HFMD- warning: graphic images

HFMD... also known as Hand Foot and Mouth Disease. It's as gross as it sounds, and prior to now I thought it was something only animals got. However children do indeed get it, often from sharing toys with snot and slobber on it-- but apparently adults can get it too. I'm so embarrassed I caught a baby disease! I originally thought it was from the mass amount of little delicious clementines I was eating. WRONG.

 For the last week Drew and I have been eating pudding, yogurt and popsicles (Drew usually eating in the bath). We've been trying not to disturb all the blisters that have formed in our mouths. Drew has little blisters also on his hands and feet.

 I never had HFMD as a child, so as an adult I am more susceptible-- and now that I think about it, I never had chickenpox either! I think it has been nice to have had this sickness at the same time as Drew because as I eat something terribly painful I know not to give it to him. Hopefully this explains his horrible sleeping habits lately.

Tis the Season

We've been busy celebrating this wonderful holiday season so I will start at the beginning of our festivities.

Thanksgiving break was great. We lounged around, ate good food, went shopping, and hung out with friends. It was nice to spend some time with Spencer before he fell off the face of the planet as he studies for his first semester of law school finals.

We actually had Thanksgiving at our house. I wouldn't really say we hosted because we didn't make the turkey which is a big part of hosting, we basically provided the place to eat because our lack of furniture made it easy to maneuver tables and chairs into our family room.

Everyone brought great dishes. After playing games, talking, looking at Black Friday ads, we busted out the pie. Which was also divine. When I finally remembered to take a picture it was of only empty dishes. I would say Thanksgiving Dinner was a success.

Aunt Diane's Famous Creamed Corn

Some friends and I went out shopping around 10:00pm to be the first at all the deals while Spencer and Drew stayed in the nice warm house. We got some great things but above all I bought a vest. a fur vest. at 3:00 in the morning at the outlet mall. picture this...

The Saturday of Thanksgiving break a group of friends went up to Skaeneatles, NY to see the whole city participate in Charles Dickens "A Christmas Carol" Festival. I wasn't expecting much so I was pleasantly surprised at how much fun it was. People were handing out eggnog and chestnuts roasted on an open fire. Residents walked around in costumes acting in character wishing people a Merry Christmas. There was caroling and a nice big tree out on a long dock in the lake.

 More recent events included our branch Christmas party. Drew is not quite yet in nursery but since the numbers are so small he was asked to participate in the nativity as a sheep.

He kind of hated wearing his cotton ball shirt but oh well. Spencer, of course, was studying for finals so while I ate my prime rib dinner Drew took ornaments off the Christmas tree and shattered them on the gym floor. 

Mobile Uploads: Chapter 4

Since I was without a phone for most of the summer these mobile uploads post have been nonexistent. However now I am fully equipped again and ready to roll...

 Here is our apartment the day we moved in. Hasn't really changed in the three months we've been here.

Spencer refused to stand with a piece of paper like we did HERE but whatevs, I snapped this picture after I dropped him off as I awkwardly reached out the passenger window. Happy first day of law school!

This area of the world is interesting. People are so ...... I really can't find the best word to use. It's not a negative thing it's just a different thing than I'm use to. For example I have no problem eating off styrofoam, but since living here I am now understanding a life of recycling and going green. So not only do all the foods at public events come in Vegan, Gluten-free, vegetarian, and Kosher but the supplies on which they serve the food is always 100% compostable. This was at some law school shindig.

I started babysitting when I was ten. Sometimes for $5/hour or sometimes even less than that. I would save my money and seriously contemplate on which Beanie Baby I was going to buy. After I made the purchase and took it home in the brown paper bag (don't really remember why the beanie babies were always in brown lunch sacks) I would put a little plastic cover on the TY tag and put it on a shelf. To me they were collectors items and over the years as I've seen the prices on eBay drop, and drop and drop I've decided that those beanie babies were a waste of my hard earned cash. I now let Drew play with them and smear chocolate and yogurt all over their fuzzy faces. I saw this display at the mall and was floored. Some of the beanie babies in the bin were some of the rarest to be found. I only looked for a minute, but of course refused to buy animal shaped bean bags.

