Amelia in her Pumpkin

Every year our friend Justin and Val have a party called Pork and Pumpkin. It is a wonderful celebration where the guests eat dishes that are all pork based and carve pumpkins. Goes together pretty good, hunh?

Considering that I live in NH I have been fortunate to make it to quite a few of these gatherings. I was there 4 years ago when we were wondering if Bush would get re-elected and I was telling friends about this great girl I had gone on a few dates with--named Heidi.

Anyway, in the years since we haven't been able to make it out to Pork and Pumpkin but have submitted our carving entries through the miracle of the internet. This year I have created (while Heidi was at yoga) a creation that involves not only pumpkins but another cool thing that we made this year.

Cutest Playdate ever!

Amelia had a playdate with her friend, Michael, last Friday. They spent some time on the floor together playing with her "crawl and learn" ball from Grandma and Grandpa Crumrine. Michael really liked it and Amelia did a nice job sharing. We'll see what happens in a few months with the sharing business...

Our Beasts

This post is about our delightful cats, Toonces and Badger. This picture is a few years old and Badger is now a healthy 15 pounder - but it's the only one I could find on this computer. Every morning these beasts like to chase each other around the upstairs, generally as Amelia is attempting to fall asleep. I can hear them tearing all over the place - and every morning I go upstairs and give them a dirty look and then come racing downstairs. This morning it occurred to me that they really do know HOW to respond to discipline, they just choose not to (shocking, I know). Amelia had just quieted down and I hear this huge BANG (probably Badger the fat one jumping from a dresser) and then I hear Amelia cry. So I go up there and stand outside her room and give them a stern look and point at them to come into the hall. They both come running out into the hallway and go down the stairs with their tails down. It's like they go up there and make noise every morning just to terrorize me. Typical cats.

Fortunately, Yoda has been terrorizing them all morning long and they are sitting on the counter as I write this and will not come down because of him. Good dog.

Yoda Takes a Break

First it must be noted that we have gone over 200 posts. A cool but somewhat disturbing milestone. Heidi and I were hiking the other day and were trying to remember when Gooch had come to visit last year. We went back and forth about one weekend or the other and finally said, "You know what? We could go back to the blog and see the exact time." It is an odd era that we have entered with this constancy of communication. I look forward to seeing what we think of it in 20 years or so. Every kid will not have a dearth of information about their early years but rather a flood--what will they do with it all?

Our friend Chip took this photo on our hike of Mt. Moosilauke last week. The mountatin begins with a very steep first mile that has many human-made stair steps. Yoda is good at going up stairs but not down. As I was hiking up I became very worried as the stairs went on and on--I had no idea how I would get Yoda down the moutain.

We hiked to the summit, lunched and turned back. Yoda continued to do well until we reached the stairs. At that point he had little interest in continuing. The pitch was so steep that there was no way I could carry him and make it safely down myself so the solution pictured is what happened.

He was calm the whole way down and once again proved that he is a very good dog.

Pictures from Chip

Our friend Chip is an awesome guy and one of the best friends I've ever had but he is a little challenged when it comes to things technological. If you want a beautiful piece of furniture built--he is your man. But if you want to know the difference between a Mac and a PC--he is not.

So it was with great delight that I opened my email today and saw that Chip had finally discovered how to email digital pictures. For about 3 years Chip has been taking and managing his photos only on his camera--never downloading, sharing or printing, but occassionally showing us them on the view screen.

A few that we liked:

A Good Mommy Save

Sorry we have been slow to posting this week -- no explanation -- but hope you enjoy this video! :)

She loves carrots!

Amelia surprised me today by eating an entire jar of carrots. This is evidenced by the header picture. I was assuming she wouldn't like them because she has not enjoyed other vegetables (green beans, avocado, peas...anything green...) but she loved them and kept opening her mouth for me even when there wasn't food on a spoon! The only reason we stopped was because we ran out of food... Now I"m going to try to make our own carrots - I was hesitant to put forth all the effort (like I did with green beans) if she wasn't going to like them...

Hiking

This weekend Yoda and I hiked Mt. Moosilauke with our friends Matt, Heidi, Heidi's dad Bruce and Chip. It was a terrific October hike complete with ice on the top of the mountain and fall color in the distance.
Rime ice on a cairn...

http://picasaweb.google.com/crumlives/Moosilauke2008October?authkey=0bHZEM3Twyw#

All of the pictures from the day.

No Amelias were injured in the filming of this video...

She sits, she stands...what's next?

Amelia continues to wow us with her athletecism (spelling???). She likes to move around and explore - and gets frustrated that she just can't do it by herself yet...

Yoda ate a snake

Yesterday while on a walk in the woods, Yoda ate a dead snake. Tom and I turned around to see him eating "something" but didn't think too much of it. Tom walked back to grab him, of course he wouldn't come when called, and Yoda darted off with the snake flying in the air...and then it was gone in one gulp.

I am scared to death that he is going to throw up while Tom is at work today and I am going to have to clean up re-gurge snake. GROSS! And I thought diapers were disgusting...

