Wheels up on Friday

We have white walls and mostly empty rooms again. The cycle of apartment life is completing and with most of our stuff neatly divided between parents and friends we are left with a couple of suitcases, a baby cage, and a blow up mattress. Henry is sleeping on the changing table pad and a couple of blankets and Finn’s time-out chair is a 5 gallon bucket of plain white paint. 4 more days until we take off and the excitement is definitely building. This weekend we got to say, not goodbye but “See ya later” to a number of people and with each telling and re-telling of the coming months we are getting more excited. “This time next week” is the start to many of sentences and the end usually has us on the beach with a cocktail in hand. It really is an appealing picture if you think about it.

We have found that when we tell people about our plans they react in one of two ways: “What and adventure for you” or “What an act of service”. I wonder what it says about those people that fall into the different categories. Both are true and the real yin and yang of the situation. We have this amazing adventure ahead of us, living in Hawaii, looking after three boys under the age of 3, waking up in paradise to work at 5 in the morning, and exploring a beautiful place through the eyes of a toddler. I think we are getting as much, if not more then we are putting in and though the circumstances are terrible, the opportunity is once in a lifetime for our family.

A couple of great things

• These photos are fantastic.

• Oddly entertaining video of a baby laughing slowed down.

• Who had the day after the last game in the "When will the Lamar Odom Trade rumors start again" poll?

• A good article on how the internet is not necessarily making us smarter.
  

Father's Day Weekend

This past weekend we went to the Washington Coast to a friends beach house for a family get together before we head of to Hawaii. The house is in the process of being fixed up and is definitely under construction but it was a great getaway. Kate made crowns for the dads and we walked around Long Beach, listened to crazy Bing Stories, and got a lot of naps. It was a really great, close time for all of us. Sunday we wen to Astoria for the Farmers market and bought a cool spray paint canvas that these great guys did.

Clean teeth are Happy Teeth

Finn had his first dentist appointment today and he held up pretty well. He cried a bit while the dentist was doing his thing but all in all he was much better then I am. Before we got married and before I lost my insurance in Santa Barbara I went to the dentist to get things fixed. I don't hate the dentist per say but I am no fan. I remember being in my office and have Beautiful come in after I got back and I was still shaking and feeling sick. I have a reaction to dentists, Dr.s, Hospitals and the like that is deep and intense. Again it isn't fear, it is really much bigger and more nebulous than that. I am worried that my reactions to these things will rub off on my boys. I try not to let that happen the way I have learned to like vegetables and food that I didn't eat before. There is this sort of living out how I want my boys to live. If I want them to be adventurous eaters then I need to be, if I want them to see the dentist regularly and not be effected then I need to. This is really hard to live out though, Rome wasn't built in a day right. It is all a grinding it out as we go process and today was another chip.

Sunday morning amoung the boxes

We moved a good deal of our furniture to our friends house yesterday and now our house is sparse and monkish. We lived that way for a long time when preparing to leave Indy and now less then a year later we find ourselves lounging on the floor on pillows. We seem to be in a constant state of unfinished moving. We must be restless souls or something. Finn has been napping this morning while Henry and I play on the empty living room floor amongst all sizes of trucks. I will be switching the two soon, putting henry down while I get Finn up, feed him, and get him ready to head downtown on the train. Kate is having coffee with a college roommate she ran into downtown earlier this week so it is just the boys here this morning. Having all the clear space has made it nice to play and run around as Henry perches in the middle. I'm glad that Kate gets the opportunity to catch up with her friend, but even more I'm glad that I get the boys to myself.

Goodbye old friend

With the recycling and trash can full of diapers and coffee grounds my Black Pumas were going to their eternal resting place. More then likely they were getting pulled out in 20 minutes when the guy comes around to collect the bottle and cans from our recycling but walking out there I mourned as if they were being retired. Four years ago, while living on the couch at a friends place waiting to move to Indy and marry my beautiful, my friend Dave had an extra pair of black Pumas. It might have been a wedding gift or just Dave being the nice guy that he is but he gave me the shoes the day before getting on the plane. For some reason those shoes represented something about Santa Barbara, something about friends left behind, something bigger then rubber and leather. I love those shoes and think about a season of life each time I put them on. The thing is they were a little small. I didn’t really fit into them comfortably, and I know the connection is obvious and if I were a better writer I would just let you figure it out instead of telling you, but I didn’t fit in Santa Barbara perfectly either. I liked the way I looked and for the most part I was comfortable but every once in a while my toes would get sore and I needed to take the shoes off. I took them to the trash yesterday and placed them on top of the lid of the trash can. Someone else will probably take them and I hope they fit them better. I hope they are more comfortable with where they are, then I was with where I was. There just shoes after all, just really cool shoes that didn’t fit, that I wore for too long.