Whistler 2015

After wonderful trips to Snowmass in 2011 and 2013, we decided to mix things up for our 2015 ski trip out west and go to Whistler in British Columbia, Canada with the Hyatts and the Mettenbergs.

It was a funny weather year for a ski trip in the western half of the continent.  The east had one of the coldest winters in years, temperatures were even in the single digits in DC the week of our trip, but the west experiencing a relative heat wave.  There wasn't much fresh snow at Whistler, but there was plenty of skiing in the high alpine of the two mountains to keep us busy, and we couldn't complain about the sunny skies and pleasant weather at the base.

Nora & Gigi spent the week together in Ski Camp with instructor Glen, who according to the girls was from London and 21 which is 'very, very, very young."  They did a great job advancing from the magic carpet the first few days to skiing down the 'big mountain' by the end of the week. The best part though may have been the 'unexpected surprise' of running into us parents on the slopes and showing the dads the amazing tree fort.

The boys -- Owen, Kaden and Liam --were all in their own groups for lessons.  Kaden kept coming back with reports of various black diamonds he concurred, Liam cruised through level three of ski camp, and Owen was ready for level four by with stories of his own experience on a black diamond by the end of the week.

For the rest of us, the days on the slopes were wonderful, and the evening were filled with friends, food, hot tubs, olympic rings, VR, and a little more than our fair share of Munchkin.

In closing, we all need to remember the words of Edward, Nora & Gigi's ski camp buddy from London, "Glen, why are there so many gondolas in the world?"








(click here for all the pictures)

City Museum!

The blog post on our trip to St. Louis to visit the Mettenburgs had one major omission: our visit to the City Museum. The reason was of course that it was all too much for one post. When we told people we we're planning a visit to St. Louis for Spring Break, the one thing that kept coming up was the amazing City Museum. When Joe & Cate concurred, we knew we couldn't miss it, so on Monday morning we visited one of the most amazing museums we've ever been to. Museum probably isn't quite the right word for the place, it's nothing like the museum exhibits we're used to in the Smithsonian; instead, it's more like a giant playground.

Outside there are dragons and old planes in the sky that you are invited to explore via a series of ladders and tubes of rebar. Crawling through an archway five stories in the air you spy a giant ball pit with no clear entrance. What at first seem like architectural or decorative elements quickly become places to climb on and clamber over. Slide down a roof, find a secret spiral stair, jump into a giant ball pit.

As the day started to warm up (to an unseasonable mid 90's), we went inside to find slides, tree-houses, whale mouths, giant hamster wheels, magic shows, secret tunnels and caves. Owen's favorite part was entering into the mouth of the whale, which led to a complex series of indoor caverns. As Joe put it, this is the kind of place where you see a tiny hole in the floor, and you feel compelled to get down on your knees and crawl through it to see what's on the other side. In the case of the whale's mouth, the caves led to a central room with a large crystal formation in the middle and an opening above that revealed the remains of a spiral delivery system left over from the old shoe factory that previously occupied this space. Of course this needs to be investigated, and sure enough, climbing up through the caves to a series of stairs reveals the dirty and rusted spirals, and eventually you reach the top to find a 10 story spiral slide! The exhausting climb to the top was worth it, so much so, Owen and Gigi did it 3 times!

Eventually, Elaine and Cate took Nora home for a nap, and Joe and I stayed to explore some more with the big kids. By the end of the day we were all exhausted and thoroughly impressed with the City Museum.



(click here for all our City Museum pictures)

7 Springs

We didn't have any big ski trips out West planned for 2012, but we couldn't let the winter go by without getting in some skiing. Once we saw that Owen had a four day weekend over my birthday, we decided it was the perfect opportunity for a little East coast ski adventure, so we rented a condo right on the slopes at Seven Springs in Western Pennsylvania.  This winter has been incredibly warm, and the week leading up to our ski trip was no exception as the temperatures in DC were pushing 70 -- not exactly prime skiing weather.  We weren't surprised when our first day on the mountain brought warm weather, and just a smattering of man made snow.  But this was plenty for the kids: Owen hit the lifts in ski camp, and Nora kicked off the day with her first ski lesson.  Nora was a bit nervous at first, but she had great balance on her skis, and she did an amazing job cruising down the little slope.  The speed scared her a little bit, but not so much that she didn't want to ride the magic carpet and do it all again!



