Autumn in New England

It’s not here yet, but I am starting to get glimpses of it.  I can almost smell it in the air.  The mornings are crisp.  I love having the windows open and feeling the weight of the covers on me.  You just don’t get this in Florida.  It’s such a shame that fall has to lead to winter.  I just love everything about it.  I love the weather.  I love the food, the smells – ah, butternut squash, goodies baking in the oven and pumpkins and lots of scented candles and drinking tea and cuddling under blankets – what couldn’t you love about that?  I almost feel like I should start picking out Miss M’s halloween costume!  Lots of exciting new things this fall – yoga immersion! school starting for R!  Probably some walking for M!

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Hopefully We’re Back

I’ve taken a little hiatus from blogging, partly because I am lazy and busy and partly because there’s been some tough stuff going on with some of my peeps (extended family and friends), and I’ve been feeling contemplative and quiet (ha, me?) and thanking my lucky stars for all and everyone that I have.

A lot has changed, and is changing and happening around these parts.

– My parents headed back to Florida after a 5-week stay here and lots of quality time.  Much to the surprise of some of my friends, I didn’t have a breakdown ;)

– We had a run of over 6 weeks without anyone being sick (not counting M’s pink eye).  Thank goodness for summer!

– I got a new title at work.  I am now the Operations Manager of a Marketing Agency.

– R almost has his teaching certificate (only one multiple choice and one essay test to go in mid-September).

– R got a job teaching high school and elementary music in a town about 45 minutes away from our house (he starts soon!)  This means he’ll probably be out the door before I normally get up, so life in the mornings for me and Miss M is going to be changing big time!  I think we’ll both be eating breakfast on the job, and our hygiene and wardrobe choices are sure to suffer.

– R continues to work on his thesis, and we both hope he can juggle the new job, all his existing teaching and gigs, and the thesis writing over the next year and that we can still see each other once in a while.

– Miss M now goes to daycare 5 days a week (3 days at her daycare center and 2 days at a home daycare).

– Miss M drinks only whole milk (no formula) and we’re working on phasing out the bottle and phasing in the sippy cup, which is proving to be harder than I thought it would be.

– Miss M knows what she wants and when she wants it, and if she doesn’t get it, she gets pretty angry – for example, she wants to play in the dog’s water bowl, real bad.

– Miss Izzie goes in on Friday for her 2nd yearly checkup since her two big surgeries back in the Fall of ’09.  She’ll go under anesthesia and have her teeth cleaned and get new X-rays.  They will probably redo her bonding and most likely pull some more teeth.  Poor baby.

– In addition to all that we’ve got in store for this next year, I’ve also signed up for the 200-hour Yoga Teacher Training at my favorite local yoga studio (1 full weekend a month for 12 months starting in September).

– I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of Fall, which is my favorite season, even though it means that Winter is coming.  It’s going to be a busy year!

Here are a fewer new(er) photos.  She’s still got 80’s rock star hair.


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One Year Stats

Miss M is 20 lbs (30th percentile) and 29.5 inches “tall” (75th percentile).

She claps, points, waves, furniture surfs, walks with assistance and is starting to be very verbal even though we don’t understand her “words.”  She loves talking on her fake cell phone and walking behind a push toy (not at the same time).  Her favorite is opening and closing doors and cabinets.

Posted in Birthdays, Miss M. | 3 Comments

Happy First Birthday!

We can’t believe Miss M is a year old already!  It’s been one crazy year of firsts!

We celebrating by going out to eat at an Ethiopian restaurant that we love in Hartford.

I’ll post stats after her well visit on Friday.

Happy Birthday Miss Mushroom!

 

