Virginia Vacay

by Adam
Every summer all the U.S. automakers observe a union-mandated summer shutdown period for two weeks, so for us that meant vacation! We enjoyed a nice, long two weeks in Virginia with my family; a much needed vacation for all of us. Don't be deceived by this cute picture of Bean (aka "Lily") in her car seat, it was definitely a grueling 14-hour drive from Michigan to Virginia. Thank you D.C. traffic! We decided to leave at 4 a.m. on a Saturday so Lily would sleep for the first bit. The only problem with that was that I wanted to sleep too! Despite being tired, I wasn't about to let Tiffany be the one to start the road trip. It's just too emasculating. Once there, we wasted no time in getting out to play. Monday morning, sans Bean, we went with my brother and sister to Virginia Beach for the afternoon. It was nice, but a little cooler than we expected, hence the reason Tiffany spent a grand total of five minutes in the water. I'm sure her fear of sharks may have had something to do with her reluctance to get in the water (Let me [Tiff] interject that there were scores of jellyfish as well as a pod--yes, a pod--of dolphins, and everyone knows that where there are dolphins, there are sharks). The following day, Tiffany and I, once again minus the kid, ventured out to Busch Gardens Europe for the day. The day started off well with a ride on one of the smaller roller coasters, but started to deteriorate as we rode more rides. Much to my horror, Tiffany is not a good theme park companion. After just a few rides her stomach was churning and she was pretty much done for the day! Hard to believe, I know. We almost left early, but Tiffany sucked it up and stayed for a few more hours. One of the highlights was my riding (alone) the newest coaster there, Griffon.















It was intense, but would have been more fun with my wife. :( (Tiff again--let me just say that it was quite disheartening for me to find that I no longer had the stomach of steel I once had as a child.) We got a 7 day pass to the park, which included Water Country, the water park, which we both thoroughly enjoyed. We went with my parents to Busch Gardens a few days later and brought Lily along this time.We took her on her first ride--the carousel, which she seemed to enjoy.













We stayed for the fireworks display, but the day proved to be too much for Lily, and she somehow managed to sleep through them.
















We also had time to go to Colonial Williamsburg. We had a nice afternoon walking around the settlement and taking advantage of the tourist photo opportunities. I think these stocks may become more useful when Lily is a little older!














This picture demonstrates who the real center of attention was on our trip--Tiff and I can't complain--it was nice to constantly have multiple people vying for time with Lily. We managed to go to our first movie since Lily was born--we saw Hancock and were both somewhat unimpressed, but it was nice to once again grace the seats of a movie theater.
We went to see my brother, Alex, in Richmond--since we'd never been there before we figured we should take at least one picture, so here it is--good, ol' Stonewall Jackson.
Tiffany's one request for the trip was to go to The Cheesecake Factory, so we went with my parents and sister, Ashley. I'm not a big fan of their food, but when the wife sets her mind on something I've learned it's best to acquiesce. The cheesecake was good and Lily was even allowed a bite of some whipped cream. Little did we know that she had no intention of stopping at one bite. We figured since we were indulging, we'd let her do the same.













After lunch we went to the beach at Fort Story, an Army training facility. The beaches were beautiful and clean, with white sand, beach grasses blowing in the wind, and a couple of lighthouses--very picturesque.













(we love how unsuspecting my dad looks in the picture on the right--little did he know that wave behind us was about to drench him)
































































Overall, it was an eventful trip. We had a lot of fun just hanging out with my family and taking it easy--which, of course made it all that much harder to have to return to normal life, but we're glad we were able to make the trip.

Where do your loyalties lie?

I know I'm absolutely ridiculous, but I just don't care! For the last couple of weeks I've completely engrossed myself in the world of Twilight in anticipation of the release of Breaking Dawn, the final book in the series (except for Midnight Sun, of course--follow this link for further information: http://stepheniemeyer.com/midnightsun.html). Yes, I admit that Twilight is my secret shame--my guilty pleasure--for which I feel neither shame nor guilt. :) And I'd be willing to bet that the majority of people who actually read this blog have already pre-ordered their copy of Breaking Dawn (you know who you are). At the risk of creating a rift in my marriage, I feel compelled that I must profess that I am unequivocally cheering for Team Edward. August 2nd can't get here soon enough!!

A Mover and Shaker

Things are quickly changing around our house--Lily has started to crawl within the last week, which means my procrastination of baby-proofing our house has finally caught up with me, so I am now trying to put up some makeshift barriers to keep her away from the entertainment center and electrical cords and other such tempting objects. Rolling had been her previous method of getting from point A to point B, but she finally figured out how to get her legs to work. Unfortunately, she could only go in reverse for a while. For several days, this is what I found each time I walked into the living room. She was always in the same spot, her head just poking out from under the futon. Now, however, she has figured out how to scoot forward. Her preferred system is a combination of scooting and rolling to get to whatever has attracted her attention--usually something exciting like a bottle of lotion or a phone charger. Heaven forbid she want to play with one of her toys! Anyway, all of this activity tends to wear her out, so she's been sleeping quite well. I was checking on her during her afternoon nap the other day to find her like this.
She's got all of that space and yet 9 times out of 10, I find her pressed up against the rails of her crib. Oh well, whatever works for her.

