Lucky Number Seven

Today's our 7th anniversary! This is an especially exciting one since it's the last one we'll spend as a family of two (humans).

Here's a photo from our wedding in Stage Fort Park in Gloucester.



And here's another one we took a few days ago after we watched the second day of racing at the Gran Prix of Gloucester. It's nice to get to visit "our" wedding beach every year at the race.



I can't wait to get started on our next adventure!

The nursery

The nursery is finished. I know the little guy won't need much beyond a place to sleep and something to wear, but we love decorating and this project was a lot of fun for us.

The before and in-progress photos are pretty boring. This room was our "junk room" for a while and Betty's room when we first got her and she needed her own space. We hadn't done much with it at all. Ed painted the room a pale, creamy yellow (hard to capture in photos) and did some furniture assembly. My sister, Kris, and brother-in-law, Brad, were also super-helpful with furniture assembly and arrangement. Kris was a great shopping buddy as well!

Apartment Therapy was a huge source of ideas/inspiration.

We brightened up a boring IKEA dresser with a decal. The baby monitor is from Alison.



We tried out several chairs at IKEA and decided the cheapest one was also the most comfortable. :)



Thanks to our generous friends and family, the little guy has quite a stock of books and toys waiting for him. The wooden toys on top of the bookcase were Ed's when he was a child (with the exception of one car that I bought from a retired gentleman at the local fall fair -- he makes exquisite wooden toys).



The alphabet art took a long time to put together, but I really love how it turned out. We decided to forgo a crib bumper due to the SIDS risk.



The not-so-fun part of parenting.



Here are a few detail shots. I've already assured Kris that the sweater she made is only hanging up for photo styling purposes and that it is being stored safely in a drawer. :)



My sister-in-law, Liz, made the bunny. Isn't he adorable? I love his tie. The Harrods bear is from Miyon, who lives in the UK. The wooden blocks are from Ed's childhood friend (and our current friend, of course) Allison.



I embellished the bins with a fun fabric. It took forever and was probably not the best use of my time. :) Also here are some books we got from friends and family (Neilie/Craig, Whitney/Jen, Rachel/Josh, Cara/Eugenio, Aunt Judy/Uncle Dan, Ed's mom, SIL Paige... apologies if I left anyone out). There's a blanket from Aunt Rosie/Uncle Steve, a quilt that Ed's mom made, a quilt from my mom, and a quilt that our friends Brad and Fiona made together.



I'm happy to have the nursery done. We are so looking forward to meeting its occupant!

Sources:

Paint: Benjamin Moore Natura in Citronee (eggshell)

Awesome paintbrush for edges, which eliminated the need for tape: Sherman-Williams (recommendation from Young House Love)

Wooden owl art: Maple Shade Kids (etsy)

Dresser, laptop table, floor lamp, chair, bookcase, changing table, changing table pad, laundry hamper, diaper bin, wipes holder, trash can: IKEA

Decal on the dresser: Elephannie (etsy)

Curtain rod: West Elm

Alphabet cards, canvas, and other supplies: Michael's. Cards are by Jenn Ski and the idea/tutorial is from Tiny Decor.

Airplane mobile: Pottery Barn Kids (gift from my dad, who is a flight instructor)

Crib: Wal-Mart

Elephant, giraffe, monkey canvases: JC Penney

Bedding/curtains (DwellStudio for Target), throw pillow, rug, cloth bins in bookcase, diaper organizers: Target

Fabric on cloth bins: Alexander Henry - 2-D Zoo (blue)

Froggie night light: Babies R Us (gift from Paige)

Gloucester

It's more fun to race, but spectating is a close second. It was super fun to cheer for my friends in the elite women's race and the men's race was very exciting. It was really great to see Tim Johnson win.



From deep in the archives, here's a pic of the podium when I won the women's B race at Gloucester in 2001. Guess who the podium boy is?

Tandem ride

Riding my own bike is becoming less fun, so last Sunday we got out the tandem and rode to Verrill Farm in Concord. It worked out really well. I used the telescoping stoker's stem to get a nice upright position and Ed didn't have to wait for me. Next time though, I will get out the Camelbak. I had trouble getting to the bottle cages on this bike when I wasn't pregnant and now it's pretty much impossible. Fortunately on this ride, Ed had a spare bottle in his back pocket that I could get to easily.

