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Sunday, October 31, 2010

Comparison

Let me ask you something:

If you squint your eyes, and tilt your head to the left, and tuck your chin down to your chest...then do these:



Look at all like these:


??

...yeah...I didn't think so either. 

This was the birthday cake idea I saw in an issue of Parenting magazine (thanks for the subscription, Mandy!) and decided to use for Gabe's birthday party.  Tonight I did a little test run and I have no idea how those wacky folks at Parenting magazine got the food coloring in the icing to turn out such vivid colors.  I used 20 drops of red coloring and still all I got was a deep pink.  I also couldn't make the jolly rancher fruit chews (the candy used on top to make the cakes look like legos) match the icing, so I experimented with gummy life savers.  But the saddest part is that they don't even taste that good.  It's frozen pound cake with pre-made cake icing and way too rich!  So, I'm glad I did a dry run and I think I'll probably end up doing something different for Gabe's cake at his party next weekend.  Cute idea though!

Sunday, October 24, 2010

One

Gabe turned one last Monday!  We celebrated with a couple gifts from Grandma in the morning...

"A card?  For me??"

He found the curling ribbon pretty entertaining.

And of course, he was really interested in ripping the wrapping paper...the magnetic animal puzzle book was a secondary attraction.  (Although now that we have it home without wrapping paper for competition, he loves it!)
Awesome truck with jumbo legos!  Gabe likes to push cars and trucks around and make engine noises at the same time; it's really cute.

...And then Gabe and I took a road trip to the Tri-Cities to see Lindsey & Lydia who were in town from WA DC.

Both Gabe & Lydia were not feeling very cooperative for a group picture, so we decided to just take what we could get!

Lydia's Grammy Sherry showing us how to keep two squirrely kids entertained...the talents of a Grandma!

It was an eventful day!

I'll leave you with a collage of monthly pics from Gabe's first year (idea courtesy of my friend Annie!).  I think I already said in a previous post that all the cliches I've heard about parenting and having kids seem to be pretty true (so far as my whopping year of experience in that area goes), and the part about how time flies and how they grow up so fast is perhaps the most bothersome truth of all. 

Then again, lately I've been really looking forward to Gabe walking, getting molars, and being potty trained...so at least in those respects I'm not so bothered by time flying!


Happy 1st Birthday to my precious baby boy, who makes me laugh and melts my heart and teaches me about myself and brings me such great joy - love you love you, buddy!

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth...

One of my favorite poems is High Flight, by John Gillespie Magee, Jr:


Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

Of sun-split clouds, --and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of --Wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air...
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark or even eagle flew --
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

Recent high flights:

- Bret and his dad went skydiving!  It was Bret's parents' gift to him for his birthday in April, but they had to wait to go until their schedules and the weather all cooperated.  They went on a beautiful, HOT day in August...perfect blue skies!



Jumping out of a plane...just your average father/son bonding activity.
 

Gabe helping Bret practice the freefall position.



Coming in for landing.


Bret's tandem instructor was a guy I went to highschool with - small world!




- In September, we went to visit Sara in Idaho and her boyfriend Jared took us flying!  We did loops and went weightless and I'm pretty sure I giggled like a maniac for 90% of my flight.  There was even knee-slapping.

Yes, I said knee-slapping.  Because apparently, my spontaneous instinctual reaction to having extreme amounts of fun is to slap my knee like a 1940's grandpa. 

Anyway, I would love love love to get my pilot's license. Bret's dad has started lessons to get his...so maybe I'll talk him or Jared into teaching me someday.  Now there's an idea! 


Landing


That's me in the back.



- In early October, I got to go on my third hot air balloon flight!  Perhaps not the kind of fun that inspires knee-slapping, but amazing nonetheless!  My parents generously expanded their "romance aloft flight for two" and invited the rest of us along for the ride.  (Though really, how romantic could it have been, with the balloon pilot there as well?  It's not like he could step away and give a couple any privacy...)



We helped hold the balloon open in front of a big fan so it could begin to inflate, and Mom and Dad took this job very seriously.  The bottom of the balloon opening was lifting up and blocking the inflow, so Mom went in to remedy the problem.  So cute.

Phase 2 of inflation - heating the air inside the balloon.

I was a bit concerned Dad wasn't going to let go (remember, I said my folks were taking our roles in getting the balloon off the ground very seriously).

The basket turned out to be roomier than we expected...we could've easily fit a few more!

It was an eventful few months for us!