In what could be the longest build-up to a surprise, S invited us to join her and J last night for what was originally to be J's 2008 birthday/anniversary present: a hot air balloon ride! Due to repeated inclement weather last summer, the ride was postponed to this year -- and this time the weather did not disappoint, with a beautifully warm evening, clear skies, and apparently favorable air currents.
Having never been on a balloon, I was surprised by how quickly they're able to get these things deployed and up in the air; we drove out to an open field (right next to a small airport runway, where we kept seeing the same plane taking off, dropping parachuters, circling around, landing, and repeating). They dumped the basket sideways off the trailer behind the van, unfolded the chute, ran a diesel fan to fill it with air, and then blasted some seriously warm propane flames into it to warm the air. Within 10-15 minutes, the balloon was full and ready for passengers. A second balloon was deployed at the same time, and they took off just ahead of us.
Once we were aloft, the most noticeable thing was just how quiet it was. (Well, when the propane flames weren't flipped on for an altitude gain - that was loud, and pretty warm!) The next thing was of course the incredible view -- we could see Mount Rainier, Mount Hood, the Snohomish River, and as we rose, the Seattle skyline, the San Juans, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and even out to Vancouver Island! Though we were just standing in a small canopy without harnesses or seatbelts, it felt totally safe. Our path (as the pilot explained, pretty much dictated by the wind currents) took us over the Snohomish River, past some lovely forests and homes, and a total of six miles downstream in about 45 minutes. We flew over a prop plane, past another (which tipped its wings in greeting), over a few beach barbecuers, and actually even gently grazed the top of a tree before coming in for a smooth and soft landing in a farm's grassy field. Pictures are worth a thousand words, so I'll stop talking/linking now and just show a few. :)
Far more pictures than I could ever get away with directly including in the blog can be found here.
What an amazing experience! Even the slugs that were in the landing field (which we didn't notice until Meh found one on her foot; I was still climbing out of the canopy while S bravely plucked it off of Meh) couldn't dampen the fun. On the drive back, the pilot explained the history of ballooning and some of the early French escapades and modern accomplishments involving balloons. When we got back to the ballooning headquarters, they had champagne waiting for us, and with a great flourish, used the sword-slicing-bottle technique to open and pour the wine. It was a perfect end to a wonderful and special evening - thanks so so much to J & S for inviting and including us!
For some time, Zachary has been imitating animal sounds -- it started with the dog ("ah-ah!"), snake ("ss"), and chicken ("koh"). A few weeks ago, he picked up monkeys (random combinations of "oo" and "ah") and ducks ("quah quah").
This week we've got two more to add to the mix. One of his favorite toys is a cow puppet that actually moo's on pitch when you close its mouth. Earlier this week he brought his cow puppet toy to Meh, and when asked what it said, he responded "mmm". Hey, it's a start.
This morning, he and I were reading his newest book (which he incidentally selected all by himself from his growing library). When I turned to the page with an animated cat and asked him what a cat said (expecting only his expectant smile), he responded with a high-pitched "eeeah". It was repeated a little later for mommy, one of the cutest sounds yet!
I've started getting funny looks (and/or people trying to do advanced math in their heads) when I say Zachary is "almost 22 months old", so I think it may be about time to move up to years when describing his age. Certainly the weeks and days that the blog has been tracking were interesting at one point, but are now just pretty unmanageable. So with that in mind, version 2.0 of the Zachary Age Counter (or ZAC) is now featured in the stats bar at the right of this blog. We'll see if it totally blows up on the first of the month, or on his birthday, or for Y2K10 or something.
Summer has finally arrived for real! In addition to yard and park playtime, Zachary still loves rocking in the hammock, though at times he tries to sit up in it. Here's a typical relaxing evening for the little man, even down to the unbuttoned pants:
It was a wonderful weekend celebrating my cousin M's college graduation! Well, more of an end-of-week than weekend, since I arrived late Wednesday night and headed back Saturday morning. Anyhow, it was great to be able to stay with family, enjoy the mostly mild Maryland spring days, visit the interesting and entertaining (and only moderately kitchsy) International Spy Museum, sample foods from manyyummy restaurants, and spend time with bubbie (Zachary's great-grandmother), aunt I, uncle S, my mom, brother (who I hadn't seen since his wedding!), cousins M and M, and their dog M. And I even got to see high school friend J, who's doing well and is actually living in the same building complex where my grandparents once lived.
