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.