Saw this on a door at our hotel in Boston. Weird. 

Drew's chubby self tried to get into this toy cart at our neighbors house. hahahahah enough said.

This to me is the epitome of Ithaca. A Subaru with plenty of bumper stickers.

I don't really know what to say about this one.

As Drew and I were leaving the gym he felt like he had to smear his face on every piece of available glass. This was shortly after I saw a guy with a windex bottle and a towel. oops.

 This is by far Drew's favorite thing to see at the grocery store. Something about being near an ocean that makes for some sweet lobsters in the grocery store.

Mobile Uploads: Chapter 1
Mobile Uploads: Chapter 2
Mobile Uploads: Chapter 3

Syracuse Zoo

 We crammed 5 carseats and 3 adults into Lindseys Pilot and headed up to Syracuse to enjoy the warm weather and the zoo. Courtney looks thrilled to have her hips dislocated between the two boys for the hour long drive.

The whole group

 

 The boys checking out the penguins and stomping in some unknown smelly substance.

 

The monkeys were awesome. The monkeys are always my favorite at any zoo I visit, and these monkeys were some of the best. There was a tiny baby monkey and a teenage brother monkey that were fighting each other running around the cage-- the boys loved it.

Drew now knows how to "roar" when he sees pictures of tigers and lions so I would say the zoo was a success.

Spencer turns 26!

We celebrated Spencer's birthday over the weekend (a couple different times). On Saturday we tried a place here called Wings Over Ithaca. It claims to have been voted best wings in Ithaca, which we laughed about because how much competition do they have? Well the claims didn't disappoint. I don't even like wings and the place was great. We went a little earlier before the dinner rush so Drew ran around while we covered our fingers in yummy sauces.

On Sunday (Spencer's actual birthday) we got together at the Lewis' home (due to our lack of furniture) to celebrate with friends. We had lots of cookies and tons of icecream to assemble SmartCookie Sandwiches. I didn't get any pictures of the night except Drew and Chet who showed up in the same pajamas.

Happy Birthday Spencer! We love you!

Oxiclean: the stain specialist

First off, did anyone know that bananas stain clothes? I never would have thought... but when I got some of Drew's clothes out of the dryer and saw some weird brown spots on a couple of the shirts I couldn't figure it out. Was there a marker in there or something? It was weird because they were all only dirty around the neckline (where Drew typically spills his food...) After I discovered that it was bananas I thought about just presoaking the clothes, maybe putting some prewash stuff on it and then washing them again... well that was like 5 washes and 2 months ago...

Drew has just been wearing this shirt with the stains on it like a grungy kid

A neighbor told me that Oxiclean would take banana stains out but she had never used it on clothes that had been washed and dried (multiple times) So I tried it anyway.... and presto...

I'm still kind of shocked at how easy it was and how well it worked. You can't really tell in the picture but the shirt is a cream color. The color didn't change or bleach out at all. So later I tried it on a lot more clothes, and they all look great! I just boiled some water and worked out a little concoction and soaked the clothes. It was weird but it worked. I picture methamphetamine makers looking kind of similar...stirring chemicals in a bowl in their kitchen...

Little Stinker

For Halloween Drew dressed up as a little Skunk. It was nice and warm and really adorable. Our Branch had a fun party on Friday where the kids ran around and swapped candy. There was a murder mystery being played out with lots of yummy soups and hot chocolate.

Drew really liked putting candy in his little bucket. 

 

 Spencer and I kind of had lame costumes. We were bags of trash. I seriously have never seen so many skunks snooping in trash as I have here in Ithaca. I don't even know if I had seen a skunk in real life until we moved here- and now I've seen a lot! Not sure what the means.... lots of people throwing away good leftovers or the fact that we are surrounded by a forest...

