Bath Time

Some pictures from bath time...

I like this one of her gigantic belly.

Becky Comes to Visit

We were excited by a visit from Heidi's sister Becky this weekend.

A couple of photos:

Heidi and Amelia Sleeping (with cat)

I think this is a beautiful picture of Heidi and Amelia sleeping. I'm sure Heidi won't like her hair but it is just such a great image of them.

This one is our mean cat Toonces. We love her but she can be snarly. She has been incredibly kind to Amelia though and sleeps at Heidi's feet almost every night. Maybe she is serving as protector.

This final one is from our trip on Wednesday to visit Tucker. Later trips in the week were cancelled because I was sick and had to sleep all day on Thursday. I don't know what was wrong with me but I could not wake up. I feel much better now though and I am headed out to continue working on our side porch.

Couch Pictures

http://picasaweb.google.com/crumlives/AmeliaMontage?authkey=J9ml_As3N3w

Here are some pictures of Amelia sitting on the couch.

Types of Fish

This is a little video that Heidi took while I was trying to calm Amelia. It is proof that parents will say anything to try and get their kids to calm down.

Currently, yes dear reader in this exact moment, I am trying to calm Amelia with the magical Baby Bjorn. I had her in the approved--facing my chest--position and have now moved her to the very age inappropriate outward facing position. Of course because the detailed instructions that come with the Baby Bjorn say not to do this until a certain age lest the baby's head break off, it is working perfectly.

Heidi has been the real champion in terms of calming Amelia down because she has been the one to continually try to feed and calm her in the middle of the night. I remain the cooker of dinner and the occasional unloader of the dish washer.

League Play

April 2008

Today I took Amelia down to the basketball court. Partially she needed a walk and I wanted to try out the court. I haven't played basketball in a few years but I used to play all the time in college. I have gotten much worse by never practicing. I used to be able to make about 22/25 free throws on a regular basis. Today I first made 11/25, then 13/25 and finally 9/25. I think the last time was because my arm got tired. I'll keep practicing.

The video clip here is one that I found. It is from the other day when we went to Squam. I didn't know Heidi was filming this. At the end I do slide up on the ice. The top of it was a slushy layer but the ice was still 5 inches thick.

Heidi and Amelia went to the lactation consultant today. Amelia has been very, very fussy from 1am to 4 am for the last few nights and Heidi went in for some advice. The good new is that Amelia just happens to be fussy in the middle of the night. She is still gaining weight and is producing all the things that she is supposed to produce (many of these very smelly.) She now weighs 7 lbs. 14 ozs. so even with all the fussiness she is gaining weight faster than she needs to.

Day of Many Walks

22 April 2008

Today was the day of many walks. Amelia did a lot of crying during the night. Heidi did a great job trying to calm her and feed her but I wanted to try and give her a bit of a break during the day.

• First, Amelia and I took the trip to the dump. It worked out well although she did cry when the car stopped.
• Second, when we returned from the dump she was al ready in the car seat so I figured we might as well go on a walk down to the river.
• Third, we went to Alton for lunch and while Heidi was ordering our food I took Amelia on a walk to show her Alton Bay.
• Fourth, I took Amelia on a walk because Heidi needed an afternoon nap.
• Fifth, I took Amelia on a walk in the baby bjorn because she kept crying and would not let Heidi eat dinner.
• Sixth, Heidi and I took another walk with Amelia because she was not yet ready to calm down.

As a matter of fact she is not yet calm. But we can't walk any more. At least we are getting our exercise.

Outdoor Time

21 April 2008

The weather here has been so sunny and warm this week. Heidi has been able to drink her morning cup of tea in the front lawn, with Amelia in the bassinet beside her. Yesterday we were all out in the yard for about 2 hours. I was working on a new deck for our front yard and the girls were working on sending out birth announcements and thank you cards from the shower.

Right now I am waiting for Amelia to wake up so we can do another first--a trip to the dump. I'm sure Amelia will like it because she does not seem to mind bad smells. And we will be travelling with about 100 of her diapers so she will feel right at home.

