Carpets are so nice.
The best part of going to Evansville was spending time with family! Ben really enjoyed playing with his cousins, Ethan and Kylee. He also really enjoyed Uncle Jason and Aunt Kymber's carpet. He wishes we would invest in some plushy wall-to-wall carpet. We are not though. This is one of Ben's first major disappointments in life. I did buy him a new pacifier though. He seemed to like that.

Turkey Day! But we're in a different time zone!
We made it to Evansville. It was great to see everyone. Ben enjoyed being passed around and nibbling bites off of everyone's plates. I think he gained about 5 pounds this holiday weekend but we're going to put him on a strict diet of pureed fruits and veggies so he can slim down for the New Year.

Gobble Gobble...time for Thanksgiving Travels!
Mood:  rushed
It was 4 am and we packed into our Sentra and started the 1102 mile journey from Newton to Evansville, IN. It was grand because the menfolk slept for the first three hours and I got some nice peace and quiet for a change!

We stopped in Akron, OH for the evening. It was pretty disgusting. We walked around for a little bit. We found some Quaker Square thing which made James happy because he's a fan of Quaker oatmeal. We also found some graffiti. We didn't find a restaurant though. We asked some people who worked at Hertz rent-a-car where a restaurant is. They told us but when we got there, the restaurants were all closed! Someone needs to work on revitalizing Akron. We ended up going back to our hotel room and ordering a pizza from Papa John's.

Creepy Crawler and Puff Connoisseur!
Mood:  bright
It's been over a week since Ben has learned that he can actually get places. It's hard to put into words what it really is. It's more than the cruising thing, but not quite crawling. I guess he just slitters. His new found freedom has enabled him to find a plant stand. This plant stand is no longer in our apartment. He likes to play with the radiator and the knobs on our TV cabinet. The dust ruffle on the sofa also tickles his fancy.

Ben has also discovered how to pull himself up in his crib. He likes that a lot. He uses the assistance of his Peek-a-boo piano.

Ben also has been devouring Gerber Puffs. He likes Cherry and Sweet Potato but is not a fan of Sweet Corn. Apple Cinnamon is also up there on his likes, however, he seems to spit up a lot after eating those. Nothing like Cinnamon flavored spit up to make you want to go "yummmmm"!!!

Paigey's Baptism
We trotted off to Manchester NH today to Paigey's baptism! It was a great ceremony and the food was outstanding. I would have liked to eat more but a certain little boy was acting like a crazy loon!

The plethora of little ones got to play with each other. The toy of choice was the Puff container. All the little tykes were battling it out for the puffs!

Our last supper
Tonight, we decided we would head back to our old stomping grounds and grab dinner at the Corrib Pub. This was Benny's first restaurant. We figured, he was so good back in May, he'll be good again. We were wrong. Dinner was anything but relaxing as Benny Ha Ha wanted to play with everything but his toys. Our two placemats fell victim to Ben's antics. We were able to save our glasses but my straw wasn't as lucky. I tried to bribe him to give me the straw if I gave him a couple of his toys. He didn't like that.

To give him some credit, we did actually feed him at the restaurant and he managed to keep the mess to a minimum. No one had sweet potatoes thrown at them so that was a plus. James and I both agreed that we probably won't attempt to take Ben out to a restaurant again until about 2010. Maybe 2011. Unless we get desperate. Also, we are more than willing ot pawn off our precious little boy to anyone who wants to watch him while the two of us enjoy restaurants.

Election Day Fun!
Today, Ben and I trotted off to Franklin Elementary School to cast our votes. Unfortunately, I don't think anyone we voted for won. That's right, I'm one of the few people in Massachusetts who did not vote for Senator Kennedy. So even though my votes didn't really count towards anything, it was important to teach Ben from an early age that you have to get out there and vote.

Baby Einstein Fun
Mood:  flirty
Ben watches TV. He can't help it. It's a fact of life. People watch TV and last time I checked, babies were people too.

Well one day last week I thought "I should let him watch something more acceptable than the morning news and E!'s True Hollywood Story." so I was thinking "Baby Einstein" is a great baby thing. But there was no way I was going to spend $15 on one stupid 29 minute DVD. So what does one do? Go to Ebay, but of course! We found these great bootleg Baby Einstein 21-DVD sets! We purchased a set for $41 plus $12.99 for shipping and handling. Total price each : $2.57.

All the DVDs seem to work, but I thought one DVD was fishy. I put it in and the puppets were speaking in French. So I stopped it and tried to adjust all the DVD settings. Nothing worked. So I kept listening and then the puppets were talking in Japanese. Then Russian. Then Italian. It wasn't until we made it through the whole DVD that we realized that the puppets were trying to teach Ben different languages. Wonderful. So at least I learned that our DVD player isn't possessed. And I have a new goal and that is to teach Ben to count in Japanese before English.

Ben's First Halloween
Mood:  sad
It was a great Halloween here in Massachusetts. The weather was beautiful and it would have been perfect for walking around. We didn't. We decided to stay home and give out candy. I strategically positioned Ben by the front door so he could admire all the kiddies in their costumes. Unfortunately, everytime kids came in costumes, Ben started crying. I don't think Halloween will be one of his favorite holidays.

On another note, apparently our new neighborhood is a trick-or-treat haven. Last year, we had about 5 bags of candy and ZERO trick-or-treaters. This year, we had 3 bags of candy and what seemed to be hundreds of kids. I started to run out of candy so we threw in some fruit snacks...Shark Bites to be exact. So now we're probably known as "those people who give out gross things" on the street.

Lastly, I stratigically picked out Ben's halloween costume last year, on November 1st, a $4 clearance item. It was a pumpkin (you can see it in the pictures). Unfortunately, it was just too hot to put that on him. So he had to dress in his alternative costume. He was an Irish Man eating a Banana.

Boo Hoo
Mood:  hug me
So lately, Ben has gotten extremely sad when men make stupid faces at him. This was apparent tonight when he ran into Uncle Paul. A perfectly content little baby turned into such a sad thing. This happened a couple weeks ago too, when Ben encountered the Great-Grandpa Tard. It also happened last week when we visited Papa Joe at a work site. However, I don't think Papa Joe made a face at Ben...he just simply looked at him.

I've been making faces at the little lad since he's been born. So I've been trying to prep him for the loons in the family, but apparently I failed.