Basement Tour

We still have quite a bit to do in the basement - most of it has no ceiling, several pieces of trim are missing, some patching and paint touch-up is required, and we need a bit more furniture. However if I wait until all this is finished before showing you some pictures, you probably won't see it until we move. I even made you a basement tour video, complete with Catherine cameo at the end.

Bedroom area before:

Bedroom after:

Playroom area before:

Playroom after:

Playroom after (from other side):

At the bottom of the stairs (to the right) before:

At the bottom of the stairs (to the right) after:

Catherine enjoying the basement (it was muggy upstairs today):

Meow, Moo, Arf

Animals are funny. They do funny things and make funny noises, which is perhaps why little kids like animals. I like animals well enough (like I said, they're funny) but even funnier is kids imitating animals. I will admit that adults coaxing kids to imitate animals is often the funniest of possible scenarios, but I personally think this video is more entertaining if you focus on Catherine.



Catherine has not wavered in her dedication to accessorizing, as you can see her hat and sunglasses are still staples in most pictures.


Since she has discovered that she actually owns two pairs of sunglasses, she often thinks Daddy or I should be wearing the extra. One time she did try to wear both at once, but I don't think she found it a success - she hasn't tried it again.

Shoes Shoes Shoes

Catherine had a pretty typical Sunday: church, lunch, a walk, playing with shoes, and telling stories.

Here Catherine is taking notes during the study before church:


She wasn't quite ready for a nap at church this morning but she was the only kid today, so we mostly played outside for the first half of the service. We chased some birds, picked some flowers, and said "vrooom" every time a motorcycle went by.




We went in for communion, at which point Catherine finally fell asleep on a chair and slept through all the commotion of post-church coffee hour.

I guess there were a lot of shoes lying around the house today, and this inspired Catherine to organize them a bit. According to Catherine, shoes should not be left on the floor; they should always be put away properly on the couch, chair, or coffee table. I find them in these places quite often, but today she really made a project out of arranging them all.





Catherine has been working a lot on repeating words with us. She has a handful that she uses regularly without prompting (shoes, more, mine, dog, mama, dad, eyes and of course no) but she also enjoys repeating words and will try almost anything. Some of her favorites are nose, ear, bowl, and knee, and she has also made attempts at cheese and a couple others. Today Daddy and Catherine worked on "elbow" - one of her first 2-syllable words! She says it pretty clearly in this video (although after that it's just her regular storytime babble).



And if that wasn't enough, here's more hand-waving story time babble:

It didn't take Catherine any time at all to settle back into her normal routine at home - she seems blessed with the ability to be content with whatever is going on. We definitely may have tired her out a bit - she has slept until 7 or 7:30 every morning since we returned from vacation, except of course this morning. It actually doesn't matter much to me when Catherine wakes up because Mary usually wakes me with a good kick to the ribs by 6 or 6:30 anyway (only 1 month until she's due to make her appearance!).

Thursday and Friday I had a lot of catching up to do with work, but I think being able to go to play group and lunch date with Daddy on Thursday helped Catherine accept the working schedule again after the vacation schedule. Today we still had to catch up on some laundry, cleaning and shopping after being away, but we also had time to start arranging a few things in preparation for Mary and we even made it out for a walk on the beach this afternoon.

A good standby in Catherine's entertainment menu: the musical telephone:



Catherine was my motivation for organizing the 0-3 month clothes for Mary - I didn't have much choice once they were spread all over the house. Also, you should note how awesome her hair is getting.



Catherine's favorite outdoor activity is picking up handfuls of dirt and relocating them to other flower beds, plants and pretty much anywhere else. Her play house, car, and wagon are all full of dirt, and there are usually several piles of dirt on the sidewalk and front stairs.





Catherine enjoys throwing handfuls of sand around at the beach just as much as she likes throwing handfuls of dirt around at home.

Catherine's First Vacation

Catherine definitely earned the right to be invited on more vacations - she was far better all week than one can reasonably expect from a toddler and it made for a very pleasant and relaxing week off. I'm sorry there are no videos in this post (youtube seems to be broken at the moment).

We didn't make nearly as many stops on our second day of driving (Augusta, ME to Quebec City) but Catherine doesn't seem to mind the car much. I had a stash of new toys ready to bring out when necessary, and our friends loaned us their portable DVD player, so the couple times when Catherine started to get a little fed up with being strapped in we consoled her with Wilco videos and cartoons. We made one stop at an antiques mall in Maine (Michael bought a nice little end table and Catherine played in the gravel driveway) and zipped right through the border crossing, at which point everything immediately switched to French (and kilometers - what fun to see "Maximum 100" on the highway). We made another stop for lunch and had a minor delay due to a bike race; we also saw dozens and dozens of signs for Moose crossings but no real live justification for them. Either way, the drive and the scenery were quite pleasant and we made it to Quebec without incident and were settled into our hotel in the Old City by mid-afternoon, plenty of time for a little walking tour before dinner. We stayed mostly in Old Quebec (the part of the city inside the city walls), following a self-guided walking tour around the sites and stopping at a crepe place for dinner (crepes everywhere!).