Alas, the fortuitous bump to the direct flight I enjoyed on the way there wasn't meant to be on my return trip -- and besides, I thought to myself, the direct flight departed 4 hours later anyway. So of course in the city where I stopped over, the connecting plane was late arriving, thunderstorms kept it grounded for an hour, and in the end, I landed in Seattle 30 minutes after the aforementioned direct flight. There was even another flight from Denver to Seattle leaving 50 minutes earlier at the gate directly across from mine (which as it turns out, beat the thunderstorm entirely), but since the two airlines aren't partners, nothing could be done to make a switch happen.
On the plus side, the timing did allow me to accept an airport pickup from visiting friend M, and I got to spend a bit more time M & K before they headed back home this morning. Zachary had a blast with M & K as well, and apparently has a new favorite Japanese children's song:
We'll miss M & K, and wish them a safe journey home and the very best with their pregnancy and beyond!
I'll never understand airlines' insistence on overbooking. Are they so pessimistic about their own on-time performance that they assume a bunch of passengers will just miss their connections? Even when it's the sole flight of the day for the airline from this airport, and likely most passengers are originating there?
On the flip side, I am *so* not complaining. I'm on my way to Maryland for my cousin's graduation tomorrow and Friday, and when I heard the gate agents start sweetening the pot for volunteers to be bumped, and mentioning they'd rebook on other airlines, I stepped forward. You see, another airline happens to have a direct flight where I was going, so even leaving 3 hours later, I'm getting:
A direct flight arriving 8 minutes later than the connection would have landed.
A flight on an airline I actually fly, so tasty miles accrual.
A flight voucher (though lamely, you've got to actually go buy your ticket at the airport in order to use it - what is this, the 1950s? They can handle electronic ticketing but haven't figured out online voucher codes?)
Free meal vouchers -- three of them in seemingly random $9, $7, and $5 denominations. I grabbed lunch, and the restaurant employee was trying to find me an extra buck in snack foods to maximize voucher use, since you can't get change from them. Sadly, nothing was that cheap.
Plus it's more uninterrupted time to knock out e-mails. I've finally gone from 260+ down into the 30s, though as soon as I connected to the internet, I was back up to 60. Ack!
Apparently they still bring pilgrims -- in this case, from Texas.
It's hard to believe that already nearly a year has passed since friends M & K moved to Fort Worth. We've kept in touch through phone calls, e-mails, and duelling blogs, and I had that visit soon after they arrived, but it was still wonderful to find out that they were coming to town this weekend for an M-delivered lecture tomorrow. And it was even more exciting when we learned that they are expecting, and that Meh and I were allowed to host a baby shower for them!
Meh of course had been planning for months, but everything really came together in the last few days, with amazing efforts both artistic and culinary. Art-wise, Meh's crafting generated a vast array of cute baby-themed decorations adorning everything from windows to the dining room chandelier; a trivia game matching character names to children's books; and tiny vials of mints and chocolates for the attendees. Which brings us to the food, which was simply beyond -- tea sandwiches, scones with fresh whipped cream, a lemon tart (thanks to friend S for his recipe!), brownies, cookies, cupcakes... Wait, why am I enumerating them when one of Meh's artistic deliveries was a lovely menu?
Zachary had taken a long morning nap (a side result of his continuing 5 am wakeups?), so he was rearing to go for the afternoon, running around between (and occasionally into) people's legs before moving outside and circling the porch and yard with or without his pushcart. I think he went in his swing about four times as well. Entertaining him was a pretty fulltime job, so I didn't get to spend a ton of time with the other shower attendees, but it seemed like everyone had a wonderful time and enjoyed getting to catch up with M & K, celebrating their pregnancy, enjoying the incredible spread, and soaking up some of the beautiful summer weather.