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Retreat and Renewal

For the first time in just about a year R and I took a vacation without M.  We went to the Berkshires and camped in a Yurt at October Mountain State Forest.  I am not sure you can call it camping, because there are beds, and walls, and a lock, and electricity.  But there were no bathrooms or showers, except the campground ones that you had to walk to with a flashlight, so that totally counts as camping!  While the Northeast was undergoing a heat wave, we were nice and cool in our Yurt with a ceiling fan and bunk beds.  The main attraction of our two nights away was a day pass to Kripalu, a center for yoga and health.  We camped in order to save some money.  $30 a night is pretty affordable and it turned out we were much cooler than the people sleeping at Kripalu.  We headed up that way on Wednesday after work, got settled in our Yurt and then hit Lenox for dinner.  We looked at every dinner menu in the whole town, each one even better than the last, and we settled on Cafe Lucia.  We celebrated a great professional opportunity and a good review at work.  We celebrated M, we celebrated us, and it was wonderful!  On Thursday we headed out early to Kripalu, so we could catch breakfast.  The food is absolutely pure and amazing.  There is very little, if any, meat and I assume most everything is local and organic.  First we attending a seminar about opening your heart, literally and figuratively.  Next we went off on our own on a hike down to the lake.  After lunch, we headed out on a guided bike ride through the rolling hills of the Berkshires.  About half way through I figured out I had eaten too much lunch and the heat of the day (I think it was 100!) made me need a nice little break before continuing – but I think we all did.  We rode through Lenox and into Tanglewood.  In the end I was so glad we decided to go.  After a few hours of taking it easy, we hit a moderate yoga class, dinner and then a seminar about breathing techniques for relaxation and meditation.  It was such a perfect day.  On Friday we had planned to check out the Appalachian Trail but instead opted to go out to breakfast and window shop and eat our way through Lenox.  My favorite store was Colorful Stitches.  It was just a beautiful store, with beautiful things.  I especially loved the front porch railings and tree trunks which were all knitted around.  I want to do this at my house so bad, but SOMEONE won’t let me!  It was just a perfect vacation.  It wasn’t too rushed, and it wasn’t too long (read: I missed her, but I wasn’t crazy missing her, because I knew she was safe and sound with my mom).  I hope this is a yearly tradition we can have.  We are lucky to live less than an hour and a half and a quarter tank of gas away from an amazing place like this.

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New Swing Set

M got a new swing set for her birthday!  Even though it’s made for kids 3-6 years old, we just swapped out one of the regular swings for a baby swing, and she’s all set.  It’ll also be nice to have something to play with outside when her older, more sophisticated friends come over to play.  She was really happy to watch the boys assemble this and to stand in the playhouse portion of it, but she was very nervous on her first swing ride – her arm was shaking like crazy!

Posted in Miss M. | 1 Comment

The Moment That Changed My Yoga Experience

I tried yoga a few times in college, but could never seem to empty my mind and silence my inner voice.  I could never seem to do what I thought was the key to yoga: to think about nothing.  I would sit or lay there or hold a posture and my mind would be full and loud and would tell me, stop thinking about all this, you suck at this, you are too high strung for yoga.  I would worry, I would make lists in my head and I would continue to berate myself for not clearing my mind completely.  I would tell myself, even though I felt physically strong, that my mind was just not made for yoga.  Then, after moving to Connecticut, I remember a life changing moment in my yoga practice.  My teacher said to me that practicing yoga is not about clearing your mind and emptying out your thoughts, it’s about seeing those things, those worries, those to do lists, and just letting them go, even if it’s only for an hour and a half.  Focus on softening, starting with your facial muscles, your cheeks, your forehead, your jaw, unclench your teeth, and for goodness sake, smile if it strikes you to do so!  Make audible noises when you exhale, like “Ha!” if you need to.  Don’t work to clear your mind, work to focus your mind, to experience it and take it all in.

I’m feeling invigorated after a Power Class last night that nearly made me pass out (I saw stars!).  I am oh so sore today and loving it.  Namaste!

Posted in Yoga | 2 Comments

Baby’s First Fourth of July

We had an awesome trip to Contoocook, NH for the fourth of July.  The weather was hot, the raspberries were ripe for the pickin’ and the chickens were friendly.  M got to “march” in her first fourth of July kids’ parade and we got to try chocolate covered bacon.

First time climbing stairs

Posted in Family, Miss M., Summer | 1 Comment

Teeth Brushing

Brushing M’s teeth is a lot like brushing Izzie’s teeth – she’s really more interested in eating the toothpaste and biting the brush than she is about getting her teeth brushed.  She does a pretty good job though. And hey, she only has 7 teeth to brush!  Lately she’s been wanting to hold the brush herself and we’ve been trying to show her how fun it is to brush your teeth!

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11 Months Old

M is 11 months old!  She’s crawling everywhere, she’s pulled up to standing a couple of times and while she was sleeping through the night, she didn’t do much of that this month.  She’s had her first case of pink eye in both eyes but slept through the night the whole time she had it.  It continues to get harder and harder to get a good monthly photo since she grabs at everything, so I am including a few outtakes.

Posted in Miss M. | 2 Comments