Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Happy Memorial Day!

Yes, Jer did burn the white hots.

We took a wonderful long weekend up to Ithaca to visit Jer's Parents. I love to visit Ithaca. It is such a beautiful place, and it brings back many memories of being a college student and of dating Jeremiah. It makes me very grateful for the experiences that I've had. It was so exciting to share this place with Luca. He does not get to experience the outdoors in the same way living in a much more urban environment.

Happy Birthday Luca!!!
Luca had a fun birthday complete with a treasure hunt! Here they run on their way to discover the next clue. At the end Luca holds up one of his presents, A LIGHTNING MCQUEEN CAR!!!




Whenever we visit Jer's family a familiar scene plays out. Jer finds the chain saw and takes on his forrester alter ego. He roams the property with a crazed look in his eyes searching for some poor species to cut down. His parents follow pleading mercy on behalf of the trees.




Here 3 generations of Fairbank Men work together to build a fire.

We drove through beautiful Cornell Campus. Below is the infamous Rand Hall. You'd think for an architecture school it might be more impressive. As we drove through we explained to Luca that if he works really hard maybe someday he can go to school here too. We told him that if he did we would move back to Ithaca with him. That may turn out to be a deterent.






Here we are up behind the Ithaca Gun Company at the top of Ithaca falls. You can see Cayuga Lake and Ithaca in all its spring splendor!




Grandpa Meditates in the Chapel for prayer and meditation. Only in Ithaca.





Beautiful Ithaca falls. I drove by this spot almost everyday. It is so easy to take it for granted. Luca really enjoyed walking out to the base of the falls and engaging in the age old ritual of rock skipping. Maybe someday he can be a master like his old man.




Luca gets his hair blown back at the Ithaca Science Center.





Since I didn't get to have a little girl to dress all in frills, I have my fun by dressing my little boys in matching outfits.


Luca loves to water his garden, so in order to prevent it from being a swamp we control the portions using a spray bottle.



We have been very busy the last few weeks. Here we are in State College PA for Becca's Graduation from Penn State!!! We got to visit Nana and Papa while we were there.




Monday, May 19, 2008

Addendum to Boys and Flowers

So, Jeremiah entered the last post. I read it at work, and I thought to myself. Is it really that hard? It makes it sound as if our family life is very difficult. So I drive home planning to ask Jer about it....I open the door to James screaming (because he wants to nurse and will not take the bottle) and Jer saying "Ouch! Ouch! Luca you poked me in the eye!"
I guess no need to ask. It really is difficult, but we love it. They make everything better and more exciting.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

BOYS AND FLOWERS

Lately we've been thrilled to have two little boys in the house, partly because its a big draw. Babies tend to lure people to our house that we really want to see, but have been too lazy to go visit on our own accord. Both of these guys are really unique. Where Luca's bedtime ritual is to brush his teeth, read a story and say a prayer, James preferes to eat himself into oblivion and throw up. (The doctors say he's gaining *Plenty* of weight so not to worry). It really is a lot of work, though. Sometimes we have days when I ask myself whether we were just duped by all those people who said having children would be a great blessing. Luca has a neat trick where he moves in on James like he's going to love him and give him a hug. He gives him the sweetest hug which we, as parents, like to see. By the time we realize what's going on, Luca is squeezing the head with all the strength his 3yearold T-rex arms can muster. James does not approve (see sequence below). In fact its incredible that a baby can learn to be wary at such a young age. Luca has spent a fair amount of time on our stair landing timeout zone for this stunt. But for every ten hours where we feel like we've been duped, we have five minutes of sheer wonder at the beautiful boys that they are (like when they're asleep - see below). Which brings me to my next clumsy attempt at overt metaphor: I've been gardening lately (for the past year) trying to get flowers to grow in our front yard. It has been an ongoing saga of struggle. Struggle to get the soil conditions right. Struggle to keep away deer and rabbits. Struggle to haul 500 lbs of fertilizer and soil and mulch in the back of a compact car. Anyway, my year of effort is resulting in one week of sheer beauty. here's a picture of some Iris's - we've got about 100 of these little ladies. Actually, we'll have more than one week because I relented to outside advice to plant a variety of plants that would bloom at different times. (for the record, having a garden where every plant was of the same species in uniform rows would also have been satisfying) So check back as the season progresses - I plan to post too many pictures of my flowers on this blog as if they were my children.