Our first stroll on Dufferin Terrace (St. Lawrence river is immediately on the right, and the big castle-looking building in the back is the Chateau Frontenac, once a castle and now a hotel).


No Quebec nightlife for us since we had to get Catherine to bed at a decent hour, but it meant we had time to watch the US Open and NBA finals games in the evenings (I'd say at least a third of the available TV channels were in English).

Sunday we woke up at our leisure (past 7 for Catherine!) and had......crepes for breakfast! Actually Catherine had crepes for second breakfast - I think one of her favorite things about vacation was eating first breakfast in the hotel room flipping channels on the TV between bites.

Catherine cleaning the window at the breakfast place (she really likes cleaning right now) - she attracted a lot of attention from passers-by. Michael is constantly impressed by her super high LOLPM (Little Old Ladies Per Minute - rate of attracting and stopping them by her sheer cuteness).


After breakfast we went to the local Anglican cathedral for church (only the oldest Anglican parish in North America) and then spent the afternoon browsing the antiques district (Catherine slept in her stroller for most of our shopping trip). It rained a bit Sunday off and on, which was slightly annoying with Catherine. Usually we would just duck into a cafe or museum for a few hours, but Catherine doesn't really like to sit anywhere for a few hours, which limited our options slightly. We ended up stopping in for some gelato, then played in the hotel for a while. The rain stopped in time for us to walk out and see a couple things we didn't get to during Saturday's walking tour.

Catherine and Daddy attract attention everywhere they go - you can see people watching them in this picture!


In the less-populated antiques district:


Sitting down to lunch in a plaza:


View from the Citadel at the top of the city:


We were actually able to eat dinner at a pretty nice restaurant even with Catherine - going early (before the "serious" or "romantic" diners show up) and being in the outside seating makes a dinner at even a nicer place pretty stress-free. Catherine is generally good (she likes being out) and when we're outside even a meltdown isn't really a big deal. Michael was excited - he got to try some caribou.

Monday we took a little side trip out to Montmorency Falls - a big waterfall (taller than Niagara, though not nearly as wide) only about 20 minutes outside Quebec. Catherine loved this, and was much more pleased with running out on the bridges than Daddy (ask Michael sometime how he feels about suspension bridges and hanging cable cars - the words "certain death" are bound to come into play). We walked around some trails and looked at the falls from several vantage points (not including the cable cars) and then hopped back in the car and drove another 20 minutes or so to the Basilica of St-Anne-de-Beaupre, a large basilica and famous shrine in Quebec. I have to say Catherine was more impressed with the waterfall, but she also enjoyed exploring the church and drinking water fresh from the spring of Good St. Anne.

Michael and Catherine both impressed by the waterfall:


Catherine and I out on a landing (Michael did not join us):


Catherine and I on the bridge over the falls (again without Michael):



It rained a bit more Monday afternoon as we headed back to Quebec City, but again we were able to get out for dinner. Michael enjoyed a true Quebec meal: pea soup for starters, meat pie for the main course, sugar pie and coffee for dessert, finished off with frozen apple cider. Catherine ate his broccoli (other than a few bites of gelato, she really did fail to take advantage of the lenient nutritional guidelines in place for vacation).

We headed home Tuesday morning guessing we could probably make the 8-hour drive in one day, but we had Wednesday to spare just in case. We went for one last stroll on Dufferin Terrace before getting in the car.

Watching the boats from the Terrace:


Catherine taking off for more running, and Daddy worn out by all the walking:


Catherine was great - our first big chunk of driving lasted almost four hours (we started looking for a place to stop for lunch after about 2.5 hours, but northern New Hampshire is little more than trees and mountains so it took much longer than anticipated to run across a good stopping place). Catherine just napped and played and snacked and was happy enough to crawl back into her car seat after lunch. Probably less than an hour after lunch we saw some walking trails and thought it would be good to let Catherine run around (we had plenty of time after our long morning drive) but after about 2 minutes of walking she just started hanging on Michael until he carried her - It took 5 days, but I think we actually succeeded in tiring her out! Other than a quick stop at Dunkin (more for Michael than Catherine) we drove all the way to Boston before stopping for dinner with some friends. We didn't leave Boston till around 8, so Catherine just slept the last leg of driving and was easily transferred to her crib when we arrived home - she slept soundly until 7:30 this morning!

Catherine's favorite things about vacation:
1. Walks all day!
2. Unlimited face time with Mommy & Daddy.
3. Lots of meals and snacks.
4. Getting to wake Daddy up early (when we're all in one hotel room, there's not really a way around this).
5. New toys.

Back from the Far North

Just wanted to let everyone know that we returned home safe and sound this evening and Catherine is sleeping happily in her own bed. Sorry for the lack of updates while we were away - no free wireless at the hotel. Hopefully tomorrow I'll get all the pictures and videos sorted out and have a monster vacation post for you!

Catherine Cruises Maine

We spent the day yesterday trekking from the Cape up the Maine coast and eventually turning inland and stopping for the evening in Augusta so we're in line to head off to Quebec this morning. We decided to only go halfway the first day with several planned stops and detours since this is the first long car trip with Catherine and we didn't really have any idea what we were getting into. She was actually very accomodating the whole day and seems to like the idea of vacation.