The high school is off this week so we are going to take a few day trips to see friends. As of now we are planning one trip up to see Tucker in Lebanon and maybe one later in the week to see Matt and Heidi up near Squam. We'll see what happens--and let you all know.

Kayaking on Squam

Here is a set of pictures from our recent trip up to Squam.

http://picasaweb.google.com/crumlives/AmeliaSFirstRedHouseDay?authkey=ZKOWGEE5Mjc

Stretching

19 April 2008

Heidi was home alone the other day and was playing around with the camera. Here is Amelia at her most active.

Amelia's First Trip to Squam

19 April 2008

Today I was going to work on building a small deck at the front of the house. But it was so sunny and so warm that we decided that we just had to do something outside. I knew that Squam was still frozen over but I wanted to go up and see it. This time of year, when the temperature is in the 70s but the lake is still frozen has always been one of my favorite times to live in NH. There is something about the fact that spring is so appreciated here. Other places this would be just a normal day but we haven't worn t-shirts outside since September so it is really a treat when all of a sudden the weather finally snaps and spring truly arrives.

We enjoyed a great drive up to Squam, we bought sandwiches at the Holderness General Store, and then we took a walk down to see the lake. Allow me to set the scene for this first clip. The temperature is around 75 F and the water temperature is...cool. This video also does a great job of showing all the baby weight that I gained in sympathy for Heidi. Very embarassing. Luckily I recently found an issue of Self that has, "4 weeks to your best bikini body," on the front cover so I will be using that to get ready for summer. I also am happy to include this clip as a favor for my friend Dan who is getting married this summer and thinks that he is fat. Dan--this should make you feel better.

I don't really need to defend anything there. The water was truly brisk and refreshing. But I will give a little more context to the day. While driving home today we saw girls in bikinis riding a paddle boat through the ice. So I'm certainly not the only one who is ready for summer. Here though is one more clip--at the end Heidi gets to editorialize a little about what she thinks of my swimming.

So that was Amelia's first trip to Squam. I would show you video of here there but she mainly just rode around. Even after the white whale body that you have just seen I assure you that it was a very beautiful day up there. If you every wonder why we live where we do--it is for days like today.

Tom

A little Amelia Video

I was trying to take a nap the other day and this is what happened.

PS How did we get this video? Our house is rigged like the Nixon White House--just with video rather than audio.

Pictures of some weekend visitors

http://picasaweb.google.com/crumlives/WeekendOfVisitors?authkey=Rx4DxbIEOqI

Someone actually requested more pictures. So here is a set from the last few days.

If at any time you would like to turn any of these into posters to adorn your family or game room, let me know and I can send you full resolution copies of them. The ones on the link should be fine for post card size pictures or simply for looking online.

Turkey, Cat, Deer

14 April 2008
Every morning I work from around 4:30-7 in my home office. That is if a computer sitting on a table made of old 2x4s is a home office. Today as the sun finally illuminated the front yard I looked out and saw a turkey, a cat and a deer all in my field of view. It isn't like they were hanging out together--they were each about 50 feet apart--but it was odd to see all 3. I often see the deer, sometimes many deer, eating across the street and our neighbor maintains a flock of 22 stray cats so I always see them but the turkey was a new site today. The turkey was also the closest of the three, he was just outside the window no more than 10 feet away. We keep planning a move to Concord but I will miss the local wildlife when we do.

On a separate note--we have loved all the gifts for Amelia but we also enjoy the ones for us. I am pictured here in sun hat that our friend Whitney got for me. She is from California, the land of new fashion trends, so I assume that everyone will soon be wearing hats like these.

Weekend of Visitors

13 April 2008

This weekend was a fantastic weekend of visitors for Amelia. On Friday afternoon Heidi visited our friend Denise in Concord, Friday night Tucker and Matt visited, Saturday morning Ron, Emily, Elijah and Ruth stopped by, on Saturday afternoon Gooch arrived and on Sunday afternoon Jamie and her boyfriend and Jen stopped by for tea and chips.