GM River Days

This last weekend marked a big event in downtown Detroit--GM River Days. It's a four day festival on the Detroit International Riverfront (Windsor, Canada is on the other side of the river) . It included games, rides, music, food, exhibits, and fireworks.
We went on Saturday and were lucky to take everything in just before a huge rainstorm began. It was quite a bit of fun--we got to see some jet ski performances--I was amazed at the stuff those guys (and girls) can do! Adam's favorite thing was watching the Ultimate Air Dogs--dock jumping dogs that run and jump off a platform into a pool and compete to see who gets the longest distance. We let Lily splash around in a couple of fountains and entered some raffles/sweepstakes things. Lily won a DVD at one booth.

They also had an impressive display of classic cars. Here is Adam in front of a '57 Chevy Bellaire.
You can see the ominous clouds above. We had to book it back to the Renaissance Center to beat the downpour. Because we had Lily's stroller we had to go up the wheelchair ramp, which is just a lot of switchbacks. As the rain started coming down we scrapped that idea and carried her up the stairs in it and made a mad dash for shelter. Good times!

Father's Day!

Father's Day was a weekend celebration in our house, regardless if Adam noticed, or not. Saturday started off with me trying to keep Lily quiet and entertained so he could sleep in. When he woke up I made us a nice, healthy breakfast, which was followed by a long walk to the local farmer's market in downtown Farmington. Before we left, Adam was complaining that he didn't have anything to wear, so I decided to grace him with an early Father's Day present. He finally got a Detroit Tiger's hat as well as a new T-shirt.
We had planned on trying to find some vegetable plants at the market to take home with us but didn't find anything to our liking. Instead we went to Quiznos and had lunch. I consider the trip a success. I had a good laugh when I pointed out to Adam that he had overlooked the sizing sticker on the front of his shirt and had been walking around all day with it like that. It was a fun, laid-back morning. Adam--always the optimist--noted that if it weren't for the high gas prices, we probably wouldn't have even thought of going out for a morning stroll, which is probably true. We've tried to curb our driving as much as possible and, hence, have started walking more. Let me tell you, though--it was a hot walk home--I felt like I was suffocating in my jeans--if only Lily hadn't vomited all over my shorts the night before! Once we got home we filled Lily's swimming pool up and let her splash around for a while.

On Sunday Adam enjoyed yet another day of sleeping in, followed by a much-slaved-over breakfast of chocolate chip pancakes. The one thing he asked for for father's day was a nap. He attempted to take one, but the quality, I fear, was less than stellar; Lily had just woken up from her nap as he went to lay down, and she's usually rather vocal after she gets up. I walked into the bedroom to find Adam with a pillow over his face in an attempt to muffle her squawking. I ended up taking her out for a walk. We tried to grill for dinner, but apparently the charcoal we bought is rather cheap and was not cooking the chicken satisfactory to Adam's taste, so we scrapped that and threw it in the oven. I think it turned out fine.
(If Nat is reading this, please note there is not one, but two bottles of spray butter on the table).
Adam and his little buddy before she went to bed (try to ignore the messy spit up stain on her shirt). Happy Father's Day Adam!

Feasting on the Words of Christ

Somehow I don't think this is quite what Nephi had in mind. This afternoon I left Lily in the living room with some toys and put on a DVD for her to watch so I could clean up the kitchen. She was having a great time, laughing, squealing, and so forth. I noticed after a while she was no longer sitting up, but laying on her stomach. I could only see her legs because the Love Sac was blocking my view. Normally she gets mad when she's on her tummy, but she seemed to be fine, so I didn't think anything of it. Then after 5-10 minutes I began to wonder what was keeping her occupied so intently. I walked over to find she had gotten hold of my Ensign and had wrinkled, shredded, slobbered all over, and eaten (apparently) the first page of Elder Bednar's talk.
For shame! Does this look like the face of one who is remorseful for what they have done? I didn't think so either.

Mother's Day '08

Sunday marked my first official mother's day--I say official because we kind of celebrated it last year since I was pregnant at the time. Overall, it was a pretty good day. The whole weekend was actually quite nice. On Saturday I went to the Detroit Institute of Arts (by myself!) to see a special exhibit. It was one of my birthday gifts from Adam--a day to myself to go to the museum. I'm not sure if that was because he was being thoughtful or that he just didn't want to go. Let me tell you, it was amazing--I spent a couple of hours perusing some incredible paintings. One of the highlights was part of the museum's permanent collection--an enormous mural by Diego River, housed in a large room called the Rivera Court. It was just overwhelming to see. I can't describe how huge this thing is--here's a picture so you can get a glimpse of its scale.
Moving on--later that afternoon, Adam, Lily and I went to the park and threw the Frisbee around--Lily didn't participate so much in that--she just chilled and watched us for about half an hour. I must say that Adam's Frisbee throwing ability has improved quite a bit over the years. Sunday was cold and rainy, alas, but it was still quite nice. Lily surprised me with a wonderful gift--a good night of sleep (which is the same thing she gave me last Christmas, but I'll take it). Adam gave me cold, hard cash to spend on whatever I wanted (mainly because I tell him something new I want every other day so he had no idea which thing to get), and the double CD set of Ghostbusters I and II (kind of an inside joke)--what a great husband. He also had sent me a beautiful bouquet of flowers on Friday.
On Sunday he took care of Lily all day at church and that afternoon so I could just sit back and relax. You might note that Lily has become much more photogenic when having her picture taken. She gets very excited and just smiles as soon as we whip out the camera (which happens quite a bit around here).