Bye bye bee bo

When Oliver was born he received "The Belly Button Book" from Ethan. Like Ethan, Oliver loves the book. However, being a summer baby Oliver has been confused by the ending of the book - for those who aren't familiar with the book, when winter arrives belly buttons (aka bee bos) hide. This past weekend Oliver took the first step to understanding - he tried on his fancy new snow suit.

He was a bit dubious,

and a bit slippery - we tried sitting him up in the chair, but he kept sliding down.

Keeping up with the Doyle's

There are the Jones's and then there are the Doyle's. Here in Newburyport everyone is trying to keep up with the Doyle's - and we are no exception. Therefore when we heard that the Doyle's were going to tear down their deck and put in a patio, and that they were going to take down a tree, we decided that we had no choice, but to do the same. So on Saturday we called Anna in from her pirate ship and called my parents down from Maine, and we all spent the day working in the backyard.

Oliver, supervised by Anna, did a wonderful job wielding the crowbar and tearing up the deck.

Oliver also, with help from his Papa, manned the chainsaw and took down a large branch (the best we could do -- we don't have a tree to take down).

In addition to her supervisory role, Anna spread some fill over the lawn (and into the house).

Thanks to hard work from Anna and Oliver (actually from my dad and Davis) the area is prepped and ready for the stone to be delivered.

Although this last picture may look like utter destruction, it is actually an ad. We have clean fill, tree branches, and lots of scrap wood (some rotten, some not) -- all free to a good (or a bad) home.


Wonder what project the Doyle's are going to do next...

New duds

When we went out to Block Island a few weeks ago we packed a couple pairs of Oliver's favorite pajamas knowing that Hannah and Molly would be, as usual, dressed beautifully. Well, rather than be impressed with his airplane and duckie pajamas, Molly and Hannah, and their parents pointed out Oliver couldn't straighten his legs -- his favorite pajamas were too small for him. Davis and I took a look - they were right - so when we came home we put the favorite pajamas away for another time.

Then, a couple weeks ago, Melissa, John and Molly came over for dinner and pointed out the the pajamas Oliver had on were "a little snug."

A couple nights ago Davis called me upstairs to Oliver's room - the pajamas Davis had put Oliver in - the ones that had seemed so big a few weeks ago - were too small. Like the ones he had worn in Block Island, these pajamas prevented Oliver from straightening his legs. We took a look in the pajama drawer - with the exception of fleece pajamas, the drawer was empty.

Google box emergency.

Here are a couple pictures of Oliver in a pair of new pajamas. Thought we'd post the pictures so that people didn't think we were into a new kind of foot binding thing. Yes, Oliver is, somehow, in the 97th percentile in height - but no, Davis and I are not jealous and we are not trying to stunt his growth through too-small pajamas.

You'll notice the kicking he's able to do in these fancy new monkey pajamas.

Three months

When I was in elementary school summer vacation seemed like an eternity - a wonderful eternity. When Oliver was born, three months ago today, I thought that my maternity leave would feel similar - I was wrong. The past three months flew by and today I headed back to work. Our original plan was for Oliver to head to daycare but, as luck would have it, his Aunt Elizabeth offered to take care of him. Recognizing that the day would be a difficult one, Elizabeth sent Davis and me pictures of what she and Oliver were up to throughout the day.

Here are the pictures we received-





As you can see, they had a pretty good day. As for me - although I missed Oliver, it was nice to use my non-mommy brain.

A BIG thank you

A few weeks ago we had a sweater catastrophe. Davis had made Oliver a wonderful sweater and had put some very special buttons on the sweater -- ones his grandmother had put on a sweater for him. After Oliver had worn the sweater just a handful of times one of the buttons broke. As fortune would have it, we met Evelyn King that same day. Evelyn came to the rescue -- she managed to fix the button. Davis has now reattached the button and Oliver is happy to be wearing a sweater that has two buttons (as opposed to the one button and dental floss - MacGyver style sweater he had been sporting). So a big thank you to Evelyn!


Evelyn is much more than a button-fixer - she is an amazing jeweler. I encourage you to check out her website and see the fantastic pieces she creates. Her site is www.evelynking.net