Our first stop was in Ogunquit, a little more than an hour north of Boston on the coast of Maine. This little town is well known for an ocean walk called The Marginal Way, a fairly short (a mile or so) and easy (mostly paved - great for strollers and those that toddle) walking path that sits right on the coast and offers non-stop views of the ocean, giant sky, and rocky Maine coast. Catherine accepted a ride in the stroller on the way out (she had just dominated a large grilled cheese sandwich) but insisted on walking herself the whole way back. At first it was pretty slow going because every time we had to pass anyone walking towards us on the trail she would stop on the side and stare at them until they were well beyond us, then continue. Luckily this didn't last or it would have taken us hours to get back. She powered through the whole way back, drinking about a liter of water on the way and at the end, and seemed pretty glad to crawl back into the stroller to head back to the car.

After lunch and this walk, we made the short drive up to and through Kennebunk, stopping in a few antique and rare book and print shops on the way, then made one final stop for another leg stretch at a little monestary on the north end of Kennebunk. By this time it was getting into the late afternoon and Catherine was pretty exhausted, so she slept the hour and a half drive through Bathe, Maine and out to a restaurant at the end of a pier on the Five Islands. Michael and I enjoyed fresh-caught lobster and salt-water cooked corn, while Catherine opted to munch through an apple and some red peppers (she hasn't really learned how to take advantage of vacation food yet). Then it was off to our hotel, only slightly later than planned, and Catherine was asleep by nine and just woke up a couple minutes ago around 7. There won't be as much stopping and walking today (there isn't a whole lot other than trees to see between here and Quebec) but it should only be four to five hours of driving so here's hoping for the best.

Lunch in Ogunquit



The Marginal Way



Antique Shopping


Lobster Dinner

MINE

Whenever Catherine is begging for something of Daddy's that she can't have (soda, twinkies, pens, books, computer mouse, etc), Michael always points to the object, then to himself, and says something like "No, mine." Catherine actually learned that this means she should just give up because he isn't giving in, but she recently also discovered that she could play his game as well. She has pretty much claimed everything in the house as hers by either pointing to it, standing on it, or hugging it to her chest and then pointing to herself and saying "mine." I guess the next step is sharing...



We head off tomorrow morning for a short vacation in Maine and Quebec city. I'll have my computer, so I'll try to post some things while we're away. We told Mary not to pull any shenanigans and try to show up early so she can vacation in Quebec as well...

Heat Wave

We have survived a "near historic" June heat wave here on the Cape, thanks in large part to the beach, our screen porch, and the basement. For the past several days it's been in the upper 80s during the day and staying in the mid to upper 70s at night with high humidity, pretty much unheard of for this time of the year, but today was supposed to be the last day of this, putting us back in the upper 60s for the weekend where we belong. I know all of you back in St. Louis are proudly scoffing at our meager little heat wave when it's probably been in the 90s there for weeks, but I'm pretty sure you all have air conditioning and I'm also fairly certain none of you are 8 months pregnant, so just be warned that if you wish to voice your scoffing in the comments I reserve the right to uninvite you from the blog. :)

Anyway, even though the house has been about 88 degrees since Sunday, the basement never went over 74, which doesn't sound like a big difference but it was a very welcome relief. Thanks to the wireless, I am able to work anywhere in the house so Catherine and I spent most of the last few days hiding in the basement (Michael moved a couple couches down there the other day and I relieved the piano room of some of its stash of toys).

We also spent Sunday afternoon at the beach which was quite pleasant. For some reason Catherine decided she was afraid of the water this time, so she spent all her time digging holes in the sand and putting sand on the chairs and in her bucket and on Daddy's feet. (fyi - I know her face looks super red in most of these pictures, but it's not sunburn (I promise we use tons of sunscreen) - as soon as she spends even a couple minutes in any sort of heat, her little cheeks flush bright red and just stay that way.)







Our friends Michael and Krista left Monday, but Catherine had a good time while they were here. Saturday we went to a local marina (Catherine knows the word "boat" and likes to show it off) and we had some good meals and saw some other random Cape Cod sights.




After the first or second day Catherine was quite pleased to have two friends in the house and was for the most part very entertaining and well-behaved. She did throw one pretty solid tantrum for them - she woke up from a nap in a rather foul mood one afternoon and spent about 15 minutes stomping her feet and screaming in the kitchen for no reason I was able to discern (didn't want picked up, didn't want a drink, didn't want a snack, didn't want Daddy, didn't want to go back to sleep, didn't want to go outside - just wanted to stomp her feet and yell). I don't even remember what snapped her out of it, but she was soon fine and everyone had a good chuckle. Who knows, maybe her foot was asleep.

Catherine has been running around in rompers like this yellow one since it's been so hot - Michael thinks they are hilarious. Catherine thinks standing in buckets is hilarious.


We were eating outside at a restaurant - Catherine only wanted to eat the dirt.



I think this was yesterday - Catherine got the brilliant idea to use my sandals as a bowl for her cereal (no milk involved at least). Apparently there is no need in life that cannot be met by a shoe.




And finally a short beach video: