Monthly Archives: September 2006

Some new photos

Due to some server issues, we’ve had a bit of a photo backlog here at World Wide Wood. I appologize to those of you who anxiously await new pics of Lady Catherine. Hopefully these will make up for the wait!

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Happy Girl

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Catherine received a Baby Einstein Exersaucer as a gift at my baby shower (thanks Gabi and Tom!). She’s still a bit small for it, but we thought it might be time to dig it out just in case. My parents and brother were up visiting last weekend and they gave us a hand setting it up. Catherine seems to like it just fine, but I’m sure she will LOVE it once her feet actually reach the floor 🙂 More pics here

The weather has been pretty nice around here lately; not too warm, not too cold. Just perfect for walking around town. Catherine and I have been spending some time each day outside. We’ve always been fans of Lynch Park, but we have to drive to get there. We have started frequenting another park a little closer to home, but just as nice. We walk there, hang out a while and walk home. It is the perfect package; a little exercise and a little relaxation!

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Swing Time

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Last Friday, in anticipation of her four month birthday, Catherine tried out the big kid swings. Well, the big kid’s baby swings, anyway. Her first attempt was exciting. She and I decided that we’d save the underducks for when she’s a bit older. Feel free to check out her Grover Monster impression here: NearFarNear. Her impression is so good that she feels the need to go incognition. I just love those rhinestone sun glasses! (thanks Jenn!)

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Self Portrait

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I have discovered a problem that I imagine most parents have. I see Catherine doing something incredibly cute, or looking incredibly sweet, and I try to capture that exact moment with the camera. It never works! I can never seem to get a picture that looks quite like I hope it will. That does’t stop me from trying, though. So, we end up with a ton of cute, but not cute pics of the baby. Here are a few I took at the park yesterday.

Needless to say, we’ve been having fun. We’d like to have fun with you too. Drop me a line and maybe we can play together! Catherine would love to see you 🙂

Operation Dinner Out

We had dinner at [Acapulcos](http://www.acapulcos.net/) tonight. That’s not such a big deal, but we did get some good photos of us with Catherine. 🙂

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See more [here](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/baby/acapulcos/).

Four Months

Today is Catherine’s four month birthday! Hooray! In celebration, I’ve created a new [monthly](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/baby/monthly/) photo gallery, with one shot per month. In going back, I’ve tried to grab the best photos from as close as possible to the 26th of the month. Hope you enjoy it. 🙂

Catherine also had her four month pediatric visit today. Her weight was 16 pounds, 9 ounces, and her length was 26 inches. The doctor says that she is doing just great! Becky and I would agree. 🙂

Tooting her horn

Do you know my friend Bethany? She’s a pretty cool gal. So cool, in fact, that she wrote the front page story of the Eagle Tribune today. It’s the one about the local Grocery store closing. She normally writes for a smaller subsidiary of the Tribune (Town Crossings), but had an opportunity to step up. Hooray for her! Go read her story!

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Beth, Becky and Catherine

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I have known Beth for nine years now! (wow!) She was a guest of mine in Shepherd 314 during my freshman year at Gordon. She and her sister Abby were up from Texas to visit Gordon as prospective students. Little did we know that 2 nights of watching Ilia Kulik would lead to years of friendship!

Here’s a funny story: When Beth came with us to visit Catherine at the hospital (see picture) she and Peter were sitting with the baby while I had stepped out of the nursery for a minute. While I was gone a doctor (whom I had only met once) stopped in to give us an update. He was talking to Peter and Beth and it wasn’t until he asked Beth how she was feeling that they realized that the doctor thought that Beth was me! I ran into him on my way back in and he said “oh, there you are!” I had no idea what he meant. Peter and Beth filled me in.

I can’t blame him, though. Check out the picture for yourself. We do look pretty similar!

Nice job on the article, Bethany! Keep up the good work!

DDR

Several weeks ago, Becky and I finally joined the crowd and bought DDR [(if you don’t know what that is, read about it over at Wikipedia)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dance_Dance_Revolution_ULTRAMIX_3). Specifically, we bought Dance Dance Revolution Ultramix 3. Also, since we didn’t have a video game system to play it on, we bought a used XBOX, and of course some dance pads to use for playing the game.

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Becky poses in a DDR move

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[A few more pics here.](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/geekiness/ddr/)

We had heard about DDR a while back, I believe on the Today show, where there was a segment on kids who lost weight while playing DDR. Then our friend [Jenny](http://raingirl3179.livejournal.com/) mentioned using it as part of her excercise regimen, so we thought it sounded intriguing. We finally got a chance to play on Martha’s Vineyard, when the Lyttles had it in their cottage. They had the Xbox version, which has some really great songs. Later on, we went up to Jenny’s apartment and tried her version, on the PS2, with the workout mode. After that, we decided that we had to get it. 🙂

We ended up going with the Xbox version because we felt that it had more enjoyable songs, and that is key in our enjoyment of the game. Since we didn’t have any video games already, we didn’t have a particular loyalty to a gaming platform no matter whether good or bad. Surprisingly, I was pragmatic enough to let slide the fact that the Xbox is manufactured by Microsoft. 🙂 It certainly works well enough to play DDR, which is the only thing we have plans to use it for.

The game is really a lot of fun, and it is, as best I can tell, a very good workout. We have workout mode turned on, which is a game-wide mode that tracks calories burned during any type of game play. You input your weight, which it uses in a fairly simplistic calculation to determine calories burned. After you complete each dance session, your calories burned are summarized. You can also track your daily calorie burn record in the main Workout Mode menu. It draws a pretty graph, and it also charts your weight over time (assuming that you edit your weight in the game as you take the measurements on your own).

