Ohio

This weekend we flew to Ohio to visit Travis's family and friends in Orrville.  The flights there were extremely delayed in both Denver and Chicago due to thunderstorms.  We arrived into Akron/Canton just after 2am and got to bed just before 4am.  Luckily, that was the worst part of the weekend.  The rest was a busy blur of visits and fun.

This wooden cradle has been in Travis's family for over 150 years.

On Friday, Andrew met Jon (our tax guy and family friend), Rita and Raymond (very good friends of Grandma and Grandpa), Great Grandma Sarah, and Great Uncle Sid and Great Aunt Karen.  Uncle Sid and Aunt Karen came over for pizza, fried chicken, and six-handed euchre.  A good time was had by all.

Rita and Ray.  Ray also showed us around his machine shop and some of his current projects.

With Great Grandma Sarah in the nursing home, who brought her own baby doll.  It's not clear that she knew exactly who we were, but she smiled at Andrew, said his name, and stroked his legs.  Andrew has now met all of his living great-grandparents.

Great Aunt Karen is a natural!

Uncle Sid and Aunt Karen

On Saturday, after trips into Dalton for breakfast and down to the famous Lehman's Hardware for some shopping, we visited with Susan and her family.  We got to meet baby Perry for the first time.  It's hard to believe that he's currently four times older than Andrew (8 months), and yet in a few years he'll be "the same age."

In the evening, Josh came over with two of his boys, Max and Micah.  Josh was a teaching protege of Grandma Mary Ellen and a mentor to Travis.

Grandma rocks Andrew to sleep after his big day

On Sunday, we went to church with Grandma and Grandpa, where we met up with Gladys and Ray.  Gladys made Andrew some very thoughtful gifts, including a quilt featuring all the activities we love stitched on to each square.

Gladys.

Ray, Gladys, and the lovely quilt.

After church we headed down to Holmes County (Amish country) for a trek on a rails-to-trails path.  We hiked the four miles from Fredericksburg to Holmesville.  It was extremely hot and humid, but we were buoyed by Powerade and the novelty of the lush green countryside.

Amish buggy - the trail has a "buggy" side

We stopped to nurse at this bridge.  The guardrail provided a nice place to sit as well as some privacy.  

Before we headed to the fireworks we stopped in on cousin Big John and Joella.

We then staked out our spot for the best fireworks display in the tri-county area.

Tummy time

Grilling brats

"Fire in the Sky" championship softball game at Orr Park

Superman ride at the midway.  Note the Amish girls in front.

Andrew got really freaked out by the firecrackers going off right behind us, but he enjoyed the main fireworks display.  He watched the first 10 minutes or so from Daddy's lap, and then drifted off to sleep.

On Monday, we spent the morning going through Travis's baby books and baby photo albums.  Boy, does Andrew look EXACTLY like his dad!!  I'll have to scan in some pics and post them for comparison.  Grandma kept exceptional records.  She has journals in which she jotted down a few notes *every single day for Travis's first four years.*  This makes me feel like a slacker with just a blog and a baby book.  We found valuable information in those journals about Travis's "puffy foot" that he had at birth.  (More on the foot situation later this week.)

Grandma and Grandpa got to execute their first two diaper changes before we left for the airport:

The flights home were uneventful and on-time.  We're getting the hang of timing feedings around airplane schedules and running through airports.

Andrew's first international configuration - ORD-DEN on a 777 in Business Class

We also had a ton of fun playing with the overhead reading lights.  When we turned them on, Andrew would squint.  When we turned them off, he would open his eyes wide in this shocked expression.  It's sort of hard to see on the video, but trust me -- hours of fun for everyone!!