Yesterday we headed back to ye Swedish flat-pack furniture store to pick up the little man's new table and chairs, an early birthday gift from mima and papa! They're super cute, tiny, and he of course has little interest in sitting on/at them at the moment. But still, the chairs got approval when he tried to push them around the room. Time to pick up some felt pads for the feet.
On the drive down, we were listening to a little man CD that we hadn't heard in quite some time. When "Old MacDonald" (heh, gotta dig the Wikipedia link) came on, Meh mused that we had at least five versions of it, including pseudo-James Brown and Italian-translated covers.
So it was of course statistically bound to happen: this morning, Zachary's randomly shuffled music mix on the Xbox happend to pick three separate versions in a row - out of 200+ tracks no less. When the third rendition came on, I had to skip to the next track. There's only so much barnyard music one can handle at 5:45 in the morning.
As you might have noticed from the super-clear (and actually new) images in this post, our new camera arrived on Thursday! It's tiny (I know, we'll try to avoid a repeat of our last small camera's fate) but otherwise very similar to the last camera. The main new feature I found was that you can actually zoom while shooting videos. But it's digital zoom only, and no refocusing, so our mileage may vary. All of the pictures so far have of course featured Zachary. Yesterday, Zachary and I played at the park, and all three of us were hard at work preparing the grounds, house, and tasty foods for our friends M & K's visit and their baby shower later today!
Zachary finally broke out of his three animal noise rut yesterday, and was monkeying around (oh, the pun!) for mommy. Here's a video she grabbed; apologies for the quality, we're still back to our old camera until the new one arrives (hopefully later today!)
Meh also tried some trivia out on the little man to surprising results; she asked him where his hair, ears, eyes, and nose were, and he was able to point at all of them successfully on the first try. (For his nose, he 'pointed' by jamming his thumb up into a nostril - so cute, though hopefully not the start of a habit!) In general we've been working on getting him to identify and count items in his books, though he prefers to hold our finger and make us do the actual pointing.
Despite the blackout paper on his curtains, Zachary has been getting up earlier and earlier, often seemingly even preceding the crack of dawn. Meh was wonderful about getting up with him yesterday so I could get a bit more sleep - at this rate, the little man is going to drive us to a 9 pm bedtime of our own! At this point we still can't really get him to stay up much later than he does; he's always ready for sleep by 6:30 at the latest, and attempts to stay up later generally lead to lethargic semi-play with toys and books. Some child care folks say the key to sleeping in later is going to bed earlier, which I think would really get crazy for the little man - when would we put him down, 5:45? Other friends suggest a little top up of milk before bedtime, which we may attempt if this trend continues. *yawn*
Zachary is certainly a creature of habit, and at times he will become very displeased if things aren't just so. We've seen this in his choice of books (bedtime has specific favorites; if you offer him a book he doesn't want, the hand sweeps across and pushes it away), the way he wants to play legos (we assemble them, he disassembles -- though lately he's started snapping them together himself), and of course the specific foods that he most enjoys (though again, he does occasionally try something new, even if it's just bringing it to his lips before an outright rejection).
His drinking cups similarly must conform to exacting dimension and delivery requirements; milk in a sippy cup (or if we're feeling adventurous, occasionally in an open air cup), juice in one of these nearly airtight straw/lid cups. (The air-tight seal is a double-edged sword; lately he's been pushing on the springy plastic lid, which forces up juice through the straw and makes a mess. It also doesn't work so well in pressure changes on planes; on the flight home from Florida, the juice cup soaked his shoes and socks, which were sitting alongside it in the seat pocket.) On the occasions where we've forgotten to bring the right cup and try to serve milk in a juice cup or vice versa, he looks at it suspiciously, will occasionally take a sip, shudder, and then hand it back to us while shaking his head.
Incidentally, we've been noticing lately that Zachary will always carefully put his cup on a table or counter top if he's done drinking from it. The other day I found one on the front window sill that he likes to look out of. The converse is also true though; if I'm filling his cup on the counter, he's been starting to make attempts to grab it before I can get the lid on.
