad has had this bear forever :) I remember it as a kid and being in several different air bases through the years.

Monday morning my brother, Kate, Gabby, Leslie, Ben and I headed back to NY. It was a crazy, short, whirlwind weekend but it was SO much fun! I love family road trips with fun people. Ben’s first real road trip went great, he handled everything we threw at him really well which made the weekend much more enjoyable. Here’s to the next one guys!

by Heather
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And I’ve never been to Boston in the fall

50 imaginary points if you can name the song reference.

Long time, no blog apparently! Things have been crazy around here. I’ve got a bunch of projects going on that I’m excited to share when they’re finished. This post however is about last weekend and our lightning fast trip to Massachusetts. My brother, his girlfriend Kate, my sister Gabby, Benny and I all headed out for a roadtrip to visit my dad.

We arrived at 2am Friday (well I guess it was Saturday by then) to a very confused dad who didn’t know we were coming (it was a surprise!) My step mom Leslie had already been there visiting for a while so she had beds all set up for us and we crashed soon after we arrived. The plan had been to drive through the night so Ben would sleep the 5.5 hours…but he didn’t sleep…at all. So much for that plan :)

Saturday morning we hung out for a bit while my dad was at work. He got off around lunch time and we all packed into the minivan and headed to Boston for the afternoon.

Ben did so great on the subway!
He even hung on to the poles like he knew that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do.

Justin and Kate, so cute :)

We stopped at Starbucks for a bit.

And got pizza at a place called Sal’s. Ben REALLY likes pizza!

We walked around a lot and did a bit of sightseeing.

Nothing too historic or colonial Boston-ish, but it was still a fun city to walk around.

Ben did great the whole day, even with a crummy morning nap and no afternoon nap.
We asked a lot of him and he fared pretty well! I was very thankful!

by Heather
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Hold on for Randoms

It’s been a while since I’ve done a random update post! Here goes:

Andy and I started watching the show Fringe. It’s kind of a sci-fi series with a bit of dark humor. It’s written by the creators of LOST which we really enjoyed. We managed to watch seasons 1-3 in the past month and are ready for season 4 to start next week. There were many nights we’d say “Let’s watch just one more” and ended staying up way too late. Not for everyone, like I said it is a bit dark…but such a great story!

Andy’s new job is going great. The commute is kind of blah, he says he passes an accident every day on the highways (people just don’t know how to drive). The job itself is interesting though and people seem friendly. He’s got so much work to do which is a drastic change from the old place.

Hunting season is starting soon. I have a love/hate relationship with it. I love that Andy gets to go have some fun, hang out with the guys and hopefully bring food home. I hate that he’s gone a lot of the weekend :-P

Ben’s birthday party is coming up in about a month. I have the invites made and just need to get them printed. I’m going to have office max do it, it’ll just be easier. Andy has an awesome printer I used to use for all my graphic design school projects but it was such a pain to try and get everything lined up when I wanted to print a double sided project.

I’ve been thinking I might post some more designy things on here. Instead of just baby updates. There is more to me than baby baby baby. Only a little bit though ;-)

An online company “bought out” one of Andy’s projects. It’s a Bluetooth OBDII reader that you plug in your car and it does a whole bunch of diagnostic stuff. They didn’t so much buy him out as pay him to make all his work open source. I told him I totally support him if he wanted to try and go further with it himself, but in the end when he looked at the time to make all the things and trying to sell them on his own…it just looked better to get one big check from this company. I’m proud of him, it’s such a cool project. He bought a few new toys with the money he got…a new hunting rifle, a high end microscope for doing electronics and then a Motorola Xoom from craigslist. Among other things. Money went out as soon as it came in, silly Andy.

Ben is starting to get into everything. A simple distraction or a ‘pick up and move’ seems to work for now but it gets me wondering about future discipline. My goodness I feel like I just figured out how to take care of him and now we’re going to have to decide how we parent.

Finally, I’m loving this fall weather. It just jumped from summer to fall overnight but I don’t mind one bit :)

by Heather
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That’s all folks

Well, Ben’s all done nursing. The past few weeks we’d moved to only morning and bedtime nursing so I figured it was coming soon. I was hoping to get to 1 year but lately Ben started gnawing instead of nursing (yeah…ouch!) Then he started losing interest all together, pushing me away with a giggle.

I’m happy to get myself back but I’m going to miss the quiet time with him. I’m so thankful everything worked out and I was able to nurse Ben for 11 months though! It’s free and really great for him :) And with any luck I’ll be able to do the same for future kiddos.