Sleeping Beauty

I thought this picture went well with Tom's post below. I took it this morning during her only nap of the day. She loves being cuddled up next to soft things while she sleeps. This picture also shows all the rules we have broken in her crib. You're not supposed to have bumpers or blankets in cribs anymore - but she sleeps better with both. And our doctor said she's big and strong enough now that it's okay. Good thing because when we initially took the bumpers off we were going in 3-4 times a night to pull her arms or legs out of the crib slats. I finally put them back on in a moment of frustration at 3 am - and from then on she started sleeping better. So we think she likes to feel boxed in. It's also cute to find her "playing" with the characters on it :)

A Great Night

Tuesday nights mean I have Amelia while Heidi goes to yoga. When we made the switch in the parking lot Heidi told me, "Good luck--she hasn't napped all day." Thanks for the well wishes I thought :)

She screamed until we were on 393 where we could go 55 and then she was asleep. She stayed asleep even in the driveway at home. I wanted to let her sleep so I left her in the carseat and went in to let the dog out and to feed the cats. I came back out and she was still asleep--I couldn't belive it she had never done this.

Anyway, let's move on to what made it a great night. Our feeding went well--normal. But when I put her to bed I tried something new. Instead of feeding her a bottle in the rocking chair I just gave her the bottle in the crib. She can now hang onto it by herself so as she sucked down milk I read some stories. It worked amazingly well and when she finally tossed the bottle I wrapped her up and put her to bed.

I went downstairs and Heidi was home. We talked a bit about how well it had gone and she eventually said that we should turn on the baby monitor. We turned it on and there was music playing. Amelia had turned on her mobile (a button inside the crib) by herself--awesome!

Mt. Major--Again

Three moderately interesting things happened today.

1. We woke up to a beautiful day and decided to hike nearby Mt. Major. We got there at just the right time, and hiked a little known trail successfully avoiding the hoards of people hiking the main trail. When we got to the bottom there at least 300 cars parked along the sides of the road.

Some photos:

2. Last night we had an awesome surprise visit from our friends Gooch and Jamie. He had played in a rugby match in Canterbury and they stopped by on their way home. Heidi was working on the computer and heard doors close. The next thing she knew she could hear footsteps approaching and then a figure emerging from the darkness. All I heard from the kitchen was her yelling "Jamie!!!" Her terror faded to excitement and she yelled to me that Gooch and Jamie were in the front yard. We both love surprise visits so we were very happy to have them stop by for a few hours. We spoke in measured tones about the presidential race and at the late, late hour of 9:30 they headed for home.

3. The best for last. We spent our first evening away from Amelia. We like her so it wasn't like we were rushing out of the house but we are told that we should occassionally do things without our kid so we gave it a try. Grammie Perkins came over to sit for Amelia and we went to Baptism class. Baptism class is a series of 3--one hour discussions with everyone who is having their kid baptized on Nov. 2 and the priest. We are fairly into it having both been raised going to church every week but we have been a little amused by the people that are there but not really there. One poor guy is clearly really sad about the hour of football that he is missing.

After baptism class we went to dinner at one of our favorite restaurants and then ran some errands at Target. It dawned on me as I waited for Heidi to check out that we had just completed a very "adult" day. I remember my parents leaving us and doing exactly the kind of thing that we had just done.

So to prove I wasn't totally grown up yet--when we got home I dove in a pile of leaves

Special thanks to Grammie for giving us our first night alone.

Also--Heidi wanted to mention that because we are both teachers and nerds we had a participation contest during baptism class. We competed to see who could answer the most questions. She won 4-3.

Closing Lake George

More picture at the link below... a hike from last weekend and our time at Lake George this weekend:

http://picasaweb.google.com/crumlives/WelchDickeyWithTuckerAndClosingLakeGeorge?authkey=tu9E8KCsYyw#5256011225175022674

And a video:

Lake George Wrap Up

At Lake George to close up for the season.

We made the best time ever on the trip over. 3 hours from Concord. We were spurred on to keep driving by the near constant screaming of our friend Amelia. It was not one of her best trips. Yoda kept peeking over from the way back to find out what the crying was all about.

At this point a fire is going in the living room, the Red Sox are playing the Rays on the TV and we are discussing how to close the place up tomorrow. Lake George was the best part of my summer in my first year of working full time. I felt like we were here for a month but it was only 12 days.

the only video I could get to upload today....

She gets cuter by the day!

Yoda gnaws on Amelia's arm and she does not seem to mind.  Maybe her extra fat stores are cushioning her from his needle sharp teeth?
Look how big our two babies are getting...
Amelia loves riding around in the backpack with Daddy...
..and then she falls asleep...
...and Yoda protects her! (He wouldn't move until she woke up...)

Fall Weekend

We had a great Fall New Hampshire weekend.  Tom took Yoda on his first hike with our friend, Tucker and his golden retriever, Griffin.  Yoda had a great time but is still sleeping it off. He did not even yelp from his crate this morning when he wanted to get up and he slept through lunch. Heidi is hoping this lasts through Monday.  Amelia enjoyed some swinging at the local park and eating leaves - as you can see from the pictures!

What Happens While Heidi is Away

Amelia swims

Here are some pictures of Amelia during her swimming lessons - and with her friend, Michael.  She loves swimming even though she gets so cold by the end that her hands turn purple (don't worry - the doctor said that's okay...don't worry).