Busy Times

I am one day away from a 16 day spring break right now. Normally, my excitement about spring break is somewhat tempered as I actually like the rhythm of my work life. This year, however, with the addition of Mo, Gram being in school full days and my job search in addition to my regular job, I am pretty happy to be about 18 hours from my break. I've been doing a great deal of traveling (at least by my normal standards) and it's taking its toll. I revisited a school today and had a great day there. I got to teach a class and work with a Smart Board for the first time. They are pretty cool instruments, I must say. Next week I have another revisit planned. One of the things that is easing the sting of this whole move is how chipper Gram has been about the whole business. He is excited when we go on weekend jaunts to check out prospective towns and he is already excited about the new friends he is going to make. I sure hope he holds on to this positive attitude for a good long time. He has been rating prospective homes by the pizza in the area. He's got his priorities pretty clearly aligned at this point...

Finally - A New Photo

A recent photo of Mo. I'll upload my photo software again soon

New Adventures

Well, most of the past month has been consumed by the search for a new adventure in our lives. We found out last month that we will be moving on. My relationship with my school has not worked out the way I had hoped so we're on a job search now. When Gram and I went to Boston, I interviewed with a number of schools and I have been visiting campuses over the past two weeks. I have had three on campus interviews and I have another one scheduled this week. In addition, I have a conference call coming up this week as well. This whole process is flattering, exciting, scary, and exhausting. We hope to have some idea of where we will be before too long. We took an impromptu trip last weekend to visit one campus and may do the same this weekend as well.

Mo is beginning to crawl, unfortunately she only moves backward so far. She gets pretty mad as she moves farther and farther away from her target. Gram continues to be a fantastic big brother and we are so thrilled at the way he cares for her.

We're Stil Here

It's been far too long since I took the time to write. I did not anticipate how hectic life would feel when we all settled back to work. Between Gram's school and afterschool schedule, Beth's work and annual campaign drive, Mo heading to daycare, and me being back at work and tutoring in the evenings, we have had a VERY busy life. I should take a few minutes here and there to write...

Today Mo and Gram and I will be home bound pretty much all day. We are getting a genuine snow storm here. Last weekend there were rumors of a foot of snow and we got about three inches. This time it is the real deal with snow seriously piling up on us overnight. It is supposed to snow throughout the day today. Schools were closed and so is Mo's day care, so I am on daddy duty today.

Gram and I are due to drive to Boston tomorrow around lunchtime, so I hope this does not interfere with those plans as I have a conference to be at first thing Friday morning. We'll be staying at Woogie and Tara's house and they invited Gram to join in the fun so he can play with his pal Grant while I am at work.

Mo is sleeping through the night more than half of the time these days which is a pretty glorious change in our lives. She comes home tired from day care and she is eating rice cereal and oatmeals now to fill her belly. The next big stage for us is to move her crib to our guest room since Beth and I are sleeping on a mattress on the floor in the guest room. Mo was waking up whenever she heard the bed creak at all. It's been quite some time since I woke up in my own bed in the morning.

Our main computer at home is in need of some serious repair so we do not have new photos loaded anywhere. I need to load the software to another computer to transfer some photos for updates. Gram hasn't changed much in a month but Mo sure has.

Big Week

So, this week was the first time in our lives that all four of us had to get out of the house every morning. The good news for the week:

A) Mo LOVES her day care. She does not cry in the morning, she is happy when we get her in the afternoon and she is sleeping better (a bit)
B) Mo is now eating semi-solid food. On new year's day she had her first rice cereal and she is eating that every day now in addition to bottles and breast feeding. Yesterday we introduced some pear and she seemed pretty pleased.
C) Mo has a tooth! One of her bottom teeth broke through overnight.
D) I remembered all of my students' names and remembered the appropriate math.

I've been tired this week. A different kind of tired than what I was experiencing the last seven weeks. We had another rousing game of Mouse Trap last night and, once again, I was the first one caught. This time Beth won and Gram had a tough time with that. He's got some learning to do when it comes to dealing with disappointments in his life. sigh...

Family Traditions

So, Beth has been pretty intent on us starting some traditions of our own and the two that have taken root thus far are Pizza and Movie night on Fridays and family game night on Saturdays. Gram gets to choose the movie on Fridays which is rather unfortunate for us. We have seen the Garfield movie recently, a Sonic video, and, last night, we were subjected to Kirby (an extremely odd pink blobby character that does not talk and whose primary 'power' is the ability to inhale everything in sight.) It is beyond description, really. We just finished playing the game Mouse Trap which Gram chose at a cute little toyshop on a recent family outing. He was so geared up as the machine was being built during the game and he trapped Beth first. Then he and I ran around the loop repeatedly before he caught me. He jumped in the air yelling 'VICTORY' as the trap came down on me. I suspect that he'll have some pretty happy dreams tonight.

Gram's Excellent Bowling Adventure

Our friend Richard sent the following highlights from the bowling adventure yesterday.