Graham's First Month: A Photo Essay

First hour. 9 lbs. 21 inches. 57 minute labor.

First Grammy cuddles.  Thank goodness for her help.

Dad recalling his swaying/soothing skills.

Chocolate cake makes every "Welcome to Earth" party a little happier.

Day 2.  We figured out a "system."  Two adults+One Baby+Room Service= Easy Parenting.

Jen's midwife, Laura.  Yay!

Getting to know one another.  Not much of a mullet or ducktail.  We'll work on that.

Day 3, first road trip.  Going home!

Ian had the swaddle down pat.  And he knows how to nurture.

End of Week 1: Preparing for Winter Storm Nemo.

Catchin' some rays while studying for his Biliruben test.  Don't want to do poorly (again).

Graham likes to sleep in a sling.  Or being held.  Or snuggled at Mama's breast.

He sleeps lots. 

When it's time to eat, Dad is no longer satisfying.

Sometimes we look cross-eyed (dude on left) or tired (dude on right).

Sometimes all we want is eskimo kisses.

Working on beefing up.  Gonna have an outie, and probably Blake's build.

Someday soon, we'll look at this picture and say, "Look how lean Graham was!"

One month mark.  Mom goes to store [ALONE], Dad and three boys  play outside, then have Thai food for a picnic!

Month one was mostly snuggling, sleeping, and changing diapers. Let's see what month two holds!

Snow Pile Contest!

So you know we got at that snow in the middle of February.  Here's a sunrise view of the pile, taken on 2/10.  It was lots of fun to have such a huge pile in the yard, topping out near 7 feet at its peak.

Every day after school that week, Ian would come home and sled down one side of it.  It was awesome.  This slick slider was too quick for me.  I ended up wiped out at the bottom of the "Snow Mountain" as Blake liked to call it.

The boys were keen on the two-room snow cave, and I had to keep enlarging it as the roof started to sag with the occasional warm day or rainy/misty weather.

And just for the fun of it, we got another thick slushy snow on 2/25 that I couldn't help but get another picture of Ian as we were on our way to school.  Yes.  Have a look at those wonderful teeth that he'll be growing into over the next few years.

SO.  As far as our annual snowpile contest goes, have a look at the photo below, and submit your guess in the comments as to when the last trace amounts of snow will be gone.  I suspect it will last a bit longer than the weak showing of a snowpile last year.

When life gives you snow...

Make snowcaves!

Here we commence to record some of the great exercise that I got today.

Yesterday evening, I heard there was a threat of snow of epic proportions.  Therefore, I thought it prudent to take a before and after picture.  This is before, just in case there wasn't really going to be any snow.  (Trust me, it happens every once in a while.  We get all panicky, then get a drizzle of rain instead of snow!)

Here is a side-by-side of an "after" shot, looking across our front lawn.  On the left, we have "after the first 20 inches, and after I woke up this morning," then on the right is "after the neighbors and I had a fantastic time playing around outside all day."  I do kind of wish I had the Blake and Ian here to do some of the playing, but today they are in Maine helping Grammy take care of their 3 feet of snow.  Looks like they have more than we do.

Here is a side-by side, again, "after I woke up" and "after we did our business on the snow."  See that slot down the middle of the pile?  Yeah.  I shoveled the sidewalk.  Blazed a trail right through to the street.  We shall hereby call it Jackson Pass, for all who heretofore follow the path that leads to the front porch.

Here's what we had to contend with as far as car-digging out.  We stacked cars in the left driveway of the duplex, and hired a neighbor with a plow to do a jobbie on the right driveway.  It really saved quite a bit of time in the end to do it that way.

When I woke up, the total was basically 20 inches, and by the time the snow stopped, we were around 23 inches, most places.

On the other hand, there were places where there was much more snow, depending on how it drifted.    Piles against cars, windy sides of the house, and interesting corners in fences or houses were prone to more than the 23 inch standard.

And THIS is the  Pièce de résistance.  (No, I don't know French, I just know that Larry said it on Perfect Strangers once when he brought out his [burnt] roast duck that he made for Jennifer.  From the context clues, I think that's what we have here.)  After burrowing a chasm from the front porch through  the pile to the street, I thought, "Self, this is a GREAT snow pile to put some snow caves in.  Look how tall, how packed, and how broad the pile is!?"  The snow plows do a good job of piling up the snow for us and making sure it is packed firm.  I first worked on the one on the top left of the image.  A large one-room snow cave.  Big enough for a family of four.  Though Graham doesn't take up much space, so I bet we could fit him too.  I can sit up comfortably, and it's about 8 feet deep, with a slight curve to the right.  While I was resting from the exercise, the neighbor began working on the other side.  He worked hard to get the entrance, then I brought out the big guns (an ice chopper) to blast out the last 3 feet to make it a two-room cave.  It's got about 6-7 feet in the entrance, then another 3-4 feet for each room. Overall, the snow caves are awesome and deep.  We even "roof tested" them and reinforced until we had about 20 inches of the white suff on top.  I can't wait for Ian and Blake to come home from Maine so we can play in  them! 

First Night Chatham, 2013

Here's a few views of First Night Chatham!  Chatham is celebrating 300 years this year.  Happy Birthday to a cute Cape Cod town.  Also, wishing you a very successful 2013!

Look who got to dance like a monkey at the Toe Jam!? Adele!

Blake and Nat on their way to the Community Center for some afternoon activities.

Ian and Adele doing the Do-se-do.

Alex the Jester.

Two members of the Chatham Founding Families:  Scott and Kira representing the Eldredges.

Goofy kids waiting for the show.

Snow.  Indoors?  At the Toe-Jam Puppet Band show.

Alex trying to play two recorders.

Alex successfully playing three recorders.  Row, Row, Row your Boat in a round.

Blake managed to enjoy a couple of activities before returning home for a nap.

Ian made this clever hat with Papa at the Elementary School.

My job was to glue things to my hat.  Blake's job was to pull them off again.

Susie joined us for the jester show at the Elementary School.  No, she wasn't Alex the Jester.

Founders in the Noise Parade.

Some of the Pratt men found a nice vantage point for the fireworks.

This was the man of the evening.  We're glad he was there.  But we wish he had the show ready at 6:30 instead of 6:50, because it was COOOOOLD!

The 6.30 fireworks were great.  It was nice to not have to go down to the Oyster Pond at midnight to get a great show.  You'll have to ask Scott and GG their impressions of the firework show.

BONUS!  Here are two buddies that did alot of tromping through the yard.  Uncle Sean was great with Blake this weekend.

December 31st, 2012. Time: 0700

As one of my hobbies, and a recent tradition when I come to Chatham, I have been getting up in the pre-dawn hours to go find a sunrise somewhere and find a few geocaches along the way.  Sean and Nat wanted to come with me on my New Year's Eve sunrise run, so we got up and drove out to Pleasant Bay at the south part of Orleans to watch the sun come up.  Here's what we saw.

Sean and Natalie, the troopers through the frigid morning hours.  I think it was 26 and breezy.

We had all our ducks in a row, getting to the beach there at 7:00 sharp for a 7:06am sunrise.

We even found this old pier that has long been out of service.

Makes for a decent element to compose into our pictures.

Nearly there.

My morning companions.

Just breaking through.

It's the morning now!

It was destined to be a beautiful day for First Night, Chatham.  (300!)