Week in Madison

Happy 90th (Great-)Grandma Carole!
(can you believe she's 90? She doesn't look a day older than 70!)

After a weekend in the Dells, Andy headed back home to work while Jess and the boys headed to Madison for a week. We wanted to attend my grandmother's 90th birthday celebration the weekend following, and since I spend most of my week working from home anyway, it seemed silly to drive all the way back to Rochester on Monday, just to drive all the way back to Wisconsin on Friday.


So, we enjoyed a lovely week with my folks in Madison in the interim--we even got to see Aunt Liz, who happened to be in town for a wedding. Unfortunately, Theodore was sick and miserable for much of the week...which means the rest of us were fairly miserable as well, trying to keep a sick baby at least relatively content while Mommy had to do (at least some) work! He had his highest fever yet, actually, peaking at just over 103 degrees one night--poor guy.



Of course, we managed to have fun despite the illness, and even Theodore enjoyed himself as he was on the mend towards the end of our stay. A few photos:

playing at the playground with Grandpa

at Grandma Carole's birthday party, Simon and Theodore enjoyed getting to see some of their second cousins



lots of "Go Fish!" was played

a fun new addition to Grandma & Grandpa's toy selection was a pop-up play tent and tunnel

the tent portion soon became Simon's restaurant!

And he's off!

Theodore is now a little crawling machine. Here is some footage from his first day or two (double the speed, and you can imagine what he's like now, two weeks later!):

Theodore Crawling (19 sec):

Belated Congrats to Dave & Kristin

We have been traveling recently and have a backlog of photos and updates to share...I think roughly chronological order will be easiest for my little mind to remember, so here we go--two weekends ago:

We celebrated Dave & Kristin's wedding about a year late, with a weekend in the Dells with good friends. It was a lovely, relaxing time, with plenty of antics from the five children present!

Simon was given a game of "Go Fish" for Christmas, and he just loves it. We have played a LOT of Go Fish recently--Carl was kind enough to join us one evening.

We have learned that when Theodore gets cranky, giving him a little water to play in can work wonders...and I just love that look on his face--what is he thinking???

Out for a walk with Carl

Theodore's first trips down a slide were very popular :).

The Gubbins Family

Brothers on the playground

"Hi Carl...mind if I grab at your face for a little while?"

Here is the whole gang who was there for the weekend--the four of us plus Carl, Dave & Kristin, and Alex, Katie, Abbie, Izzie, & Emelia

Lots of good times in the pool--here Alex takes Emelia for a ride down the slide

Theodore and I ventured in one afternoon, but despite his love of playing in the bathtub and any sink or pan of water he can get his hands on, he was rather overwhelmed at the pool, so we didn't stay long.

Simon, however, LOVED it, including going down the waterslide all by himself.

Tunneling at the playground

Congrats again Dave! We hope to see you and Kristin again soon :-)

p.s. Over the weekend Theodore also started crawling--tummy off the floor--but that footage will have to wait for another post!