day 4

caleb is in india.
i'm on cape cod.
i'm exhausted.
caleb is probably a little tired too, although for different reasons.

in other news, sammy loves to climb the stairs and i'm working on typing part 2 of our love story.

day 2

caleb is in India.
he called me a few minutes ago.
he traveled for 36 straight hours...
10 minutes to the bus station
80 minutes to Logan
120 minutes of security & waiting at Logan
less than 120 minute flight to Newark
240+ minutes of waiting for his flight in Newark
870 minutes on an airplane to Delhi
a taxi ride to the train station
120 minutes of waiting at the train station
360 minutes on the train to Dehradun - final destination
something like that... i could be off a few minutes...
he's safe and sound in India.
and i miss him.
and it's only day 2.

i'm excited for his adventures. i'm excited to read his blog. i'm excited to see pictures. i'm excited to watch videos. i'm excited for his return. in 6 weeks. or in 42 days. not that i'm counting or anything.

swimming to India

sam checking out the waves

walking in the sand with mommy

Caleb left for India today.

Sam and I will be missing him mucho.

But hopefully we'll be doing some of the following:

1) texting

2) emailing

3) calling

4) SKYPING!!!

Today I helped get Caleb on his way and then worked.

When I came home, I was greeted by Sam who crawled to me in record time. We had dinner and took a little swim in the ocean. Sam LOVED it!

It was his first time actually in the ocean. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to go sooner, but today was a success. Sam LOVED the sand. Then, we put him at the water's edge and he thought it was just great. Since I grew up on the ocean and LOVED going to the beach, I'm so glad to have a little boy who seems to have the same appreciation for the ocean as I do.

sitting in the sand for the first time and the verdict is out. he likes it!

sam's on a mission... ocean here he comes.

 

taking a dip in the ocean, sheer joy on his face

hugs for mommy

sam walking in the waves

Sammy Swimming to India

Above is a link to a video of Sam crawling towards one of my first loves. The ocean. I think he wanted to swim to his dad in India. Well, his dad wasn't quite there yet, but he will be tomorrow. Hope you enjoy. And thanks to my Dad (morfar) and my brother (uncle Pete) for making the video possible, ie making sure Sam didn't drown!
(note: my frantic voice as I'm recording Sam's crawl into the ocean and a wave splashes over him. Uncle Pete came to the rescue)

give-a-way by shannon

check out my friend shannon's blog!

how cute are they? that's her little guy behr.

she's hosting a give-a-way.

it ends today.

she's giving away philosophy stuff.

check her out.

and if you don't win, you can follow her blog.

it's full of awesome goodness.

that's sam & behr. sam's showing behr how to grab. sam is good at that. especially things like my hair...

and here sam is showing how to teach behr to do a push-up. it was full on lacrosse training on the lawn. it's ok that behr didn't quite get it. sam is almost 4 months older... behr will be mastering it in no time.

here we are w/the boys in a park

and working on a timelapse with my camera. someday, i may post the actual timelapse.

pics are from our visit to Washington DC
in april
i know...
i'm two months late in posting them
maybe i'll dig up a few more?

Quick & easy dinner

Yesterday afternoon I came back from Cape Cod. We had homemade pizza dough in the freezer, cheese, spaghetti sauce, mushrooms and spinach in the fridge. I whipped up a quick dinner: green salad and pizza with sautéed mushrooms & spinach as toppings.
Delish! More so than I was expecting! I mixed cheddar cheese & mozzarella cheese which added yummy flavor. Quite the hit. Even little Sammy had a few bites and liked it!

happy mother's day... in sweden...

so, on the actual US mother's day. i was sick. to my stomach. ugh.

caleb and i had plans to hang out in boston together. we had a babysitter lined up. but then i was sick. so i cancelled. quite anti-climatic and not what i was expecting for my "first" mother's day.

so we rescheduled our date in the city. we rescheduled it this past sunday. i know, everyone leaves the city for memorial day. except us. we went into the city. and it happened to be mother's day in sweden. fitting, eh?