Anyway, the straw juice cups are certainly rugged, but they were bound to eventually start to fail after nearly a year of constant use and dishwashing. The straws started to crack, and rather than let the little man get his first taste for plastics, we started to pitch them. When we got down to one last week, I took the little man to the store that allegedly carried them. No dice, though he did have a fun time looking around at everything and checking out things I put into the shopping cart. The next day, we ran to the next-closest store, and again no dice - and then struck out for a third time stopping at a store on the way back from lunch with friends S & J. Of course, this was the moment I noticed the third straw was starting to split.
I finally found some stocked at an online store, and purchased three, feeling mildly silly that I was paying as much for shipping as for the cups themselves. Still, it seems worth it -- today, Meh tried to give him juice in a 'flip straw' cup (exact same brand! exact same cup shape!) we had in the house, and he frustratedly rejected it. He also shook off three other cups, and Meh eventually had to revert to the old on, from which he happily drank his grape juice/water mixture.
I keep forgetting to mention the milestones - Zachary's cuspids (canines) are coming in on both the top and the bottom, which of course means more hands in the mouth and occasional unhappiness. On the verbal front, he's still very talkative, and has started to say 'uck!' at times, which we think might mean 'truck'. On the food front, he's actually been seen using a fork to pick up food (often just to pull it off the fork with the other hand, but we'll take it one step at a time), and will very occasionally surprise us by eating something we offer him that isn't on his top ten list.
In the playtime department, he continues to be more and more interactive -- books, singing, dancing, playing the piano, and going to the park are among his favorite activities (the way he runs to the stroller when I ask if he wants to go to the park or for a walk is priceless). He and I have also developed a fun little bathtime game where we take turns saying various sounds and words that end in 'ah'. He of course starts with the classic 'Dah!', but then moves on to 'blah', 'crah', 'quah', 'xa', 'hnah' (a very impressive one), and other sounds. The game almost always gets him laughing, particularly when it takes me a second or two to come up with one I haven't already said (my extra rule to keep things challenging for daddy).
Meh brought home a little potty the other day, donated by one of her generous coworkers. It's very cute and multi-colored, though I'm not sure about Zachary showing an interest in training any time soon - he's still completely satisfied running around wearing a diaper comprising at least half his weight. And he often gets angry when it's time for said diaper to be changed, despite songs, distractions, and games. Not entirely related (though who knows?), both Meh and I have been subject to, um, 'accidents' in the past few days when we remove the diaper and wait more than a precious few seconds before grabbing a new one from the other room (Meh) or getting him into the bath (me).
Blog reader (or at least blog commenter :) demand for pictures of the flipped rooms and our portraits has been high, so I busted out with our old camera (and yup, a new one has been ordered) and snapped a few shots.
As the final part of the flip (well, for now at least!), I installed three new overhead light fixtures -- and no electrocutions to show for it. Score.
It was bound to happen at some point - as I went to create our last post, I noticed a shiny new tab labelled "Monetize" had popped up in our blogging website. Yes, now you too can add targetted advertising to your blog readers. But if that isn't working out for professional news sources, why should it work for blogs with like two readers? Granted, there are plenty of blogs with enough hits that you'd think maybe some ad revenue would be possible, but you've got to wonder just how much money they're going to generate. For that matter, I'm wondering what kind of ads AdSense would serve up based on the contents of our blog. This may be worth the experiment just to see how confused and inappropriate the ads might be.
For the past few months, Meh has been hinting excitedly about a surprise that she's been planning for me for our anniversary. Our anniversary is in July, so I was impressed and/or worried that the project was being worked on this far in advance. Granted, I've done the same to her for years, with what she apparently considers maddening hints of 'I think you're going to like this' and knowing (but not revealing) smiles. Anyway, so I figured turnabout was completely fair play, and I looked forward to July. But then it was explained that it was actually both a father's day and anniversary present, so was it okay if she gave it to me in June? And then, I think Meh got a little impatient and excited to show me, because this morning, there they were, displayed beautifully on our fireplace mantel!
Meh commissioned an artist to create a portrait of us (for our anniverary), and a second of the little man (for Father's Day). What an incredibly wonderful, personal, and totally unexpected gift! She apparently worked with her on picking out pictures, drawing approval sketches, picking the color palette, and creating the final portraits. I was completely oblivious to what might be in the large cardboard tube that arrived a few weeks and her several trips to Michaels last week for matting and framing.