After the warm weather on our first day, a storm rolled in and it snowed all day on my birthday. The snow was heavy and wet, so we were all a little soaked after a long day of skiing, but the storm brought about five inches of snow to the mountain, along with a healthy dose of winter beauty, and of course opening up a bunch of new trails.  Nora skied with us in the morning, showing off her new skills, and Owen spent the day in ski camp before skiing with Daddy at the end of the day.  Elaine and I took advantage of our time without the kids for a little skiing on our own, and a lovely birthday lunch at Helen's.



Our last day on the slopes was Super Bowl Sunday, and the weather cleared up for a beautiful sunny day on the newly snowy mountain.  Owen spent the day skiing with us before having a private lesson in the afternoon.  He took on a few intermediate blue slopes, and started speculating about when he would be a better skier than Mommy ;-)

Hopefully we'll make it out West for a ski trip next winter, but this was a great little trip, and I have a feeling we'll be doing it again on our next 'off' year.

(click here for all the pictures)

Austin

Last Friday was a professional development day for DC teachers and Monday was conferences, which meant that Owen had a four day weekend. We decided to run afoul of the DCPS attendance policy and make it a five day weekend in order to accommodate an overdue trip to Austin.

Which meant we had to pack a lot into five days.

There were three separate ice cream trips (at two locations), seven restaurants (including the site of our first official date) and three museums (only two of which involved dinosaurs). We saw the clock tower from a distance, saw my dissertation chair up close, and posed with an animatronic president.

Custom-made antelope, rabbit & pork sausage, huckleberry compote, sriracha aioli, cheddar sausages were consumed as well as taquerias and some serious Texas Bar-B-Que. Livestock was inspected (though none were harmed in our subsequent brunch). Longhorn paraphernalia was purchased and worn. Dinosaurs were sat upon and admired from a distance. Pools were swam in and naps were missed.

And there were cows. Lots and lots of cows.

But mostly we were able to catch up with some good friends and relatives that we haven't seen in a few years (or in the case of Brandon, Anneke and Asa, since May). Thanks to Bill, Katherine, Billy & Sarah who drove up from Houston; Shane and Laura who put off packing for a trip and playing with their new iPhone 4S to meet us for dinner; Brandon, Anneke & Asa; and Kelly, Channing, Calder & Wright who managed to not get sick. Finally, a special thanks to Uncle Truman & Aunt Janis, who let us crash at their place for a couple of nights, provided our kids with all sorts of diversions and got up at the crack of dawn to make us breakfast tacos before we headed out to the airport. We had an amazing time and we hope to see you all again soon.

(click here to see all the Austin pictures)

India

Last week I went to India to speak at what I thought was the Enhancing Capacity for Low Emissions Development workshop, but after a long series of meetings and discussions at the U.S. Embassy and the Indian Planning Commission (about which I've probably already said too much) turned out to be the Joint Indo-US Workshop on Economy-Wide Analysis for Low Carbon Strategies.

I left DC on Friday afternoon, flew to Chicago, and then took a 15 hour flight over the North Pole to India.  The flight went smoothly, I managed to get some sleep and even got to see the scenic views over the desolate mountains of Afghanistan before landing in New Delhi on Saturday night.  The jet lag was a bit tough, I kept waking up in the middle of the night with my body convinced it was the middle of the afternoon.  The upside of this was that with three 24/7 cricket channels available, I learned a fair amount about limited overs, leg by wicket, silly mid on, and the third man.

I had the day free on Sunday, except for a prep meeting in the evening, so I hired a car and driver to take me to Agra for the day to see the Taj Mahal.  It was a long four hour drive to Agra, but it was certainly worth it.  The Taj was even more impressive in person than it appears in pictures, the white Indian marble gleams in the sunlight, and the beauty of the fine detailed relief carvings and endless designs of inlaid semi-precious stones show why it took 20,000 workers, 1,000 elephants and 20 years to complete.  In the words of the Emperor Shah Jahan himself:

The sight of this mansion creates sorrowing sighs;
And the sun and the moon shed tears from their eyes.

After seeing the Taj Mahal, I explored Agra for a while and saw some of the beautiful carvings and inlaid marble work that is still done by the descendants of the artists who worked on the Taj itself.  The trip back to New Delhi took a couple extra hours due to an accident, and I learned that I never want to attempt driving myself in India.  The upside of this was that I missed our seemingly unnecessary Sunday night prep meeting.

