Crazy week

Last Saturday, we went to Sarah's friend Nate's birthday party. They had water balloons and a real piñata. That evening, we met Sarah's friend Katie and her family at our pool for Family Night. Sarah even got to be a special assistant for the magic show. They also had a coin toss in the pool and the kids got to play with pool noodles in the big pool.

On Sunday, Ali had her cat clinic in the morning, so Sarah and Nicholas hung out with David all day. That night, David went with Alison's Dad (aka, Lloyd; aka, Grandpa) to the Ravens-Giants exhibition game in Baltimore. The crowd was surprisingly excited for a pre-season game. It was funny, though, when someone in the crowd over-reacted to a call; inevitably, there'd be an empty beat and then someone would say: "Ah, it's only pre-season". Lloyd and I were (mostly silently) rooting for the Giants. It rained a little in the 1st half and both teams committed a bunch of turnovers and penalties. The seats were really great (9th row behind the Giants bench) and it was a good time.

We crawled into bed very late that evening, exhausted after a long weekend before the work week - when Sarah woke us up at 2 AM to say "I threw up". She seemed OK, but her room certainly wasn't. Huge puddle on her bed and sheets with lots of tiny spots all over the rug. Yuck! I won't describe it more beyond saying that David's off eating Oreos for a couple months.

David started feeling yucky too Monday morning, hoping it was just from the lack of sleep. He went to work for a couple hours, but then came home and slept (with fever and chills) the rest of the day. He also had another fun symptom of a gastrointestinal bug - and ended up with the obligatory sinus infection. He and Sarah have been home all week since Monday. Alison and Nicholas have been fine - although Ali has kept David and Sarah as far away from Nicholas as she could stand. Hope everyone else is doing well! :)

Upstate NY

Last Thursday to Sunday, we went to the Finger Lakes region in upstate NY. David's parents (aka, Mom-Mom and Poppy) joined us on the trip, and we met in Binghamton on Thursday night. On Friday, we went to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. Poppy and I stayed there the whole day, but Ali (and Mom-Mom) took the kids to the nearly Farmers' Museum. Sarah loved the carousel they had there.

On Saturday, *hic* we went to some wineries around the Finger Lakes *hic*. We went to 3 different places - each had 6 to 8 tastings for a dollar - what a deal! We must have really enjoyed the wine because we bought at least a bottle at each place. Later that night, we had dinner with Ali's Uncle Dennis and "Aunt" Pam. We chose a restaurant close to our hotel in Auburn, but I botched reading the map and took us around the block the wrong way before we found it.

On Sunday, we went to "The Farm, Part Deux", which is the farm of Ali's Uncle Al and Aunt Irene. They went all-out for brunch for everyone, but that didn't stop Ali, Sarah, and I from going in their pool. Their property is really great; it's on the top of a hill, so you can see in every direction for miles. I'm trying to convince Uncle Al to install a 10-meter meteorological tower as well as a 360-degree time-lapse camera and/or webcam. The camera would be great for looking at cloud and storm formations.

Unfortunately, we had to drive back home in the afternoon. After our unpleasant experience going north on I-81 in Pennsylvania (where they only have two seasons - winter and construction), we decided to take a combination of local and toll roads south instead. We still hit a little traffic and construction, but at least we felt like we were moving most of the time!

4-month check-up

Nicholas had his 4-month check-up at the doctor's last week. He's doing fine and the doctor was impressed on how happy he was (at least until he got his shots). As far as the CONSTANT urp-ing, we were just told it's normal and would soon start to subside. We've been told over and over that boys just do this more often than girls; that's definitely been the case in our family.

Anyway, for those who are keeping track: Nicholas is 97th percentile for both height and weight, and 90th percentile for head size. The doctor says that he's proportioned well and isn't too "top heavy". :)

Heat and softball

We've had three straight days of heat and humidity since our weekend rain. Today the high temperature at the home office was 101F, and the morning low was only 81F. On Tuesday, we played two softball games - and won them both! Our team usually does better in the heat; we like to joke that we tend to be younger and thinner than the average team, so we don't wilt in the heat as much. Of course, we've been saying this since at least the 12 years I've been on the team, and still more than half of the team has been on it longer than I have.

Another Busy Weekend

David saw "The Simpsons Movie" on Friday night. It was pretty darn good; most of the funny stuff were sight gags and not destined-to-be-quoted over-and-over. I'd call it about as good as a great episode from the past 10 years, but not as good as the glory years from 1990 to 1997.

On Saturday, Nicholas and Sarah's Grandpa came to the pool with us. Sarah spent over 2 hours jumping and diving into the pool and swimming towards us. Nicholas even hung out for a little in both the baby pool and the big pool with us. Check the kids page for new pictures!

Later that night we went to Jasper's for dinner with Grandpa and Sue. Nicholas wanted to be held the whole time, but finally fell asleep right before dessert. Then Ali's friend Damaris spent the night. Damaris is looking for a place to live in Philadelphia and stopped here on the way; Ali and Damaris stayed up really late (for Ali, anyway) talking and looking for places online.

Today, Bill (from the Sundogs softball team) and his family are coming to our pool with us. They have a daughter a little younger than Sarah, and a boy just a month or so younger than Nicholas.

Celebrate Goddard Day

Today was "Celebrate Goddard" Day at NASA. Sarah and her Rockets classmates came and sang four songs at the auditorium: "It's a Small World", "This Land is Your Land" - and two songs I didn't recognize. There's a picture and video on the kids webpage.

We weighed Nicholas again a couple days ago - he's now 19 pounds! He'll be too big for the infant carrier car seat very soon.