 On Monday we took Drew out to a few houses. He was kind of uneasy about wearing his skunk hat since sometimes he couldn't see where he was going or where his parents were.

 

Drew waiting with his cute friends (Rapunzel, Dinosaur and baby Chet was a monkey)

The local fire truck rolled up with flashing lights handing out bracelets for the kids. Our neighbor driving by pulled over her car like a crazy person because she was positive a kid got hit by a car... luckily that wasn't the case...

Boston: Part 4 (Salem)

I think one of the only things I wanted to do (besides eat everywhere) was go to Salem, Massachusetts. Salem is only a beautiful 30 minute drive north of Boston. Before we got Salem though we stopped at Crane Beach. It was clean and pretty but it was also rather cold out. Drew finally got use to the idea of sand and was eventually able to walk on it.

 and even taste it....

 After Crane Beach we drove up to Salem. It was awesome. Of course now it is a full functioning city, so I was thinking it would be more obsessed with the Salem Witch Trials then  it was but it was still awesome to see during October. There were a lot of Halloween decorations and this house was really decked out. I'm obviously really excited.

 Of course we found another cemetery, and Drew loved it again. Some of headstones said stuff like "Pressed to Death September 1692"AWESOME. The streets were foggy with with the mist coming in off the ocean which made it a perfect day to see the eerie sights in Salem.

Massachusetts was beautiful. It's nice that its pretty close for fun excursions. There's a lot of great cities to see on the East coast and I'm glad we'll have more fall breaks to get out and explore.

Boston: Part 3 (Fenway Park/Cambridge)

The weather started to turn a little more damp the longer we stayed in Boston. One day we decided we would do indoor things like take a tour of Fenway Park. We're not even Red Sox fans and it was awesome! We got to go to every part of the park with a great tour guide.

Drew liked sitting up in the press box in his own chair.

 

We were able to go sit on the famous Green Monster. 

 

Here's Spencer trying to contain his excitement!

The same day we went to Fenway Park we were able to go to Cambridge and check out Harvard. While we were checking out Harvard, Harvard was playing Cornell in an Ivy League football duel. I think Cornell ended up losing, but no one really cares. Apparently hockey is the big sport around here.
Harvard was pretty, but wasn't really what I expected. Cambridge is like really close to Boston and is just as busy of a little city! I think we were expecting it to be more like Ithaca, with Cornell set on a beautiful hill overlooking a quiet city. While in Cambridge we took our friends, the Pattersons advice and ate at Mr. Bartley's Burgers. I ordered the "Mitt Romney"- which was divine.

 Before heading back to our hotel we stopped at another educational powerhouse- MIT. Unlike BYU every bathroom is not equipped with changing tables for babies. So I ended up changing Drew on a little bench in a hall way. If he ends up ever going to MIT we'll have to take him back and say this is where we changed your dirty diaper... there was a cool sculpture outside that Drew loved running around.

Boston: Part 2 (Freedom Trail)

We walked a lot in Boston, it was probably good to try and combat the mass amount of calories we ate. We started one of our days by climbing the Bunker Hill Monument.  I carried the stroller up the 300 stairs which was kind of awkward. My calves were a little shaky after we got down.

After we hydrated we followed the Freedom Trail around Boston. Seriously the freedom trail is the best idea ever. I don't know if other cities have a similar thing (Salem, MA does) but the idea is perfect. You just tell tourist to get on the red brick path and follow it around the city. The freedom trail is about 2.5 miles with nearly 20 historic sites along the way.

 

The freedom trail took us all sorts of places. The Old North Church where the lanterns were to be hung that go with the famous "One if by land, and two if by sea" which led to Paul Revere's midnight ride.  The freedom trail led us to the USS Constitution- the world's oldest floating commissioned naval vessel.

 We hopped off the trail just for a minute to get some delicious cannolis at Mike's Pastry in the North End district of Boston.

 

the place was busy, and the cannolis were delicious.

The freedom trail led us right to a park downtown that Drew figured was the highlight of the trip.