The rest of the trip was all work, a read-in meeting at the U.S. Embassy with USAID, a meeting with the Indian Planning Commission (which judging from the reaction of the locals, was a bigger deal than I realized), two days of the actual workshop, and a day of follow-up meetings with the Indian modelers.  The most interesting part was the local transportation in Delhi, we rode around in tuk-tuks, little motorized rickshaws, that were terrifying to ride in (they seemingly obeyed no traffic law), but interestingly enough had all been retrofitted to run on compressed natural gas to improve the air quality in Delhi.

I'm glad I was able to add India to my list of world travels, but it was tough being away from the family all week.  Thankfully, technology has progressed since my last trip abroad, and I was able to use Facetime to see the kids and Elaine each day.  They'd call right before bedtime in DC, which was 6 am in India, and we'd end and start our respective days with smiles from halfway around the world.

The trip home was even longer than the trip there.  I left Delhi just after midnight on a 15.5 hour flight to Chicago (over the North Pole again) landing at 5 am, followed by a four hour layover, before finally getting back to DC around noon.  But the hugs and smiles from Owen, Nora and Elaine when I got home made all the weariness of the road melt away.

(click here for all the pictures)

Beach Trip 2011

It's been a few years since we've done a proper beach trip. We did a big beach trip with friends back in 2005 before Owen came along, in 2007 we went to the Outer Banks with Joe & Cate (where Owen showed his early interest in body boarding), and we did a quick weekend trip to Bethany beach in 2008. But our last big vacation with the Hyatt and Pearson clans was to the mountains instead of the beach, and it was long past time that we introduced Nora to the ocean, so we tagged along with Mom Mom and Grandpa Don on their biannual trip to Duck in the Outer Banks with Aunt Katherine and Uncle L.

I grew up going to the Outer Banks almost every summer with my family and with my best friend Brendan's family (our mom's were close friends from their days back at the University of Texas, and we'd been friends since birth), so it was nice to go back the beach with family.

Owen took to the beach like a fish to water -- he asked to use the boogie board the first day there, and fearlessly rode the waves (with just a well timed push from daddy to help catch them). Even being knocked over and rolled by crashing waves didn't dampen his enthusiasm -- and he even managed to pick up a few fans. Nora on the other hand, was a little more nervous about the water. The first few days, she was perfectly content to just play in the sand. After getting used to the place a bit, she decided it was alright to try swimming in the pool, and she would adorably yell, "I'm swimming" to whoever cared to listen. On our last day at the beach, she finally was lured out into the waves when Mommy and Owen were out playing in the ocean. She held on tight to Daddy the whole time, but had a smile on her face as we jumped to ride over each passing wave.

Given how much fun the kids had, we'll have to make sure we don't go so long without a beach trip again. I have a feeling we'll be back next summer.



(click here for all the pictures)

Snowmass

Our ski vacation began rather ominously. On our way to the airport, Allen announced he had a conference call which made checking in the two bags and skis as well as going through security with 2 kids under the age of 5...interesting. Once he was finally off the phone, the kids were fed and we were on route to Denver, things looked promising, except Nora refused to nap and would scream unless we allowed her to watch Dinosaur Train on my i-phone. Both kids crashed on the flight to Aspen, but while Nora woke up as soon as we landed and preceded to scream unabashedly, Owen remained asleep while we got our luggage, boarded the shuttle to the condos, and even when the driver had to stop short to avoid hitting an elk and he fell to the floor. We finally arrived at the condo (as it snowed heavily), got the kids in bed and after a brief exchange with Allen's friends, crashed around 11 pm MST (which would be 1 am EST).

Only to discover the next morning that Owen had a fever.

Now, Owen is typically a one day fever kind of kid, which is fortunate because he's also an aspiring Christian Scientists who refuses to take medicine. Alas, this wasn't a one day kind of fever. Owen maintained that he wasn't actually sick but rather just tired and bored, hence his sleeping roughly 20 hours a day while Allen and I alternated parenting duties and skiing. But by the third day of trying to force Motrin down him only to have him spit it on us as his temperature climbed higher and our days in Snowmass dwindled, we finally took him to the professionals at the Snowmass clinic who, after ruling out strep, the flu, pneumonia and failing to get any Tylenol down him despite four adults holding him down, advised us to go the suppository route and head to the ER if the fever didn't break.

