Fall Hiking

It's that time of year, when the mornings are cool and the days are warm, not hot, just warm and sunny. The leaves start their changes, the colors, the textures, and they descend down to earth from above. It's like spring, with all the beautiful colors.

This is the time of year when we tend to do a little more hiking, more so than any other time of year. The temperature is perfect for it, and there are so many towers to explore and peaks right here in CT that you would be depriving yourself not to go for a hike and take a look at the art mother nature has provided us.

Our recent hike was up Mt. Tom. It's relatively steep in spots, not too long, and very rocky.

The Observation Tower at Mt. Tom

The tower itself has "rickety" stairs as we were told by a sweet boy whom I will guess was seven. Rickety or not, what a view!

I highly recommend this hike to anyone in decent shape!

The kids first wedding.

We were honored enough to be invited to a wedding this weekend. What a beautiful occasion! From the bubbles at the church to the lovely favors at the tables it was beautiful. There was great food, and a great DJ, and an awesome band. This weeding was the works, and it couldn't have been for a better couple.

This was our first wedding with the kids. I was a tad bit worried. Thing One doesn't sit still and Thing Two is finding her voice in attempts at speaking.. SO Thing One was taken outside at the church, and Thing Two almost was too!

HOWEVER, Thing One shook her grove thing at the reception from the time it started at 7:30 until we called it quits at 11:00! She sure loves to dance, and run, and roam the halls too! Thing One was more about curling up in her stroller and catching some Zzzz's.

Either way it was a nice night.

Feeling humbled and overwhelmed.

School so far for me has been very challenging. I don't know how many of you have taken a college level A&P course, but it's a lot like learning a foreign language. So as one would imagine I have to spend a lot of time reading, making flash cards, filling out outlines, and studying. Or at least I am supposed to be. I made myself a very unrealistic schedule of study time to be done in the evenings that isn't working out so well for a few reasons.
1. ABC - I am addicted to their programing, Grey's, Dancing with the Stars, Samantha Who.. just to name a few.
2. Idiopathic-hypersomnia - it basically is a condition I have, meaning I am excessively tired even though I get plenty of sleep. It makes me feel horrible unless I have had at least 10 hours of sleep a night, in case you are wondering in order to keep the house clean, take care of an infant and a toddler, do all my errands, and have time for family this rarely happens. It also means that anytime I sit down to read I usually end up dozing before I am done with 2 paragraphs.. When a chapter is 40 pages long it gets kind of tedious.
So my first test is looming, it''s on Wednesday, 300 questions. 100 will be lab, and 200 will be lecture. We have 8 hours to complete it. Yippie. I am quickly realizing that hey, I can't just sit down read a book, and listen in class to get an A anymore. This class is too advanced for that, and I am studying far too little. OOPS.
So let's hope this serves as my wake up call to FIND more time to study, someway, somehow, and let's hope that I pass this test because there will only be 2 more after it!

A new world through little eyes.

So Thing Two has mastered crawling, she has even realized that she can go from room to room with Mommy all day long, how wonderful! Although she does fuss at me to slow down or stay in one room for more than five minutes some times!

If you are unfamiliar with our home we have a few different levels, all only one step up or down from the one before it. While she hasn't figured out how to get down a level, she has mastered going up a level, along with that, she has also mastered kneeling, and then pulling up to a standing position. She walks all over the house as long as you are holding her hands, all on her own.

So she is seeing the world through new eyes so to speak, and as I follow her around and watch what she gets into I am also sort of seeing the world from new eyes, and the change is kind of nice.

Apple Picking

So we went apple picking for the first time ever, WHAT FUN! Madison loved it, running all over the place, picking whatever apples she wanted, biting into almost all of them! Boy were they delicious, now I have to just figure out what to do with all the apples we have. They also had a barn with other farm items for sale, next up 12lb of peaches for $6.95... uh huh, so I made a peach cobbler, now what do I do with the rest of the darned peaches? I can only make so much baby food for Thing Two! John and I also bought some homemade doughnuts and maple candy, gees I knew I loved the fall for some reason!

OH, and there is another reason... On the 10th we celebrated our second wedding anniversary. The day was just as nice as the day we said I do, and I feel stronger today than I did then, if that's even possible. We celebrated with a nice romantic dinner at the same restaurant we went to for our wedding reception. Too bad for us that the restaurant was under new ownership that for lack of better words sucked. That didn't matter as much as why we were there. Honey I love you, and I am so happy I married you, thank you for all your wonderful gifts of being you!

July 2004.

Update

So the hubby and I have returned to school. What a week, I think I blinked, because I missed it!
My teacher will be a rambler, and the course work will be tough, she only schedules 3 tests for lecture and lab for the whole semester, this is A&P 1.. Each test will be roughly 300 questions, including essays, and we have 8 hours, yes 8 yours to complete them! OY!
Thing One and Thing Two got their pictures taken this week, actually we all did. I thought it was a disaster, so imagine my surprise when looking at the proofs there were so many great pictures!
Thing One also started dance class this week, we know the instructor and even though Madison is under the age for the class she agreed to let her try it. I am so glad she did, she was apprehensive going in, I had to hold her hand and lead her to a friend twice, but that was it, no crying, no screaming! I kept peeking in through the window, she was having a great time, it was so nice and so sad, she's getting too big too fast.. If only I had recorded it! There will be other classes I know!

Thing One also has mastered PeePee on the little potty as long as she is naked. If we put underwear on her she acts like it's a diaper. I guess we will be letting her run around au naturale for a bit until she is VERY comfortable and has been trained a bit, then I am sure the underwear won't be an issue.
Thing Two is now sitting up. She doesn't like to sit to much because that means she isn't moving, but she is sitting. She can also get up on her hands and knees and has been doing the tell tale rock.. Crawling will be in no time, I can see it! HOW EXCITING!

Camping

So we went camping for the first time with the kids. I was so scared! It turned into an amazingly great experience!
We arrived on Saturday, and things did not look too good, we got camp all set up and we had to try to get Thing One to take her nap. Thing One sleeps only in her crib, she will not sleep anywhere else, trust me we have tried. We put her in the Pack N Play... she screamed and threw a fit and split open her gums on the side... once she settled down we tried again, she played and talked by herself in the tent for 3 hours before falling asleep! Stubborn? Thankfully the rest of the trip was smooth sailing.

We were only a few hundred feet from the playground, so Thing One had the ability to roam independently, or so she thought. We were watching the whole time, but she was "free".

We played bocci, roasted smores,

swam in the sand bottom pond,

went for walks, looked for frogs, played with dogs and ate pops. It was incredibly relaxing. I am relieved to know that we can take the kids camping and we will all have a great time.