Here's the little man pic, along with one of the photos the artist used as a reference. (Portraits without even meeting the subjects in person? Impressive!)
The pictures are simply perfect on the mantel, and we've all been enjoying them. Best presents ever, and I certainly don't mind if they're a month (or two) early!
I've mentioned that the fireplace project was one of the few big things we'd really wanted to change when we first moved in. But Meh had many more plans around the room; the fireplace was just the catalyst or centerpiece or something. Anyhow, this week, we flipped that room (which was the dining room) and Zachary's play room (our 'music' room, though the number of toys made stepping to the piano a bit treacherous at times). Friends J and S graciously came over and helped me lug the heavy upright piano and the awkwardly wide dining room table around, and we moved Zachary's toys and their related storage as well. Yesterday morning he was mildly confused when I brought him down to breakfast to sit in the same high chair in the same spot, but with the whole room transformed around him. And after breakfast, he was confused and annoyed when he couldn't find his books and trucks; Meh had moved the books into a cabinet and the trucks into what had been his treasure chest of books. Once we showed him where everything is, he took to it well, and was zooming his push cart through his new much larger play area much of the day. His behavior around his "library" is my favorite; Zachary now casually walks over to the book cabinet, opens it, and browses his collection fairly thoroughly -- before bringing us the exact. same. book. every time.)
Today we drove down to everyone's favorite (well, perhaps not everyone's? :) blue and yellow Swedish store to pick up a few more pieces to complete the room transformation. Naturally Zachary fell asleep on the way, and we busted out the old classic ergo (I hadn't worn him in months!) for an attempted transfer. He was awake, but happy to snuggle with daddy for the walk around and through the store. We stopped for lunch at the halfway point, where I enjoyed a yummy pear cider and Zachary sang in between snacking on cookies and strawberries while sitting in a fashionable European high chair.
(With all of these sporadic links, I'm starting to feel like this post is the blog equivalent to that scene from Fight Club.)
In the end, we got a new chandelier (featuring both electric lights and candleholders) for our now-dining room, a little love seat that the little man will practically climb onto for story time, and a nice big shaggy carpet on which the little man likes stomping around, scattering his legos, and pushing his cart, which thankfully doesn't get stuck. I really do think he likes the larger space, as he spends a lot of time playing in a room that just a few days ago was very boring indeed for him!
I wish I could say that every time we travel it gets a bit easier to sort out the logistics. More accurate would be to say every time the logistics change a bit; on this trip, I thoughtfully attached that stroller converter wheely thing to Zachary's carseat so we could wheel him around the airport, only to have to disassemble it at security and add an extra fifteen minutes to our checkpoint experience. But one thing that I have figured out (to the apparent amusement of fellow air travellers) is that when the wheels are attached, the most effective way to lug around his car seat is perched on my head. This actually gives me back both of my hands for bags, and I only really lose a minor bit of peripheral vision. This even works when boarding the plane, though checking row numbers is a bit of a challenge.
This background is offered as a preface to our return trip from Florida. Again, we connected through Houston (thankfully thunderstorm- and delay-free this time). Zachary of course had waited to fall asleep until 30 minutes before the previous flight had landed, and somehow he remained asleep through the entire taxi to the gate. When he was still asleep as Meh pulled him out of his carseat, I became that dad, lugging four bags on my shoulders and the car seat on my head as Meh carried sleeping Zachary and a backpack through the terminal heading for our connection - naturally at the furthest possible gate. Impressively, he continued to sleep solidly through the entire intervening time, as well as the boarding, takeoff, flight, and landing. Only when we left the jetway and entered SeaTac airport did he wake up and start a round of loud 'Dah!'s as he looked around happy but bleary-eyed. I think it'll be a few days before the jet-lag wears off; after collecting our luggage and car, we got back to the house at 1:30 in the morning, and he was up by 4:30. Good times. But all in all, Zachary was an incredibly good travelling little man on this trip!
Incidentally, the return trip set a new record for questions and compliments about that Travelmate seat adapter -- I think we may have single-handedly sold a dozen more of them, if the company wants to send along a finders fee...