But it did, and finally, four days into our vacation, it really began. Owen went to ski lessons; Nora went to daycare and Allen and I were able to ski together (until he ditched me for some black diamonds) along with Nabeel, Megan, Chris, Elise and Billy.


Despite the medical drama, we really had an amazing time with the Hyatts, the Pearsons, their offspring, and Billy. The kids (Kaden, Liam, Hazel, Owen & Nora) interacted adorably, particularly after Owen was fully recovered and they were able to build their "fun house" together. The adults traded off skiing partners so that the more adventurous (Allen and Nabeel) could get in some fresh powder and fast runs before opting for more scenic runs with the less ambitious crowd (Megan, Chris, Elise and myself) and Billy even missed his heat in the "Men's Ski Slopestyle" at the Aspen/Snowmass Open just to hang out with the crew. There were lots of late night dinners (after the kids were asleep or at least in bed) and some even later night viewings of "Dan vs" with Chris providing some color commentary, but mostly it was just a chance to hang out with some of our favorite people who we don't get to see nearly enough.

It ended all to soon (though the Hyatts did manage to extend their stay a few more days...) but hopefully well go back in another year or two. After we've made sure Owen has had all his shots...




(click here for Allen's pictures)
(click here for Nabeel's pictures)
(click here for the full slideshow)

Chistmas 2009 in Iowa

At 8:50 on Christmas morning, Owen awoke, walked past the stockings and tree to his grandparent's kitchen and demanded a bowl of cereal. He promptly ate 2 spoonfuls of Cheerios and then declared he was going back to sleep, which he did, until 11:30. After another trip to the kitchen for some more cereal, he finally declared he was ready to open presents shortly before noon. 

It was actually pretty appropriate given the holiday has largely been a series of fits and starts. The weather meant that Cousin Caitlin (along with Uncle John and Paxton) had to come down Monday rather than Thursday in order to meet her god-daughter but that Auntie Ellen had to work. It meant that Uncle Bernie couldn't come at all. And it meant that Grandma Z's Christmas dinner for 18 was more of a Yuletide lunch for 8. 

But eventually gifts were opened, candy eaten, and visiting done including a playdate with second cousins Ethan, Simon and Grace. Owen and Nora got a lot of extra time with Uncle Dave and Aunt Kara and eventually Uncle Steve and Aunt Becky made it along with cousins Olivia, Maura & Sam.

 

 

(click here to see all the pictures)

Sledding in Iowa

Our original travel plans this year were drive from DC to Katherine and Lee's house in Cleveland on Saturday December 19, and to drive on to Iowa the next day. However, on Friday morning we woke up to a forecast that called for up to two feet of snow to fall in DC starting that night, so we amended our plans, quickly packed the car, and hit the road on Friday afternoon to beat the snow. While this was clearly the right decision from a travel perspective, it saddened us (well Allen and Owen at least) to miss the blizzard '09. According to our neighbors (who thought they were getting a great deal when we told them they could use our house for their family who were coming into town, but ended up having an extra house to shovel out) 18" of snow fell in our neighborhood. It surely would have been great fun to play with Owen in the deep deep snow, but as a consolation prize, we did get about six inches of snow in Iowa, and went sledding at the pond with cousin Kent, and later in Iowa City with Olivia, Maura, and Sam. All and all, Owen's first real sledding adventure was a big success.

Iowa

We did it. 28 hours round-trip in a car with a potty-training 2 1/2 year old and a 7 months pregnant woman. This was not a roadtrip for the meek or for those that can't handle listening to multiple readings of The Cat in the Hat Comes Back. No accidents (either vehicular or urinary), no speeding tickets, and Allen even managed to take a conference call despite Owen belting out "Step in Time" while watching Mary Poppins in the back seat with Mom Mom. And it was worth it for an all too brief a visit to the homeland. We had two nights in Cleveland where Owen was able to release some pent up energy with Aunt Katherine and Uncle L. We managed to get in a trip to Des Moines to see Ethel (sans Allen who had to work). Shared some quality Pond time both with Owen's and Allen's cousins. Had all sorts of fun with Grandpa and Grandma Z. Owen had lots of play time on the farm (he even got to drive the tractor, though that almost ended disastrously and reaffirmed Iowa's good sense to not issue licenses to the under-3 crowd) and got to feed Kendra's horses. We even convinced Uncle Bernie to make a trip down to see us in order to get some adorable Owen time (which we neglected to capture on film since Allen was working again) and for Elaine to beat him in a Russian Bank grudge match. We're thinking that next summer we'll try and coordinate the baby's baptism with the Fawcett Sweet Corn Festival and make it a two week stay. Until then, feel free to enjoy all the pics here.

