Act Three

Yes, we’re still here, funny faces and all. Life has been busy for me. Life is always busy for Lowell. Lowell babysat L Thursday and Friday so that I could renew my Advanced Cardiac Life Support license. Here is some free advice so I don’t see you in a cardiac intensive care; a baby aspirin 81mg a day has been shown to reduce the risk of heart attack by 23% in men over the age of 50. It is not quite that effective in women but has been shown to reduce female’s risk of stroke (don’t have the numbers).

L has decided that he doesn’t want to sleep under the covers at night; he throws them off. He then wakes up crying in the night. I think it is because he is cold. He sure feels cold to the touch. So I made him a pair of pajamas with feet. He isn’t very impressed with these feet that don’t come off. We will see who will win out. Here he is looking all cute and innocent pretending to nap in his new pajamas.

I don’t think that Lowell and L are spending alot more time together now that I am working, but I guess it is of a different quality. Lowell decided that he should buy L a piano. You will have to ask him what his motivations were. I came to the conclusion yesterday that there are some things you help develop and some things they discover all on their own.

To him it’s just a hat that mom calls cabbage. So much for helping in the kitchen with supper.

Daily Lowell and I are amazed at how L’s vocabulary is expanding. L only recently put 2 words together, now he has a running commentary. Yesterday he was colouring on a pad of paper explaining what he was doing to whoever would listen, it went something like this…”Da (draw) Barn, da barn, animal, neigh barn moo baa baa, Pa (Grandpa) barn, moo bop (usually accompanied with a pat on the head, meaning that something has bumped it’s head), da barn, Dus (Uncle Bruce) neigh, da barn… and so on.

L has very clear ideas of what he wants and what he doesn’t want, “more” and “again” have been very helpful to him. His default setting is whinning first which we are very quickly trying to curb with “Use your words, mommy doesn’t understand”. This isn’t an unreasonable request, he has more then enough words and signs to make his thoughts known.

Another birthday has come and gone, thank you to all the people that made an ordinary day special. The boys in my life bought me flowers and presented me with a Happy Cake. The sequence of events went something like this; L helps put the candles on…

…then makes sure that Mum admires the cake properly…

…but wait don’t blow the candles out yet!

The Three-County Fair was in Northampton over the Labor Day weekend. In the time we’ve lived here, we’ve never gone to the fair, so, with Pam putting in her first night-shift yesterday, L and I decided to go have a look. I happened upon some young 4Hers partaking in a showmanship class. I was immediately transported to my childhood, and I couldn’t resist taking a picture of the moment.

At our place, our anniversary and birthdays are all lumped together. So we often celebrate them all at once. Yesterday, we had sushi and wine for supper. L enjoyed the tuna and even had a go at the chopsticks.

After the meal, we brought out the “happy cake”. L admired the cake throughout the day, and when I got home from the office, he could hardly sit down for supper–Mom had told him that we would eat the cake when Dad got home. L is only 20 months old and already happy cakes are something to get excited about.

Today we took a trip north to Vermont–we wanted to take some time out before the pace quickens dramatically on Tuesday. We spent the early afternoon at Sugarbush Farm. They make their own cheese and maple syrup. After tasting some of their cheeses, including a sharp cheddar that was aged for 6 years, we bought some for lunch and some to enjoy in the coming weeks. We also toured their sugar shack, where the sap from the trees is boiled down to syrup.

After spending a few hours at the farm, we drove down the road to see some glass blowers at work. Very cool. We watched them make some wine glasses and vases. It would have been nice to buy a souvenir, but the prices were a bit on the steep side.

Monkey see, monkey do.

Going for a walk.

I’ve gone back to work. I have decided that getting ready for a job is a full time job of it’s own. I have had general hospital orientation this past week and I have another 4 days of it this coming week, as well as physicals and paperwork to sign in person. Lowell has been trying on the role of Mr Mom and doing a great job of it. Unfortunately he can’t forget that he is also a grad student with his own course to teach this fall and area exam papers to be read. So Lowell has been babysitting during the day and spending weekends some evenings at the university. Before you get to feeling too sorry for Mr Mom he has had time to start playing a new computer game.

L has discovered the recycle bin. Here he is experimenting with different drums. Last night we took the evening off. Lowell gamed until L was ready for bed and L and I played and did puzzles together.

Lowell spent the day in the office planning for his course, so L and I picked him up for a picnic supper at Puffer’s Pond. It is the local swimming hole and we decided to check it out. It really isn’t much more than a pond, but it had sand perfect for digging and water for splashing. Lowell made the sandcastles and L gleefully smashed them.

L and I spent some time at the local Farmer’s Market this morning. We enjoyed the corn on the cob and peach pie for supper and decided to save the other goodies for another day.