We are so excited that we have so many great friends that have made the extended trip over to see us. Since, at least at the beginning, we are somewhat tied to the house it has been awesome to have people come to us. Once Amelia reaches her actual due date we will start doing a little travelling to come and see all of you.

Heidi Plays a Sport

Here is a sideways one of Heidi out in the sun. With the warmer weather she is enjoying the chance to take Amelia outside--and I am too.

Hi from Amelia

10 April 2008

Here is Amelia as I tried to get her to calm down before going to bed. She spends more and more time these days not asleep and looking all around at her myopic world.

Yesterday I went and looked a few used road bicycles that I found on craig's list. One was really nice but I didn't move quickly enough on it. My old road bike's frame cracked at the end of last year from too many years of bumpy NH roads and I have been looking for a new one ever since. It is time for me to start loosing some of the weight that I gained while Heidi was pregnant and i was eating ice cream.

Ferocious

7 April 2008

Look at this maw.

This picture also is a way of saying good bye to one of our favorite outfits. Amelia is already starting to grow out of things. Her ever expanding belly moved her out of preemie diapers and yesterday she was long enough that she could not stretch her legs in this one.

Also this weekend I went on a little hike with Matt, Heidi and their puppies. Heidi's puppy is already getting a little big to hold as you can see in this picture. The view is from nearby Mt. Major--one that we hike all the time.

Moving things around for Amelia

5 April 2008

I have been working on moving some things around for Amelia. We needed to make space for all of the new baby gear that we have received and for us to simply live here. I was going to do all of this work while Amelia was still inside of Heidi but that plan didn't work out.

First is our "study." The corner of this room was torn out in the summer because I had to replace the corner post holding up the house. I credit this work to Gooch because it was with him that I discovered that part of our roof angled toward this corner causing water, over the years, to seep in and rot the corner support of the house. So I basically had to take the old one out and replace it with a new one. (If you are reading about our house for the first time this may seem like a shockingly big repair but I assure you--we find out things like this all the time.) If you look closely you can see that I did not do a very good job of color matching the paint.

















A view sitting in the rocking chair, looking out past our wall of books and into the living room.

Doing construction with a baby also requries the occasional time out. This may look like a cute picture but she is just looking around to if I have any "feeding stations."

I also put together the new gliding rocking chair for the babies room. We needed to make space for the useful but gigantic swing so we moved the living room around. And we decided that we should have some kind of dinner table so we rearragned the Lion room a bit.

Storm

4 April 2008

Yes, there was a bit of a snow storm here this morning but this post is about another kind of storm. A poop storm.

It began with trying to leave for work. I left the house not once, not twice, but three times without my laptop. I had already done this on Tuesday where I drove 1/2 way to Concord before I realized it, turned around and came back to get it. This day my idiocy was compounded by the fact that I was going to Concord for one meeting, a meeting where I was to use my laptop to give a presentation. I just wasn't firing on all cylinders to start the morning.

I had several long days this week so I was excited for a relatively short one. But when I walked in the door I could already smell that something was off. I came in and Heidi was asleep on the couch which is normally a serene image. But have you ever had an image ruined by a smell? Heidi woke up as I came in and said, "Can you fix that over there I was just too tired and I threw up this morning?" Of course I wanted to help especially if my darling wife was feeling ill. At the changing table I saw several piles of mustard colored poop spread out judiciously over the blanket, two sets of clothes, the old diaper and some wipes. It actually looked worse than it was and I wiped everything up and tossed all of the clothes in the washing machine.

"What happened?" I asked Heidi.
"Well, I went to change her diaper and I took off the first one. Then she peed and made a pee puddle right on the blanket. Then she had an jet stream poop that got in the pee puddle and made a bigger mess. Then she put her feet in the pee poop puddle. Then she curled her feet up and spread the pee poop mixture over her head." Heidi went on to explain that it was all she could do to clean Amelia up--which was why she left the clean up for me.