 

It was the best of times...

We'd made plans to attend our niece Olivia's First Communion in Chicago a couple months ago. We didn't realize at the time that I would be horribly ill that weekend and that Allen would be under a White House imposed deadline. We made it to Chicago (though Allen arrived 9 hours later than Owen and I after missing the flight for a meeting with White House staff and flying stand-by) and we're able to attend the festivities (though Allen was working on the analysis throughout most of the day with only a slight reprieve for breakfast and the ceremony), but it was a bit of a haze for us all. In the end, Olivia looked beautiful and is now a Communicant, Owen had an amazing time with all of his cousins, the White House approved Allen's analysis of the Houses' latest climate change legislation,* and the only the losses were my voice and Owen's beloved baseball hat (which got left on the flight back).**

* For the wonky out there, the above link is to the executive summary, here's where you can find the rest of the analysis.

**Also possibly Panda, the Zimmerman kids' pet hamster who went MIA after the party. We're hoping he shows up soon.

Boston

Taking advantage of a business trip I had last week up to MIT, Elaine Owen and I all spent a few days up in Boston visiting our friends the Hyatts. It had been a while since Kaden and Owen had seen each other, so it was great to see the boys have such a fun time playing together. We also were excited to finally meet the wonderful but seldom blogged about Liam Hyatt.

The whole trip was great fun, but the highlight had to be our outing to the Boston Children's Museum. As if the museum itself wasn't going to be enough fun, we got there by walking through the snow to the bus stop, riding the bus, riding the T, and walking across a bridge before finally arriving at the museum. Not wanting to be overshadowed by the journey, the museum immediately awed Owen with it's gigantic undulating wood and steel net climbing structure. Kaden led Owen on an adventure climbing through the structure as Nabeel and I looked on somewhat enviously. The boys tired themselves out climbing the structure, and playing all over the museum, before we went around the corner to meet Megan and Kaden for a delicous lunch at Flour.

All and all it was a great trip, we always love seeing Nabeel, Megan, Kaden and now Liam too, and we're looking forward to our next adventure together.

(click here to see all the pictures)

Thanksgiving Leftovers

There was turkey. There was pie. There was a "naked boy" doing laps in the livingroom. It was a fun-filled Zimmerman Thanksgiving with Grady relations Bernie, Blaine, Caitlin, Ellen & John there for an afternoon of food, family and bird puppets.

The Zimmerman cousins, aunts and uncles all left by Friday afternoon, but the Fawcetts were just starting to gather and so on Friday night Owen had a playdate with his second cousins Ethan and Grace (though Grace slept through most of it). The boys hadn't been together since Owen's baptism and it's amazing how much trouble they can get into now that they're both mobile. Fortunately, there were a lot of us around to intercede when necessary, and the boys had great time together.



(click here to see all the pictures)

Harvest

Owen really lucked out when Grandma and Grandpa Z moved to Iowa. Just this trip he's already ridden in a tractor with Grandpa Z, ridden in a semi-truck twice (once with cousin Kent and once with uncle Ken), and ridden in a combine harvesting corn. It's almost too much fun for a little boy who loves diggers, trucks and the like to handle. 

 

(click here to see all the pictures)

Milk Shots

Earlier this month Elaine and I were having a glass of wine with dinner, and Owen expanded on his descriptions of what we all eat with this little gem, "Mommy Daddy drink wine. Owen no drink wine. Maybe Aunt Katherine's house." Well it's not quite wine, but Katherine did have Owen doing shots of milk this weekend when we stopped at Cleveland on our way to Iowa for Thanksgiving.

Messes in Texas

We try to make a trip to Austin each Fall, in part to replenish our Longhorn gear, revisit some of our old haunts and get our Tex-Mex fix. But mostly we go to visit Pop Pop, who hasn't been feeling too well of late. Owen had a great time rooting for the Horns with his Pop Pop Pop, and his presence brought a huge smile to Pop Pop's face and induced a fair amount of naps (though not enough for Owen).

