Chirp

I was working in the office the other night and kept hearing this chirping noise from a nearby fireplace. It went on for hours so finally I figured it had to be more than just a nest in the chimney stack. I went to investigate and there were 3 baby chicks that must've fallen down the chimney and landed in the fireplace and somehow got stuck. I rounded them up in a shoebox and Izzy took great interest in these 3 almost feathery friends. I took them outside and placed them in a cool spot that looked like it might have ample worms and where perhaps a parent bird might find them (I wasn't about to climb up the chimney stack). I checked back a few days later and the birds were gone. I hope that they were happily reunited with family but I can't help but wonder why we have a stray cat that has suddenly taken an interest in our yard...

Safety first

I've been taking Izzy out for more bike rides lately and she has become more accustomed to wearing her bicycle helmet. Her new thing is not wanting to take it off right away. Inevitably she ends up wearing it around the house for a while. This fortunately coincides with her over-confidence in her new standing-up and "kinda" walking skills so we let it slide. I'm not sure if she's been taking in too much of the olympic diving that's been on the TV this past week or what but she seems to think that her high-chair is a high dive. Needless to say, her first attempt at a head first dive resulted in a less than graceful landing on the kitchen floor with a nice bruise to prove it (where was the helmet then?)

Tractor pull

Thursday night we had the Pitts kids for the night. In an effort to convince Gavin that you can still have fun when your neighborhood friends aren't around, we got out the riding lawn mower and did our best attempt at Burger Farm's tractor rides. Although the garden is growing pumpkins, we passed that up and Michael went up and down the big hills, the driveway and along the back of the yard that no one seems to frequent.



All of the kids got their turn to "drive" and I'm pretty sure a fun time was had by all (even Uncle Michael)!



Near the end, Izzy was a little too overzealous and no longer wanted the kids to hold her in the back and kept trying to stand up on her own. That was mommy's que to step in and take her out. We waited on the rock for them to finish up. I love this picture of her face when she could hear the tractor coming up the driveway and finally spotted Daddy and the kids rounding the bend!

I can't stay mad at that face

Now I'm not usually one to "air dirty laundry in public" (something about about British stoicism, perhaps) but the other day Tiffany and I had a "disagreement". Anyway, I had to leave to pick some things up at the store and realized in my haste that I'd didn't actually know what I was going for (I, for some reason, am incapable of grocery shopping. I inevitable get the wrong thing. In fact just on Saturday I managed to buy skim milk, which I can't stand, instead of 1%...I digress) so even though we didn't quite patch things up before I left I would have to call Tiffany from the store to get the things she needed.

As I go to dial Tiffany I see this picture that I'd set as my wallpaper on my phone a few days earlier. All of a sudden any annoyed feelings disappeared as I wondered how on earth I could stay mad at this face!



One of the best parts of the picture is the look of admiration that Izzy is giving her mum, no matter how ridiculous she looks. The picture remains as my phone wallpaper incase there's a next time, I be glad to lose that fight too!

Love you babe, even in those sunglasses!

Boston or Bust

We finally ventured on our first trip alone since Isabelle was born. We packed her bag and sent her off to the Pitts house for the weekend (thanks again Trish and Bill!) and headed to Boston to see my sister who had just moved there.



We were driving through downtown Boston in our rental car looking for the station to pick Lucia up. Being the ever civic minded driver I pulled over for the fire-truck coming behind me and pulled over a little tooo far. One curb check later I was left switching out the spare tyre (tire for the locals) and ended up being an hour late picking up my sister. Great start to the weekend!



We eventually stumbled on my sister. As an aside, looking through the statistics for the blog the most common search term is "Lucia Gattuso". Not sure how you are the most popular person on our blog but congrats sis! Maybe we need a guest blog post to appease our readers.



We ended up in Salem (where it's Halloween everyday) here we are with a Salem witch.



This is the obligatory stop and America's oldest candy store where they still make Gibralters which were the first piece of commercially available candy. Apparently they never go bad, which is just as well as the bag we bought wasn't real popular and will probably be hanging around for quite a while.



We took our first peditaxi which turned out to be an efficient way to get across town (did feel slightly sorry for the driver as he peddled all three of us uphill).



We took a whale watching tour in Gloucester where we struck whale watching gold. We sailed into an area with a pod of about 13 whales which we knew was unique as the tour guide was way more excited than us (giddy schoolgirl type excited)! Less than 1% of these tours get to see as many whales in various breech positions (it was educational too okay). We had a... whale of a time.





We were back in Boston on Monday to check out the sights. We took a tour bus around and learnt all about the story of Paul Revere ("the British are coming") and ended up the beautiful Boston Commons and the famous Swan Boats.



There wasn't much time for actual relaxing on the trip but we did catch a few minutes in the Christopher Columbus park by the Boston Harbour.



While in Boston we stayed with our friends Jonathan and Eliza Fajen for a couple of nights and they introduced us to the excellent Italian cuisine in the Boston North End. We ended up in a quaint restaurant with great food.



Coincidently the same weekend we were visiting my sister my favourite band Coldplay happened to be playing in Boston (call me Travis). We rounded out the trip with an excellent concert. Viva la Vida!

Happyfeet / Bearfeet ... Proudfeet

Our very good friends, the Proudfoot family came into Cincinnati for a week of vacation. (The Proudfeet are Michael's other other family - living with them for a couple of years in England, they moved to Cincinnati and it's through them that we met).

Here's everyone. Oliver, Big Michael, Isabelle, Little Michael, Tiffany, Julie, Myles, Ben, Emily. Enjoying the warm Cincinnati weather.



The pool is Izzys favorite place. Here's our mischievous monkey playing about.



Myles and Julie celebrated their sixteenth anniversary the day before our sixth so Emily made a joint anniversary cake.



Little bit of history, The Proudfeet have a son Michael who was two when I came to live with them. To differentiate I was temporarily called Big Michael whilst we came up with a better name. The name, however, stuck and seems so ironic now that he is 15 and almost 6 feet tall!

We took in an old favorite, Kings Island theme park. The boys wanted to ride the biggest coasters in the park and us old-timers (Myles and I) had to put on our game faces and show no fear even when faced with an 80 MPH wooden roller-coaster hurtling downhill.



Our niece and nephew Abigail and Brandon could not remember the Proudfoot's name so they constantly referred to them as either the Happyfeet or the Bearfeet, but to us they will always be the Proudfeet.

6 Years of wedded bliss! - but who's counting?

So, we celebrated our sixth anniversary the way we began. Our first date was to Longhorn Steakhouse with Myles and Julie Proudfoot and Tricia and Bill Pitts. Myles and Julie came back to visit Cincinnati so we got the group together to recreate old times. Take a peek at this "then and now" picture!



The food was good but the company was better (just as it was back then). We never thought for a moment at the time that we would be heading back to the same restaurant seven years later happily married. I remember the first date like it was yesterday but at the same time cannot imagine a time without Tiffany in my life.

I love you sweetheart. Here's to many many more recreated first dates at Longhorn.