As I said though it wasn't that big of deal on my end at least. But this story goes on. I picked up Amelia and put her on my chest so I could watch a few episodes of the Office and maybe take a little nap. I took the nap by I was awakened by a smell emanating from the porch. A few weeks ago I had moved the cat boxes to said porch and installed a kitty door to them so that we did not have the cats doing their work in the house. There were times when we had people over that the smell was as if a 12 year old boy had pooped in the corner of our living room. It does not go well with dinner.

But coming around the corner of the porch, through the kitty door and into my nostrils was an award winning odor. Heidi got the easy end of it as she took Amelia and went to a hair appointment. After she left I decided that the smell was so bad that I would dump out both cat boxes and fill them with new kitty litter. But I could still smell the smell through the trash bag so I took the bag outside. Even then I felt as though I could still smell it though so I filled a bucket with steaming water and half a bottle of Pinesol and mopped all the floors in the house.

Even after all that I still wasn't sure if I could smell poop through the pine forest smell so I took off my clothes, started a new load of laundry and took a shower. As I write this, with Amelia on my chest in the baby bjorn I think she is already working on another odoriferous product.

Books

3 April 2008

I have been impressed with how good children's books are. People have been kind enough to send us or give us many books and one of the surprising parts of having a baby has been how much I have enjoyed reading these books.

My current favorite is Ox-Cart Man which tells the story of a man who loads up his cart with all of the cottage industry goods his family has made through the winter. He travels 10 days to town, sells everything, returns, and the cycle begins again. Its beauty is in its simplicity. It also makes me think of my friends Matt and Heidi who, during this year, have knitted hats, made maple syrup, and considered buying a fleet of goats.

Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel was one of my childhood favorites and a book that I had forgotten about until we received it a few weeks ago. Make Way for Ducklings was a title that I knew but had never read. Both stories are great but I was struck by how old they were and how they have stood up over time. The steam shovel is obvious but in Make Way for Ducklings all of the cars, the police uniforms and even the way of speaking are from a far gone era.

Amelia and I looked on the Caldecott website the other day and are looking forward to reading Joeseph has a Tiny Overcoat, Golem and Black and White, among others on the list. Amelia picked these selections by drooling on specific keys--then I did the interpretation from there.

Anyway we are enjoying all of the books. I even read Richard Scary's First Book by myself when Amelia was asleep. It is fun to be transported back.

Look How Beautiful My Wife Is

2 April 2008

Doesn't she look great? Someone took this of her and I just thought she looked beautiful, content and happy. Also Amelia is asleep in the picture which I am sure Heidi is enjoying.

And if you want to talk about happiness, check out this picture of me with my new coffee maker. This was a gift from our friend Jen who read about my terrible plight and was kind enough to help me out. Thank you so much--I am already looking forward to tomorrow morning and my fresh ground cup of coffee.

Home Alone Day Two

Here we have pictures from our big day today -- Day Number Two of being alone for over 8 hours. Picture #3 is Amelia in an outfit from her Grandma and Grandpa Crumrine -- I will admit that she wore this for more than one day -- but I have changed her clothes as of lunchtime today. The rest of the pictures are of Amelia in her sling...sage advice from our friend Lesley (THANKS LESLEY!!!) to put her in it and she'd sleep. She has slept all day. I'm sure she's just gearing up for tonight...

Car Seat Fun

Here is our little peanut in her huge car seat -- Badger apparently was checking her out. I don't even remember noticing the cat when I took the picture. We learned yesterday that Amelia is now 6 pounds . She is using this added weight to exercise her lungs in the middle of the night. Her witching hour appears to be from 10pm-2am, after which time she will sleep, but ONLY if I (this is Heidi) am holding her. She'll sleep by herself during the day, but not at night! I've been assured this does not mean we will have this problem forever and that until she's 2-3 months old we can do whatever works to get her to sleep. Wish us luck!!!!! :)