Calliope's point of view on Quinn Day

Found these on NaiNai's camera. Apparently she was enough of a sucker to let Calliope run off with it. -starla

Happy Quinn Day

Our wonderful church family threw Quinn a "Welcome To Your Family" party yesterday, and it was lovely. Both Nana and NaiNai attended, as well as some folks from our local Families With Children From China group, and we totally scored some amazing loot. Quinn will not have to worry about his wardrobe any longer, thank goodness, and we are set with pull-ups for a very, very, very long time. Possibly all the way until potty training (fingers crossed!).

Thanks especially to Miss Heather and Miss Leslie for pulling this together, and to everyone who came and shared good grub and laughter with us. We love you guys!

P.S. And a very special thank you to Nella, who picked out the prettiest ever flower crown for Calliope to wear. :)

-starla

Proof we haven't locked up our children

See? We *do* take them outside now and then. The weather has been gorgeous, so the kids have been able to enjoy the playground in our yard, finally. And of course, I didn't bring my camera out the second day we played outside, thinking- hey, what are the odds they are going to do something ridiculously cute? So that's the day Calliope decided to help push Quinn in the swing and it was super adorable, and I was totally kicking myself. But in this round of pics, at least you can see Nana having a great time.

-starla

Randomly randoms

So apparently the newsboy cap is a big hit . . . you will plotz when you hear how much it cost. Judy (Aaron's mom) found it for $1.47 at Old Navy. Run don't walk! Every well dressed young gentleman deserves one. -starla

The artist at work

Every new haircut deserves a new hat and new phone

Aaron took Quinn to the barber today and brought him back with a blue lollipop (and therefore a blue mouth). He looked like a little alien child. The haircut is fine. You can see just where Quinn must have been jerking his head a bit, and there are definite chunks missing, but overall, a perfectly decent boy's cut.

Quinn is always stealing Aaron's newsboy cap, so Aaron got him a miniature version of his own. And he is always stealing my cell phone, so I gave him my old one. I guess we are teaching him that crime pays quite well.

-starla

Advice needed from the four of you reading this blog

And yes, I know that I asked this same question on Facebook . . .

So Kai-Lan apparently visited the beach in the episode "Beach Day" (a classic of the genre), and I was moved enough by watching it that I made a rash promise to Calliope that we would take her to the beach this summer. She has never seen the ocean because, quite frankly, we are not beach vacation people. I don't think I have been on a beach or in an ocean since Martha's Vineyard in 1999. Strolling along the Promenade des Anglaises overlooking the Baie des Anges in Nice in '03 doesn't count (this is also known as 'the moment when Aaron was supposed to propose but didn't because he thought I was in a bad mood'- here's a tip for the gentlemen out there . . . *finally* asking your girlfriend of nine years to marry you is a guaranteed way to lift her mood. Just sayin'). And Martha's Vineyard was a bit of a disaster - probably not a great idea to rent a tandem bike when one of you doesn't actually know how to ride a bike of any kind. We must have looked pretty funny cycling across Oak Bluffs with me in the back with my eyes shut tight and my feet off the pedals. It took Aaron several miles to realize that I was neither looking nor pedaling at all. For our honeymoon in '05, we visited Rhode Island, which might have been a great time to go to the beach . . . if we hadn't been hit with Hurricane Ophelia hours after arriving.

So the bottomline is that we are beach novices, and I'm now in the position of planning a week long vacation for about ten people Clearly, I am clueless. Ideally, we need a house that is oceanfront, with 4 -5 bedrooms, suitable for babies, the elderly, and a lunatic dog. We're thinking late May . . . I don't want to drive more than 6 hrs from Asheville, and I don't want to spend more than $3200 . . . also, as dedicated misanthropes, a crowded place like Myrtle Beach would drive us all nuts. Oh, and I don't eat anything that comes out of the ocean because a) the ocean is a dirty place and b) I don't trust anything that wears its skeleton on the outside of its body, so near a town with varied eating establishments would be good. That's not hopeless, right?

Send me an email if you have suggestions, or just leave us a comment here.

Ha! I just realized how not-happy my parents are going to be that I just referred to them as "the elderly".

-starla

All dressed up, somewhere to go

Getting ready for church this morning.