8.23.2010

Back in action!

So heres whats been up:

First off, i am almost positive i have the best little traveling baby. We have been on 3 vacations this summer and every time he's done amazing. 

No screaming fits on the plane, putting up with new people and places for days on end, having to travel in his carseat for 3 hour trips to Maine, Denver and back, etc. 
Hes such a champ. 

Heres where we went on those vacations:
NYC for the Tony Awards. 

Amazing. Incredible. 

The whole little family went, were there for 4 days, and stayed at the classically beautiful Intercontinental Barclay on a top floor 2 room suite. The room had a fireplace people. I kept all the windows open the entire time so we could enjoy the beautiful sounds of the city, and thus found if you leaned out the bathroom window (which of course i did about 5 seconds in) you could see the entrance to the Waldorf Astoria! 

 family on the hotel bed. their first time in NYC! 

Sidenote: see how the yellow of babys shirt matches the yellow of my sweater? im officially THAT parent. On special occasions, his outfit always indicates towards mine....

We spent our days wandering and seeing the sights of the city. Ry had no real interest in doing the overly touristy things like going up in the Empire State Building or going to see the Statue of Liberty b/c Silas is still so young and waiting in lines all day is not our idea of a good time, so we skipped those. Instead we got real Italian in little Italy, marveled at the open air fish markets in Chinatown, walked around Times Square at night, visited with friends, saw Billy Elliot (for free thanks to the Broadway League!), rubbed elbows with Broadway stars, ate hot dogs from a cart in Central Park, & put Silas on a bunch of oversized stuffed animals at FAO Schwarz:

jungle baby. 

The trip was full of amazing, surreal moments. i especially loved saying "i'm here to pick up tickets from the Tony Awards and the Broadway League" and having the concierge study me for a moment. As we were staying at the hotel sponsoring the Tonys, i like to tell myself he was checking to see if he recognized me from a show :)  


After that, we drove up to Maine for my aunts funeral. She passed away after a long and painful battle with cancer, but is now in the arms of her Savior, which makes all the difference for those of us still here. 

here she is doing emergency surgery on my wedding cake, 
after it slid halfway off the base and semi-collapsed while being transported to the reception site.
It was henceforth known as "the pisa cake".

A full, emotional week - but wonderful to spend with family. We traveled as a pack that week, laughing and crying all together. We picked strawberries, celebrated Ryans birthday, made donuts (ScareList check), saw the house my mother grew up in, made a New England clambake with 5 lobsters and 7 pounds of clams (ScareList check), went to aunt Paulies for a 4th of July cookout, & went out to great uncle Pauls farm where Silas saw horses and chickens for the first time: 



A few weeks later Ryan went on a business cruise while i was back in New England for the wedding of my cousin Sean and his beautiful bride Kim:


Lovebirds. 

sleepy baby at the wedding, 
and further proof of "that parent" syndrome. 

another first. 


The final trip of the summer was to Florida for my best friends wedding and THAT glorious occasion gets a post all its own. Stay tuned!