We had a wonderful rest of our trip to Florida, spending some excellent time with mima and papa and enjoying some quality beach time (where Zachary could quite possibly have slept all day if we hadn't decided that a 4-hour visit was about enough) and excellently kid-friendly parks in southern Florida. At one park in particular (which we visited twice, it was so enjoyable for the little man), Zachary got to walk a nature trail (really more of an interpretive walk based on the way he kept doubling back and zigging back and forth), controlled an enormously complex mechanical lego ferris wheel contraption, rode a carousel with papa and myself (he loved it, we'll have to get mima and papa's pictures!), and ran around a giant wooden castle-like structure with water features in the middle. But of course, his favorite feature remained their giant swingsets. Consistency, consistency.
We've long debated the merits of our digital camera. It's a handheld and very convenient to take with us, but we don't experience the excellent focus and crisp quality that our D-SLR-bearing friends get. Not to mention our camera (along with most other non-professional/non-prosumer cameras) doesn't even take photos in a standard print ratio, leading to partially cropped images when we send them out to get printed. (My favorite new feature of the photo-printing sites is the option to actually print in a 'native' ratio, even though that's like 4" x 5.3")
The thing about a camera being able to fit in your pocket is that, well, it will occasionally be found in said pocket. This morning, Meh went to do some laundry, and both of us forgot that the camera was still in the pocket of a pair of shorts that ended up in the washing machine. By the time I realized, it was already in the spin cycle. Papa had the excellent idea to use a hair dryer to help dry it out, but there was liquid behind the screen and it wasn't responsive. I've been occasionally trying out the camera during the day as it dries off, and for a while, each time something more happened: a quiet buzzing noise; all of the indicator lights coming on; the lense partially opening; and at long last, the screen allowing me to view pictures on the memory card (those at least seem wholly intact), though with a very retro vertically rolling screen. But it hasn't gotten beyond that, and I think we may indeed have to move on to the next family camera soon. For now, it'll be up to mima and papa to document the continuation of our Florida adventure, which has been very fun for the little man, us, and his grandparents alike!
Alas poor PowerShot, we knew thee well. Here's what could be its final picture, little man doing his silly little upward-squinting 'smile' in response to the camera and mommy's high-pitched "smile!" suggestion.
Zachary has had a cold since, um, his first birthday? It's not quite that bad, but he's definitely gone from cold to cold - sometimes a cough, sometimes a fever, sometimes a runny nose, sometimes a stuffy nose. We've taken him in to the doctor after a few of the rougher days and nights, but they've generally said he just needs to keep getting rest and liquids. A few weeks ago, he actually got something different - an ear infection (in both ears actually) - and he got to do a round of antibiotics. As he recovered from that, he developed another cold and cough, which seemed to be on the mend until just before our marathon travel day on Friday. Then the nose began running again, and the, um, productive sneezes resumed. We exhausted at least a box of tissues before leaving for the airport, and it continued into our Florida trip.
After another rough evening last night, we decided it would be best to get him checked out to make sure the ear infection hadn't come back. So today we went to the pediatrician that one of mima's coworkers uses. I knew we'd approve from the moment we walked in the door; the lobby was set up like a cute little main street, with a sign saying 'Well St.' in one corner and 'Sick Ave.' in another, and cartoonish storefronts and traffic lights on the walls. (I actually incidentally sat with Zachary in the middle of Sick Avenue before I even noticed it, though I did notice another parent with a coughing kid sitting on Well Street.) And Aladdin on the TV screens for us to sing along with while Zachary smiled in our laps.
When we were led back to the exam room, the main street theme continued - the central nurse station was decorated like a giant truck (to Zachary's approval), and the room we waited in was brightly colored. Oh, and the theme of oranges was everywhere -- now I know oranges are a major Florida product and symbol, but would you walk into a doctor's office in Seattle and expect to see coffee beans or Microsoft logos even on the information signs? (Incidentally, nice rendering of steaming and heavy-looking briefs.) The little man wasn't happy to be weighed or measured, and hollered every time the stethoscope came near him, but the friendly doctor was happy to report it was just another cold that rest and liquids would help cure. The trip did give us the opportunity to update Zachary's stats - up 2 oz. and 1" since his last visit. (And yes, the doctor reassured us that it's perfectly fine that his weight is fairly stable for the last few visits.)