Owen was a bit of a wild child this trip, terrorizing Aunt Janis & Uncle Truman's dachshund Brandy and Nana & Uncle Don's canine brigade. From a play-date with Calder Lewis on the roof of Whole Foods where they managed to scare away all other children, to a stop at Amy's Ice Cream where after a sip of milk chocolate milkshake he announced it was "party time" and proceeded to run up and down South Congress pausing only long enough for additional sips of said milkshake (we finally had to throw away the offending milkshake lest he implode), we seemed incapable of reigning him in. We might have hit the "terrible" phase of his two-ness.

Don't get us wrong, we aren't planning any trips to Omaha soon, but we might check out a few episodes of Suppernanny.

(click here to see all the Austin pictures)

Austria

Last week I was in Austria for the Energy Modeling Forum 22 meetings hosted by IIASA at Schloss Laxenburg. It was pretty cool to have our meetings in a castle that was once the summer residence of the Habsburg family. Not to be outdone by the meeting place, our hotel was also an old castle, Schloss Weikersdorf in Baden. The meetings were productive and the setting was gorgeous, but I'm glad to be home with Elaine and Owen and without any big trips on the horizon.

(click here to see the pictures)

Beach Trip

2008 is an off year for our biennial beach trip to the Outer Banks, but Owen had so much fun at swimming lessons and playing in the sand at the Pond that we couldn't let the Summer slip away without a quick trip to the coast. Mid-September is a dicey time for a beach trip, but Summer held on for one last weekend of gorgeous weather, and while Bethany Beach isn't quite the Outer Banks, it served us well for frolicking in the waves and leaving footprints in the sand. Owen was much more adventurous with the Atlantic than last time around, delighting in running on the beach with the surf licking his toes, but he still preferred to hold on tight to Mommy or Daddy while facing the crashing waves. Hopefully next year we'll get the crew back together for another beach adventure.

(click here to see all the pictures)

No, it's Iowa...

Living on the east coast it's easy to forget how idyllic summers in Iowa can be. The weather has been perfect, the fruit has been delicious, the tractors have been fun, and the pond has been wonderful as usual. Owen has had a blast running around Grandpa and Grandma Z's house, playing in the grass, chasing butterflies and bunny rabbits. We met Leanna and Troy's baby Grace on Monday just six days after she was born (and just five days after Owen's birthday). On Tuesday Owen charmed all the folks at the retirement home in Des Moines visiting Ethel and Karen. Uncle Bernie drove down on Wednesday and Ken & Helen came over for yet another celebration of Owen's second birthday (this one involved ice cream cake). Thursday convinced Owen that Iowa is a great place when he got to drive Uncle Ken's tractor (daddy took the wheel while turning, but Owen was very insistent that only he was allowed to shift gears). On Friday we kicked it up a notch when Owen got to ride in cousin Kent's digger and play on cousin Kent's firetruck! After the firetruck, a last trip to the pond to play in the sand and pick fresh plums (Owen took a few bites out of ten different plums which doesn't bode well for his diapers) preceded one more visit with Leanna, Troy and baby Grace. Now on Saturday we're driving back to Aunt Katherine's house, then on to DC and back to life in the big city.

 

(click here to see all the pictures)

On the Road, Part II

After packing a day's worth of activities into a single morning at Aunt Katherine's, we assumed Owen would be sufficiently tired to sleep at least half the way to Uncle Steve & Aunt Becky's. Alas, he was awake before we entered Indiana and growing restless by the time we hit Illinois. By the time we reached the door, he was about to implode from pent up energy. Fortunately we were greeted by all of Owen's cousins plus a couple of their friends who led Owen to their newly installed jungle gym and offered him every toy known to mankind plus some baby bunny rabbits nesting by their mailbox . Two hours later, Owen was ready to crash and after a book read by Olivia and a song sung by Maura, he was out for the count.

Sunday began with outside play with his cousins followed by church, which was essentially more outside play for Owen as he was so filled with the Spirit that he couldn't be contained for more than a few minutes at a time. After church we headed to Spring Valley where we saw horses, a six day old calf, and a plucky rooster. Then it was back to Steve & Becky's where Uncle Dave & Aunt Kara joined us for a barbecue while Owen napped. He woke up just in time for presents and a beautiful cake courtesy of Olivia who decorated it herself and was extremely generous with the food coloring, so much so that Olivia, Maura & Sam had to give Owen a bath immediately afterwards. After several more hours of running around outside, we finally packed up the van and headed to Grandpa and Grandma Z's, who were eagerly awaiting our arrival.

(click here to see all the pictures)