double digits

Time for a little catch up! 
Axel is 10 months old now (almost 11...but we need to cover the 10th month first).

On Dec. 16th this little turkey weighed in at 21 lbs. 5 oz. and measures in at 29 inches. (Actually I think we had a 20 lb. turkey for Thanksgiving...)




Axel's 10th month had a few firsts for him...

First Thanksgiving.

 First time getting a Christmas tree...

 and decorating a Christmas tree...

He started standing on his own and even took his first few steps.

He has definitely mastered sleeping through the night (woohoo!)...

He's a great sleeper and great eater!

He is always on the move!!!!

And he loves to dance...


He sure does make us smile!

11-11-11

Axel turns 9 months old today (I guess it should have been 11 considering the date, but I'm fine with 9 for now).  It's been a full month...with a few unexpected adventures.

I think I totally missed an eight month update for Axel baby so he has made all kinds of advancements in two month's time.  He is a pro at crawling now...and pulling himself up on everything...he has started using furniture to move himself around while standing.  I think he might be an early walker.  He loves to clap, sway and dance to any music.

He started feeding himself most of his meals...shoveling fistfuls of food into his mouth as fast as possible.  He loves most of the food I've given him - fruit, veggies, meat, bread...but he still gobbles up the baby crackers and puffs.  

I'm just loving seeing his personality coming out more and more. He is a serious guy and busy...he loves to explore and play.  Of course he will indulge you with a little laugh if he feels like it...but Tobi can usually make him laugh and smile...and she loves to do that.  "I guess I really love my brother, don't I?" Yup!  I guess we all really do!

Due to not one, but two snow storms in October we have already been getting our fill of snow. 

The first snowfall was just enough to be a fun kind of novelty...

We built a few (little) snowmen....

  but that snow all melted by that afternoon.

The second snowfall was just a few days later and left close to 300,000 people without power in NH.  We were among the not so lucky and we lost our power for about 5 days. 

 

Sunday morning we woke up to a lot of snow and no power.  So we decided to head out in search of a cup of coffee and a little warmth.  Well apparently we weren't the only ones.  This was about the 10th Dunkin' Donuts we passed...

I decided to snap a picture because all of them had lines like this of people out the door.  This one had no drive through but the ones that did had cars out to the streets.  I saw someone on facebook comment that America really does run on Dunkins.  At least Manchester NH can't run without coffee...

We finally ended up at Starbucks after lunch and running some errands.  Even then we had a 20 minute wait in the drive through...but really in was warm in the car and I had to feed Axel anyway...

We spent one night at home but Ben needed power to be able to work since he is working from home now...so we moved in to Ryan and Sarah's for what we thought might be a day or two...but ended up being three or four...

Thanks to them we were cozy, warm, clean...and Ben had what he needed to work there to.

 The kids got some good cousin time in...

Tobi got to go trick or treating for the first time (Axel too, but he was less in to it than his sister.)

Tobi went as Rapunzel (or as she would say, Tangled).  The long hair was courtesy of Auntie Sarah's crafty creations...

 

Speaking of crafty creations check out the angry birds..and Kirsten the American Girl doll (also made by Sarah).

Axel had his horse coat on...but somehow he was most often mistaken for a chicken!

Anyway, we survived just fine.  We are so fortunate to have family so close by...

It is nice to be home.  It's nice to have lights, heat and water again.  Every time I thought about complaining about how long it was taking to get power back or how inconvenienced I was feeling I thought about those who lost their homes in the earthquake/tsunami in Japan over 8 months ago and still don't have a place to call home, never mind all the amenities...or those in Haiti who had so little to begin with and lost everything in the earthquake there.  It seems all to easy to take these things for granted...

October 14

The past 3 years I've taken pictures of Tobi in the leaves at Stark Park on October 14th. Here are the pics from the last few years.

Sadly this year it was raining on the 14th...so we had to wait until the 17th.  I knew getting a good picture of both kids would be challenging...but I didn't anticipate this reaction from Axel...

"Okay...this is different."

 

"What are these things?"

 

"I don' t think I like this..."

 

"Help me, Tobi!  Get us out of here..."

 

"Seriously?  You are sticking those things on my head?"

"I'll touch them, but I won't like them."

 

"I'm outta here..."

 

And then there is this girl.....

 

 

 

 

 

 

Axel preferred crawling in the grass and playing on the statue.  As long as he didn't have to be near those terrible leaves.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few more of my favorites from the day...

Islesboro Cottage 3.0

This was our third year out at the cottage on Islesboro.  Thanks to the generosity of Ben's parents we got to live on the water for 2 weeks.  It was great spending time with Grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends at different times during those weeks.

 

It is such a lovely place. I have such a soft spot for the Maine coast and having a view of it out every window is so amazing.

 We had a little trouble getting on to the island since it is only accessible by ferry.  We packed all of our stuff for two weeks in the truck and U-Haul trailer and we were so proud of ourselves for getting there just in time to make our reservation on the last ferry only to find out the ferry was not working!  We had to hustle to take the water taxi for passengers only.  We had to decide what we would need to survive for the night and hope that no one would get into the rest of our belongings during the night.  We did just fine (minus the 3 year old screaming "I don't want to go on the boat" all the way down the ramp to the boat and the fact that we left all our cash in the truck and couldn't pay for the taxi ride! until the next day). 

Oh, Maggie (the ferry's nickname)...we've been "ferried" again!  (That was Ben's new phrase creation!)

Ben had to work most of the time we were there, but if you have to work this is the office view you want.

 

This was our backyard for the week...(at least at low tide.)

 

We did a lot of beach combing and digging.

Ryan and Sarah and the kids came up for a couple days...

 Here are the ladies in the "princess palace". 

 And how about a little kayaking?

We took a trip off island one day.

Here is Tobi getting a special ride around Camden.

 We took lots of beach walks...collecting treasures and such.

 

It was so nice to be able to be with family everyday.

 

 

 And talk about a sink view.  I didn't even mind doing the dishes ( I think I have written about this every year so far.)

 We spent lots of time on the sun porch...doing puzzles, playing games, enjoying the beauty.

 Everyday the sky was different, and so the view was always new.

 We had some of the freshest seafood you can get...lobsters from the one of the local lobstermen and mussles from the beach in our front yard!

 Oh sooo good! 

 I had my personal lobster preparer (aka my neat freak husband) present me with a fully cleaned lobster.  Yummmmm!

 These two both had a great time...

 ...living at the shore...

....crawling in jammies on the porch...

 

 ....playing at playgrounds...

`

  ...listening to Grandpa stories...

...playing games at the fall festival....

....snuggling with Grandma...

 ....relaxing in rockers...

 ...petting animals at the island farm...

 ...riding bikes...

 

 ...celebrating Jon's 10th birthday...

...watching beautiful sunsets...

 ...riding the ferry...

 ...and dancing on the ferry...

 After two weeks we had to make our way back to the mainland...

but we are so blessed to have so many great memories...once again!