Feeding the addiction

Since it has been over a week since you have seen any new Henry pictures, I figured I should throw some ones from today up. Now I know we can all sleep better tonight.

Paris

Mike and I are back from our week in Paris for our anniversary trip. We had a fantastic time and lucked out with easy flights and beautiful weather.

It has been 10 years or so since either of us have been to Paris, so we did the usual must-see sights again.

Notre-Dame:





The Eiffel Tower (proud to say we took the stairs!):






The Arc de Triomphe:



The Louvre:




One day we took a day trip to Mont Saint-Michel, which was amazing:






We were able to see Kathleen, an old friend of mine from college, and were able to participate in the Parisian tradition of excessive public drinking on the steps of Sacre-Couer:





It was an amazing trip, although a lot of our time was spent missing Henry. Our little guy thus far seems to have handled the separation well. Unfortunately, he was sick a lot of the time we were gone, but he still managed to have a great time with his Nana and Papa:


A gigantic thank you to Mark and Gayle for coming to Boston and watching Henry for us while we were away. We really appreciate it and know that Henry had a great time!

Random

Two random things for the day.

First, when Henry woke up from his nap today he started crying. I went into his room and found him upset, leaning over his crib rail and reaching towards the floor. I asked what was wrong and he said "Henry's eye dropped on the floor!!!!!"

Uh, WHAT?

He kept repeating "Henry's eye on the floor! Find it!" I tried not to laugh and just kept saying "your EYE? Your EYE fell on the floor???" He was very insistent and made me get on my hands and knees and look for his eye under the crib. Finally, after looking at all the eyes on all of his stuffed animals and counting them, and then counting his own eyes, he seemed content in the knowledge that his eye was still firmly in his head and not on the floor. Makes you wonder what kind of dreams this kid is having.

In other news, Henry made a lovely grocery sculpture today:





You can see how proud he is. Note the lovely addition of the sippy cup on top. Pure genius.

Upon seeing me get the camera out, Henry had to run and get his OWN camera to document his artistry:

Reunion

Last weekend Mike was (once again) a wonderful sport and took on full time Dad responsibilities while I was away. This time it was for my 10 year college reunion (nothing to make you feel nice and old like a reunion!) It was absolutely wonderful to be back on campus, enjoy the scenery and see so many old friends.











I also got to meet my friend Erin's baby, Everett, and it was all I could do to not snatch him and run away with him. Very squishy and wonderful.





I loaded up on Hobart gear for Henry; I am busy prepping him for his role as future Hobart lacrosse player, class of 2029. Mike has some crazy idea of him being a basketball player at U of I...we shall see.

Here is Henry blowing bubbles and showing off some Hobart pride (you can't quite make out the shirt, but it's the best I could do...)

Haircut and the park

We had to give in and get Mr. Shaggy another haircut today. He is SO, SO much better during them now - today was the first haircut where we had no tears at all! (we did have him yell "no!" at the poor woman a few times, but that is tame compared to what he used to do). He looks like such a little man now with his haircut:





Later in the afternoon we all went to the playground to have Henry burn off some energy:









And then had dinner at a new(ish) barbecue restaurant up the street from us. Henry ate his weight in cornbread but didn't touch anything else, alas. Here he is doing "cheers!" with dad:

Memorial Day

Happy Memorial Day to everyone!

We had gorgeous weather in Boston today. We took advantage of the sun and went back to the Arboretum with Henry. He had a great time running all around (as did we, seeing as he has entered the "it is fun to run away from mom and dad and hide" stage...):





Then, in the afternoon we all enjoyed watermelon on the deck:

Day Tripping

Mike and I were thinking that, since the weather is so nice and since Henry is getting older, we should start taking more day trips. We are always pretty strict with Henry's nap (we generally need to be home by 12:30 PM at the latest in order to have him asleep by 1 PM) due to his inflexibility in sleeping anywhere other than his crib at that exact time. This makes doing any longer trips tough and we tend to sprint out the door first thing in the morning and eat lunch in the car on the way home to fit in fun activities.

Since Henry is now older, we figured that maybe he is entering the age where we can be more flexible with the nap - pushing it back or maybe even having him skip his nap on days where we had a lot of fun activities. So, we decided to test it out today and take a nice long day trip to Newburyport, where they were having their annual "Spring Festival".

All you need to know is that this was a bad idea. We will continue doing shorter trips and being home by 12:30 PM for a while...maybe until he is a teenager.

However, before the meltdowns began we had a great time in Newburyport, one of our favorite towns in Massachusetts.

Henry got to watch the boats go by with Mike:



Had the rare treat of a hot dog:



AND strawberry ice cream! (lucky boy):









Also, in exciting (and very belated) news, Henry is now a proud cousin! Mike's brother Dave and his wife Jen welcomed the newest Powell - Evan - on May 14th. Henry knows all about "baby Evan" and can't wait to meet him. Congratulations to Dave and Jen!!!