November

Here is is the middle of November and Thanksgiving is next week! My new business has been keeping me really busy, especially added in with Mike's work responsibilities. We are headed south for Christmas! Let us know if you'll be around- we'd love to see everyone. I don't have much time, but wanted to share this link with all of you-
Sneak peek at our new family photos

We had them done yesterday by a photographer friend who specializes in natural-light photography. We did our session at the Coast Guard Academy since it has been such a big part of all of our lives so far. This is all we have gotten to see of the photos, too, so you'll have to wait for the rest just like us!

October

Sorry I didn't realize it has been over a month since I posted! We have been VERY busy lately!

Ava started preschool at our local nature center. She goes two mornings a week and LOVES it. They have a different theme each week. This week was snakes, so they learned about the letter S and did snake activities (yes, including a visit with real snakes-right up Ava's alley). Here are some photos of her first day. They have tons of class pets-rabbit, guinea pigs, turtles, fish, and toads.

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We have been enjoying fall activities, including a trip to a corn maze. The trees are changing quickly now, and, believe it or not, we actually had SNOW last night! It seems way too early for this.

Sorry these are out of order, but I can't get the site to let me re-arrange them. There were not dinosaurs in the maze...we visited The Dinosaur Place and took a walk among life-sized dinosaur replicas.

Ava painted a pumpkin like a cow for a local contest. She insisted that it even have udders.

And now back to the maze...

My kids are glad I have short legs- they get new hats whenever I hem new pants!

In other news, I have recently started my own business selling lia sophia jewelry. You can visit my site at www.liasophia.com/christynewell. This is in part to fund our trip to Florida for Christmas, among other things! Yes, in case you haven't heard, we will be down mid-December!

Emerson's big news is that he is still a little guy...but with a big vocabulary. He amazes us daily with the things he repeats. You definitely have to watch what you say around him. He calls my purse "money." Tonight he actually said "elephant." He is only 18 months old! On the other hand, Ava has been recommended for a new speech evaluation by the school system speech therapist when we took her to a developmental evaluation a couple of weeks ago. She seems to speak pretty well to me and her teachers, but we're going to have it done just to be sure. If you would like to see more photos, visit my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/christynewell. And if you'd like me to do a lia sophia show for you, let me know!

Summer comes and goes...

Summer came late to CT this year, and seems to be already gone-just the way I like it. We have been enjoying daytime temperatures in the 70s and chilly nights in the 50s. At the beginning of August, Ava and I took a short overnight trip to NYC. We took in some free children's theater (which was excellent).

We went to Rockefeller Plaza for one of the free Today Show concerts (Jason Mraz). Word of advice...not worth waiting around for! They only do about 3 songs. We didn't go early, though, and were still able to hear the music just fine.

The kids were silly as always.

We spent several mornings at the (man-made, chlorinated, slimy-things-free) lake at the Navy base.

Mike figured out how to let both kids help him make pizza dough. He is much braver than I.

Ava is FINALLY back to smiling for photos, after a long break.

Emerson, on the other hand, is hard to keep still.

Mike had a birthday.

The kids are starting to play together (which sometimes results in Ava crying and Emerson with a handful of her hair).

And in a blink it was fall. We went this weekend to Lyman Orchards in Middlefield, CT to check out their sunflower maze.

We had clues to get us through without getting lost-we chose difficulty level "Tiny Tot" just to be safe.

Ava has made a new friend-this is Matthew. He recently moved to the area with his Coast Guard family.

In other news, Ava goes to orientation for preschool at the nature center tomorrow, and is looking forward to her first day with "only big kids, no babies" on Thursday. Emerson has been battling a very sore mouth (and we have been getting very little sleep). We thought it was due to his molars coming in, but took him to the doctor this morning and found that he has a mouth full of blisters (aka hand, foot & mouth disease). So he is now peacefully napping after his first dose of Tylenol with codeine, and we are hoping that Ava doesn't get it so she doesn't miss her first week of school!

Another month goes by...

...and I haven't made any new posts. Really, it's Facebook's fault. They make it so easy to upload photos that I often forget that some of you aren't on there! If you wanna try it out, you can see my page at http://www.facebook.com/christy.newell (although you may have to make an account to do it).

The first half of July was spent in Florida visiting family. We drove. It was long. Very long. But we plan to do it again at Christmas. It was finally summer in CT when we returned home (previously it was cool, rainy, and very much like living in Kodiak all over again...which wouldn't be a bad thing, but that's another entry entirely). We have been enjoying the absence of planned activities and venturing out to new places. Our favorites so far are the running trail around the lake at Mohegan Park in Norwich and the man-made chlorinated lake with a sandy beach at the sub base in Groton. We are also making new friends thru our local MOMS club and are going to our first official meeting tomorrow.

Mike was back at work for 3 days after vacation and came down with something. Turns out that the H1N1 (swine) flu was going around among the new class at the CG Academy, and he was sent home for 5 days in case he had it (at that point they had 37 confirmed cases). He was miserable, but turns out he didn't have what they thought he might. The test takes 4-5 days to come back. So long story short, we are now cancelling our long-planned trip to NYC next week since he has missed so much work between vacation and sickness. Of course, the hotel we booked was a great deal but non-refundable. Anyone want to use it? It's for August 6. I thought about taking the kids by myself, but I don't think I am that brave.

Here are a few photos. For more, visit my Facebook page. Really! It's not hard!

These are from our annual trip to Buttonwood Farms to see the sunflowers. If you look in the blog archives for the previous two Julys, you will see Ava's annual photo for comparison purposes. Emerson took his first one today.