Pic from the back-of-the-tandem cam, as Claudia would say.



The pumpkins at Verrill Farm were looking really lovely.



We had so much fun that we bought a tandem tray for our roof rack earlier this week. We've already got a few rides planned. We'll be doing a belated anniversary trip in mid-October in southern Maine and now we can take the tandem. It seems fitting, since it was a wedding gift from my dad.

Baby shower

My MIL and SILs hosted a lovely shower for us with Ed's extended family on 9/19.

This panda cake doesn't know what's coming. Ed decapitated it. (This is the same cake mold my MIL has used to make fabulous kid-friendly cakes since the '70s.)



Baby jail!



Tiny hat.



These overalls were worn by Ed's uncles and then by Ed. Don't spank! Ed's comment on this photo in FB: "I imagine this was a cute joke in the 60s. Today, an overbearing liberal political statement. Excellent."



Ed's mom made us the cutest quilt. There are little messages under all the duck wings.



(Almost) the whole family! The funny thing is that even though these are Ed's blood relatives, the majority of the people in this photo have my last name.



Micah, my SIL Liz's Yorkie, always gets lots of attention. Here he is with Ed's friend Allison, whom he's known since they were 10. (Recently she graduated from Sloan one year ahead of him.)

FIRMMAN Tri

I've got a cold, so I've finally got some time to catch up on blogging.

Almost two weeks ago, Ed finished off his short triathlon season with the FIRMMAN (half-Ironman distance) in Naragansett, RI. I got a refurbished entry-level DSLR (Olympus E-520 w/14-42mm & 40-150mm lenses) so we can get better pics of the kiddo in the future. The camera arrived just before Ed's race. I got more than 100 photos, thanks to sports mode and "microdrive." We have some time to become more sophisticated camera users before the due date, fortunately.

One thing I hate about triathlons is that they start super-early in the morning. We were on the road at 4:30 a.m. There was no coffee to be found at the race, so I had to make do with some Clif ShotBloks (dark cherry w/caffeine).

The seas were pretty choppy, which made the swim challenging. Ed was able to use his skills from our surf lesson in Waikiki in May to successfully negotiate the breaking waves at the start and finish of the swim. You can just barely see a kayaker and a buoy and a few swimmers in this pic. I guess I need a longer lens. :)





As usual, Ed had an excellent bike leg and made good use of his cyclocross mount/dismount.





Off on the run.



The last brutal .5 miles of the run was on the beach. While I was waiting to get this shot, I was standing behind two Cyclonauts guys (one of whom had crashed and had a huge rip in the back of this shorts). They were talking about pro cycling. I think one guy was from Belgium and the other kept talking about those great Belgian pros, the Schleck brothers. It was all I could do not to yell, "They're from LUXEMBOURG!!"



The finish -- 4:55.44.



Half-Ironman complete!

Mayflower International Triathlon

We went to Plymouth (home of Plymouth Rock, which was on the course) for Ed's second triathlon yesterday. It was a gorgeous day and I had the best iced coffee and breakfast sandwich (egg and cheese on a Portuguese sweet bread roll) before the start. I'm glad that it's not too hard to get Portuguese sweet bread around here -- it's one of my favorite Hawaii foods.

The swim went along the jetty in Plymouth Harbor. Here all the guys in Ed's wave lined up by the boat ramp and then started the swim.





Ed did a textbook cyclocross dismount after the bike section, which had a lot of short, steep hills and went through Myles Standish State Park.



The run. Ed went even faster this week than last week!



Floating on air at the finish. This was a longer course than last week.



Ed was 2nd in his age group! Unfortunately he got the wrong age group trophy, but the promoter said he would send the correct one next week.



And here's the baby bump at week 28. It's getting a bit hard to transport this thing with all the walking involved with triathlon spectating -- I'm going to have to break out the running shoes for next week's half-Ironman so I'll have some more support. Or maybe I'll bring my own bike so I can get around more easily. If I do, naturally I will avoid the triathlete faux pas of riding without a helmet and festering in a chamois for hours and hours after the event is over.