Taking the need for good old fashioned home remedies to heart, mima and papa took us to one of my favorite New York-transplanted kosher delis for lunch afterwards; true to form, Zachary declined both soup and a tasty looking potato latke. I'll admit it, I forced myself to finish the latke for him - yum!
We're in Florida! Zachary, Meh, and I braved the journey to scenic West Palm Beach to visit Mima and Papa, as well as (let's see if I can enumerate them fully) nanny (Zachary's great-grandmother), poppy (Zachary's great-grandfather), Aunt K, Uncle H, and Aunt M. Oh, and we met cousin E as well, as part of a gala family barbecue dinner at mima and papa's house this evening. But first, on to the epic adventure that was our journey to the Sunshine State.
Unfortunately, none of the airlines seem interested in plotting a direct route from Seattle to the Palm Beach or Fort Lauderdale airports. Not that these are gigantic hub cities or anything, but still - shouldn't every other city in the country have a direct line to beaches and sunshine? The only real 'direct' option is Miami, which is still about 2 hours to Mima and Papa's house, and has fares that truly reflect the non-competition, going for $650+ when I checked months in advance. So every time we visit, we get to enjoy a different airline's hub city and a few extra hours tacked onto the journey. Sometimes this is actually a nice break. Not so this time.
One big problem I have with the hub and spoke model is that you end up flying to arbitrary locations that may or may not be even remotely close to a straight arc from departure to arrival city. We at least are usually able to avoid the ones that are obviously in the wrong direction (though a friend once explained how this is a great way to exploit the airlines via mileage runs. Honestly, I fly enough that I don't want to invent additional flights just to get more miles.) This time, we picked scenic George Bush Airport in Houston. Unfortunately, we also picked a week where the airport would apparently be fully shut down multiple times due to thunderstorms -- and yup, we got to enjoy one of these events.
Zachary for his part was amazing on the flights - happy, talking up a storm, playing with his toys, and eating occasional snacks in between walking up and down the aisles with us. We did have a wardrobe malfunction, where his outfit leaked onto mommy pretty early into the first flight, creating some early stress (only one backup outfit) and discomfort (no backup outfit for mommy) that was a good preview of the stress of the extended delays that would ensue. As we approached Houston (on time), the captain came on the PA, announcing Houston was closed due to thunderstorms, and we were going to do circles for the next 30+ minutes waiting for it to open. When it didn't in 60 minutes, we were rerouted to Austin to refuel. Of course, every other plane heading for Houston had been rerouted as well, so we sat on the tarmac waiting for the 2 fuel trucks on duty that day to deal with the thirty planes sitting around us. 90 minutes later, we were done refueling, and had to wait for clearance to land in Houston before we could take off. 30 minutes later, we were back in the air for the short flight back to Houston.
By this time, the crew had exhausted most of the onboard supplies (not to mention themselves; an attendant had to waive his right to go off duty 16 hours after starting his shift, in order for the flight to not get scrubbed in Austin), including drinkable water. So Zachary got his first taste of fizzy water with a splash of juice. The faces were precious puckers and shivers of surprise(unfortunately not photographed), but he clearly wasn't a fan. We landed in Houston to an obvious state of bedlam - lots of cancelled, delayed, and still-not-arrived flights. And here came the second problem of the hub & spoke model: when every flight connects through a single city, late incoming flights mean later outgoing flights. Our own outgoing flight (due to leave two hours before we'd landed) hadn't even arrived yet.