June in Review

Sorry it's been so long since we've updated everyone! June was very busy for us. Mike was away for most of the month as a safety officer on a 40' sailboat for the Coast Guard Academy, doing distance racing. The longest race he did was Annapolis, MD to Newport, RI. The day he returned, his mom flew in and we got ready for our trip to Maine. Ava and Mike were slated to be in a wedding party there, so we headed up a few days early to enjoy Acadia National Park.

L.L. Bean in Freeport, Maine. A great stop with kids!

All Maine hotdogs are in a pink casing. Ava was happy that it matched her pony.

We went on a park ranger-led hike in Acadia. It was beautiful!

These are the rocks we climbed to get to the top!

Emerson fell asleep along the way.

Emerson's first time on a beach.

Ava loves buoys. She even posed with one.

We went tidepooling at a pink granite beach.

Nana and the babies. Poor Nana had to deal with a very sick Emerson while Mike and I enjoyed the wedding reception.

The cottage we stayed in.

Groomsman and flower girl

Ava sipping water in her champagne glass in the wedding limo.

May 2009

I realized that it's been a few weeks since I've posted photos! Mike has begun his summer assignment (racing 40-foot sailboats with cadets, not a bad gig if you ask me, or him!), so I've been trying to keep the kids busy.

We joined some friends at Captain Scott's Lobster Dock in New London for lunch a couple of weeks ago. Yummy fish and chips! They had a penguin, and Ava asked to have a picture taken with it. Why they have a penguin I have no idea, but here it is:
Here's Ava and her friend Saylor, waiting on lunch to be served.

Last weekend we went to an art show in Westerly, RI with a Bunco friend of mine and her two girls, 5 and 11 months. Ava had a blast hanging out with an older girl. They had free kids activities, so the girls got to paint their own jewelry boxes.

Emerson preferred to run around in his favorite shoes, sandals that squeak with each step he takes.

The main attraction was a fountain in the park, though. Emerson thought it was delicious.

Ava tried very hard to reach the water but somehow managed to stay dry.

Another Bunco friend, Sue, saw my mom's request on Facebook for us to take photos of our weekend's activities, so she also came to the art show, camera in hand, and had about 15 photos waiting in my inbox by the time we got home. Thanks, Sue!

The next day, we got a surprise return home by Mike for a few days. He was able to join us when we went to a Morgan horse farm in Old Lyme to see the new foals. Some were so new that they still had umbilical cords that hadn't yet fallen off! Of course Ava wanted to touch them all.

But then she realized that they have teeth. This one had just been biting the fence.

Emerson absolutely loves all animals, and spent the morning squealing at the horses.

We spent the next few days enjoying our finally-warm weather. Here's Mike, the most relaxed he's been since starting his new job last fall. The sailing is doing him good!

Daddy and daughter.

Watch out, here he comes!

On Thursday, Mike had to get back to the boat in Long Island. We decided to drive him there and make a stop in New York City. We just went long enough to ride the subway (a request from Ava-but she probably won't make that request again...it was too loud and scared her!), go to Toys R Us and ride the Ferris wheel, and stop by a bakery we saw on Throwdown with Bobby Flay (Levain Bakery, Upper West Side) to sample some of their famous cookies. Had I known that the 2 hour drive would turn into nearly 4 hours each way due to crazy traffic, Mike may have just taken the train instead! But the kids had fun, and we made it home by dinnertime. Now we have another 2 weeks til Mike returns.

Waiting for the Ferris wheel.

Going up up up.

We are preparing for a trip to Maine for a wedding the day after Mike gets back, and then will be going down to Florida the first couple weeks of July. The kids got new sunglasses for the occasion.

Ava dressed for church this morning...we didn't actually go to church, though, because all three of us now have a cold and decided it was best to keep our runny noses to ourselves.

Happy Mother's Day!

Our weekend was to begin with a day trip to Boston--Ava earned it by filling up her responsibility chart for a whole week, doing everything that she was supposed to. That is a really big deal in our house! The weather was predicted to be drizzly in the early morning and then clear up, but by the time we reached Providence (only half-way to Boston), it was pouring. We decided that since I wasn't feeling very good (allergies!) that we would play it safe and try out the Providence Children's Museum instead. We had a blast!

Ava's favorite exhibit was an entire room filled with water activities. Balls, water jets, boats, chutes, and whirlpools. They even provided tiny smocks for the kids.

Emerson especially enjoyed it and used the chance to prove that he is a crawler no more. He enjoyed the new view a couple feet higher than shoe-level!
They had a giant Lite-Brite.

Fake rocks to eat.

Even a wooden cow...

On Mother's Day, we were going to go to church, but Emerson had us up every hour all night long Saturday night crying and drooling. He has now done the same thing 3 nights in a row. We think he is cutting his molars, and having a really tough time doing so. Since he now walks, he has to switch to a new Sunday School room, and we figured that it was not a good day to have to try that out since he had so little sleep. So instead, we took advantage of the first sunny day in a week to spend some time outside. After going out to breakfast, we went for a walk at Bluff Point.

Poor Ava...Emerson doesn't realize that she isn't big enough for him to lean on!

He was SO excited to be able to wander around on his own!

In the afternoon we went to our favorite local farm/greenhouse that also happens to sell ice cream. Yum!

Ava got to give Emerson his first taste of ice cream ever. She was unexpectedly very nice about sharing with him.

Emerson fits well into the family. Not only did we find out at breakfast that he loves grits as much as his dad (born in New England but definitely has southern roots!), he also loves animals. here he is jumping for joy at the cows and sheep.