well, i didn't end up capturing any pictures IN boston. i wanted to get sandwiches at some small sandwich shop and walk boston taking pictures but i didn't know that's what i wanted to do (more on that in a minute). we ended up having lunch at stephanie's on newbury. have you heard of the place? it's yummy. i had french toast. caleb had a cobb salad. we sat outdoors. we people watched. we talked about architecture and church. we talked a little bit about being parents. then i realized i wished we hadn't eaten at stephanie's on newbury. not for any other reason than i wanted to walk boston w/caleb, my camera and some sandwiches and snap shots of life happening on a sunday afternoon. now i know. so next time we won't eat at a fancy newbury street restaurant. we'll find a hole-in-the-wall sandwich shop somewhere in back bay, north end or somewhere else. we'll bring our cameras. we'll eat our sandwiches on a bench in a park and snap pictures of life as we see it. that's our next date. hopefully before caleb leaves for india.

ok, well, i promise. that wasn't complaining about mother's day. caleb and i had a date. it was beautiful weather in a beautiful city. sam was with my friend sam having a grand old time in a grand old city. life is good.

after boston, we drove to ipswich. we used to live there. i LOVE ipswich. i miss it. i miss my crane's beach sticker. i miss russell orchards being 5 minutes from our place. i miss walking to the train to go to boston. i miss walking to the library, to the bank, to the market. i miss the neck (those of you who know ipswich, know the neck). i miss our walks along the ipswich river. i miss bradley palmer being close. heck, i sometimes even miss the long windy drive down 1A.

anyway, we went to strawberry hill in ipswich. with sam. we had fun. walking. taking pictures. carrying sam. showing sam strawberry hill:

hanging from trees

chewing grass

 

sitting on rocks.

note: sam representing caleb's alma mater thanks kim :)

 he loved it all.

 

we ended the day with ice-cream at downriver in essex.

as you can see, sam loved the spoons. and maybe there was a hint of ice-cream on the spoon.
overall, a fabulous day with my fabulous husband and happy-go-lucky little boy.

i'm a mom.
more on that later...
on that note, some more pictures.

timed shot w/our camera sitting on a rock

crawling around on strawberry hill

walking back sam gets a plane ride through the grass

a walk before dinner...

These smell so delicious

Yesterday was a productive day at work. I messed up on Monday and it was straightened out yesterday (I took Tuesday off from what I was working on and worked on something different). After work I asked Sam if he wanted to go outside and play. He was so easy today. He played by himself, took two 2 hour naps and was just a happy boy. When I said, "Go outside and play". He got so excited, he knew what it meant. He was laughing, talking and smiling while I was getting things ready to go outside, and by "getting things ready" I mean getting my camera, cell phone and car keys because it was GORGEOUS out!

Sam pauses to take in the moment, or check out a passing car...

We headed to the park with the swings. Sam LOVES the swings, so I sat him in the swing and he laughed the whole time. I called my friend to come join us and she came outside. We sat on the grass near the park and then decided to take a little walk... well, it turned into a longer walk than expected, not distance, but meandering.

Laughing with Sam

 I took pictures of Sam, she took pictures of Sam, and me (which is nice b/c I'm usually behind the lens).

Happy Sam

Figuring out his balance

I had a brilliant idea of taking pictures of Sam near a rock wall. I leaned him against it and started clicking. I heard this odd grinding noise and wondered what it was. I realized it was Sam's teeth and instead of scooping him up, I took "just one more picture". Then I scooped him up to bring him inside for dinner. I guess I finally got the memo: first grass, then lilacs, concrete and he finally got my attention with rocks!

Sam trying to eat grass, lilacs, concrete and a rock wall

You know it's bad when your kids starts gnawing on rocks b/c they're hungry and then you decide to take "just one more picture". I promise, I do feed Sam on a regular basis. We came inside, Sam had water, a rice-cake, lasagna, and pieces of my chocolate chip cookie. Gourmet, I know.

Next time maybe it should be a walk AFTER dinner, especially if my camera decides is forced to join us.

PS- Recently bought a 50mm lens for my Digital SLR. Such a FUN lens! Thanks Katie for the recommendation!

Said rock wall.