Someday, We Will Move!

Demolition work has FINALLY started on the Flanders house. Amazing, but true. We will move hopefully this year.

Here are some before photos:


And some after:

It turns out there is a lot of asbestos in the house, so that all has to get removed. You can see how dusty it is in this last photo. All the workers were wearing industrial strength dust masks, and of course me, Paul, the contractor, architect, et. al were not. Duh.

The house is in worse shape than we thought. One of the descriptors in the brochure when we were looking at this house was "good bones!"--ha, what a joke. One good discovery during demo was vaulted ceilings! So now we are getting rid of the attic to have high ceilings, which is fine by us.

Happy 2008

As promised, the moms got their night out on the wild town of Ocean Shores. The dads babysat and we went to the Quinault Beach Resort and Casino where we went completely crazy and ordered two rounds of drinks, onion rings, and played the slot machines. Woohoo! Afterwards we had a drink at the Green Lantern pub and conned this newly married bride into giving us two slices of wedding cake (they were in the midst of the reception when we arrived). The bar was shutting down early that night so we went back to the beach cabin as Paul and Frank were preparing dinner. By 11pm I was so exhausted I could have cared less about staying up until midnight and dozed in a la-z-boy while everyone else whispered in a dark room so as not to wake the two sleeping kiddies. Apparently some fireworks went off at midnight and I jumped up startled from the noise, asked why it was going on, and was very grouchy and puzzled about Frank offering me champagne. I have absolutely no recollection of this and only remember happily standing up to have champagne with everyone. And none of this happened because I was drunk; rather I am not used to staying up so late these days and am generally asleep by 10 pm.

So, another wild and crazy new years has come and gone. I don't miss the hangovers, that's for sure.

Cellar Raid Party

We decided to rent out the tasting room at the wine storage facility here in Portland where we stash our wine and had a great turn-out! Lots of friends from Seattle came down for the day, and one friend who never leaves the Eugene area even came by.

Here are August and Dad bellying up to the bar:



Lucky for August this was his seventh wine tasting, so he is becoming an old pro at this!



We are taking off for Ocean Shores, WA for New Year's Eve. Last year we did the same thing and it was the most sober New Year's Eve of my adult life, since I was 2 months pregnant at the time. Supposedly the dads are going to give the moms a break this year and let us go wild while they bottle-feed the little ones. I'll be sure to post an update on that next time around!

Travelling with Baby--Our First International Trip with August

Well, we made it to Ireland and back in one piece, and now a week later we are headed to NYC. Yes, we are crazy.

Everything went better than we could have hoped for; August slept really well during the day which let Paul and I see the sights, and he slept a lot in the car, which was great as we were able to get in several long car trips.

However, August thought the airplane ride, both going and coming, was just too fascinating to miss and he was mostly awake during the flights (2 hrs. to LAX, 10 hours direct from LAX to Dublin).

At the airport:


Aer Lingus' idea of an in-flight bassinet is a cardboard box with pillows on the bottom of it. I am not exaggerating. So Paul and I wondered: what if you spend $4000 on a business class seat? Do you still get a cardboard box?


K. and E.'s wedding was beautiful and romantic, and August held out from 1:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. (the wedding didn't really wrap up until 3 a.m. but there was no way any of us could have gone that long).






At the Guinness factory:

Stone circle ruins on Sheep's Head Peninsula:


Mizen Head, furthest SW point in Ireland:

Time Flies

Hard to believe August is almost 9 weeks old already!

We are all leaving for Ireland this coming week for 12 days and will have loads of photos to post when we get back.

He is growing really fast and already weighs 13 lbs., much to our surprise (then again, he is consistently hungry so there you have it).

Check back soon for more photos and a report back from our first big trip with him!