Zachary still handled things pretty well, first strolling around in his car seat's wheeled adapter and then taking the adapter itself for a push around the terminal. But even he was totally fried and eventually needed to be held by mommy while she sang the same song over and over. The flight finally arrived, unloaded, re-boarded, and left, and Zachary again did very well and even slept a bit (in between more wokka wokka-ing) as our now long haul to Florida wrapped up a little after 3 am, more than 4.5 hours after we'd been scheduled to arrive, and 15+ hours after we'd headed to the airport. Oh, and here's a time lapse set of videos of Zachary's in-flight commentaries:
We all slept pretty late today; even Zachary wasn't up until 10 am. He's been very happy to see mima and papa, and has played a lot with them and their fun toys (including a toy piano that he plays and sings along with in a very cute way). And when the family arrived for the barbecue this evening, they brought his new favorites of this trip: pushable cars and trucks (did you expect something else?), both finger-sized and Zachary-sized! Through most of dinner he was pushing his Spiderman pushcart around the patio, to the delight of the guests. He was still pretty exhausted and was ready to crash before folks had left, though I think we'll get to see nanny and poppy again later in the week. A wild and full first day!
At last, our long-term fireplace remodel project is wrapped up! This was the one feature of the house that Meh really wanted to replace when we bought it; the previous owners (or perhaps two or three owners ago?) had turned their fireplace into some kind of altar/shrine thing (see below), complete with pipe organ-looking tile and a giant but only mildly effective wood-burning stove.
Various other projects (many invisible - crawl space, insulation, etc.) had distracted us, but finally Meh put her foot down and we got things rolling back in, um, Feburary. Unfortunately, when they went to install the new gas fireplace insert, the company that makes the inserts had gone bankrupt, and the model we'd planned on using was nowhere to be found. A futile search ensued (since other models were more expensive), but we finally switched models to one that was nice-looking but not bank-breaking, which thankfully didn't require the fireplace to be re-reframed first. Then the fabrication of the hearth and sides, then the mantel, and finally repainting.
The construction crew wrapped up the final paint touchups on Tuesday morning, and we enjoyed a cozy fire that night that warmed up the entire downstairs. Zachary isn't quite sure what to make of it; Meh says he'll hover just beyond the hearth and smile at the insert before running off in the other direction.
Our neighbors tore down their fence in preparation for building a new one. This did two things: made me mortified that the dishevelled state of our backyard is now on display, and allowed me to get at some of the weeds and brush near the property line. While Zachary swung happily this afternoon, I raked old leaves and dead brush. While I was working, a tiny bird flew suddenly out of the stone wall. When I peered at the place she had been, I saw a nest with three tiny eggs in it.
Friend T showed me a website that helped me identify the bird as a dark-eyed junco.
I have spent Zachary's nap time for the past two days doing yard work and weeding the front garden. It's no fun. It was even less fun since the neighbors hired three professionals to do it for them. So, as they quickly and efficiently tidied the neighbors' yard, I yanked weeds pitifully with my tuchus in the air, making little progress. One of them actually asked me "who was winning." So tonight, I decided to take revenge. We ate the weeds. Dipped them in honey mustard and ranch. So there.
In what could be the longest build-up to a surprise, S invited us to join her and J last night for what was originally to be J's 2008 birthday/anniversary present: a hot air balloon ride! Due to repeated inclement weather last summer, the ride was postponed to this year -- and this time the weather did not disappoint, with a beautifully warm evening, clear skies, and apparently favorable air currents.
Having never been on a balloon, I was surprised by how quickly they're able to get these things deployed and up in the air; we drove out to an open field (right next to a small airport runway, where we kept seeing the same plane taking off, dropping parachuters, circling around, landing, and repeating). They dumped the basket sideways off the trailer behind the van, unfolded the chute, ran a diesel fan to fill it with air, and then blasted some seriously warm propane flames into it to warm the air. Within 10-15 minutes, the balloon was full and ready for passengers. A second balloon was deployed at the same time, and they took off just ahead of us.
What an amazing experience! Even the slugs that were in the landing field (which we didn't notice until Meh found one on her foot; I was still climbing out of the canopy while S bravely plucked it off of Meh) couldn't dampen the fun. On the drive back, the pilot explained the history of ballooning and some of the early French escapades and modern accomplishments involving balloons. When we got back to the ballooning headquarters, they had champagne waiting for us, and with a great flourish, used the sword-slicing-bottle technique to open and pour the wine. It was a perfect end to a wonderful and special evening - thanks so so much to J & S for inviting and including us!