There are a few areas where DDR is weak. It doesn’t take your body through a full range of motion, particularly in the upper body. Also, although it does raise your heart rate, it doesn’t keep it up, which is key to developing good cardiovascular health. In addition, there is no stretching, warm-up, or cool-down built anywhere into DDR. You can get that on your own by changing difficulty levels and doing stretching beforehand, but that can be easy to forget. Continue reading here aboutlifting.com Finally, it is a fairly high-impact excercise. The jumping and foot stomping can be pretty hard on your joints.

We haven’t been doing it for long enough yet to see any solid results in one way or another, but we are both definitely feeling better, and it’s a heck of a lot better way to spend our time than watching TV in the evenings. 🙂 We are certainly getting more excercise this way than we ever did with our gym membership!

If anyone’s in the area and wants to come check it out, let us know. We’d be glad to have you over. 🙂

A Busy Weekend

It’s Sunday night, and Becky and I are finally settling in to watch the season premiere of [The Amazing Race](http://www.cbs.com/primetime/amazing_race10/). Hooray! But here’s a summary of the rest of the weekend:

Friday

Friday night, I sent Becky and Catherine out of the house for the evening. They went to have dinner with Nonni, and I spent the evening cleaning the apartment. Floors, carpets, bathroom, kitchen, the whole works. It needed to be done.

Saturday

[Beverly Hospital](http://www.beverlyhospital.org/) hosted a birthday party for babies who spent time in its Special Care nursery. There were some activities for the older kids, as well as photos of all of the babies born in the past year or so. We saw a few of the nurses and doctors who worked with us while Catherine was in the nursery, and we recognized a couple from our childbirth class, as well as another couple who had twins in the nursery while we were there.

We also ran into Dan Cederholm, author of [Web Standards Solutions](http://www.simplebits.com/solutions/) and [Bulletproof Web Design](http://www.simplebits.com/publications/bulletproof/), and proprietor of [SimpleBits](http://www.simplebits.com/), at the party. I wasn’t expecting to see him there, but as we were walking around, I spotted a guy with a computer-ish shirt, then saw his name tag… aha! I don’t think I would have recognized him without the name tag. His baby, [Jack](http://www.simplebits.com/notebook/2005/12/20/jack.html), spent some time at the Beverly special care nursery. We struck up a conversation with Dan and his wife Kerry. They’re quite nice folks, and Jack is as [cute as can be](http://www.flickr.com/photos/simplebitsdan/sets/1621982/). Check out his [great hair](http://www.flickr.com/photos/simplebitsdan/243819470/in/set-1621982/)! We ended up meeting them for lunch at [Panera](http://www.panera.com/), since we were all under the (mistaken) impression that lunch would be served at the birthday party. 🙂 We had a nice time chatting about life as new parents.

[Here’s a few photos of Catherine from the party.](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2006/special_care_birthday_party/)

After lunch, we headed home to get ready for [Art](http://kizoku.blogspot.com/) and [Leanne](http://leannennael.blogspot.com/)’s wedding. Our friend Beth was all too delighted to come and watch Catherine while we were at the wedding, so after we gave her the low-down on Catherine’s relatively simple needs, we headed down to Braintree for the wedding, and then to Boston for the reception. It was a very classy affair. We had a good time sitting at the “[CBD](http://www.christianbook.com/) Table” at the reception… 🙂

You can see the wedding photos [here](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2006/art_leanne_wedding/).

Sunday

After church, we drove out to Worcester to have Sunday dinner at Grammy’s. Catherine got to meet a few new Quitadamo relatives, we had some delicious meatballs and pasta, and helped Grammy out with a few housekeeping tasks. Those of you with Family access can see some [photos from today](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2006/sunday_dinner/).

Phew! Thankfully, we don’t have anything planned for next weekend. If we’re lucky, we’ll get to relax a bit. 🙂

W

Winner of the National Book Award by Jincy Willett

The reviews on the jacket of this novel promised a hilariously funny novel. I can honestly say that I didn’t find any part of it funny. I finished the book, but it was more out of principle than enjoyment.

I’m not sure what else to say. It probably wasn’t the worst book I’ve ever read, but kind of a waste of time. I guess I shouldn’t judge a book by its title; this novel certainly won’t be winning the National Book Award any time soon.

Happy Birthday, Nana!

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Happy Birthday, Nana! We enjoyed getting to see you when we were out for Johanna’s wedding, and it looks like Catherine enjoyed seeing you too… or at least you were a cozy place for a nap! 🙂

We hope that you have a great birthday!

MoSsy

Becky, Catherine and I went to the [Museum of Science](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/travels/2006/museum_of_science/) today, mostly for free. We had some free passes left over from the Star Wars exhibit, so that got us into the exhibit halls for free. We parked at the Cambridgeside Galleria for $3.99, so that was a good deal, and it was just $3 to cross the Tobin Bridge. $8 for lunch at Taco Bell on the way down, and $24 for dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen on the way back, so that’s less than $40 for a very nice day in the city.

It was nice to wander the exhibit halls with no particular agenda in mind. We covered pretty much the entire building, and we got to see a few shows, including the always fun lightning show, and the entertaining ‘mind games and optical illusions’ show.

We didn’t go to the [BodyWorlds](http://www.mos.org/bodyworlds) exhibit today, though it is something we are interested in seeing… it will be around through January, though, so we still have time. It is a bit pricey at $24 per ticket, or $16 if you go in the evening, but from what I’ve heard, it’s worth it.

Also, we took one of the cutest photos of Catherine while we were in Boston. She is wearing a dress made especially for her by [Michelle](http://mikao.blogspot.com/). Are you ready? Here it is!

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You can see all of today’s photos [here](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/travels/2006/museum_of_science/).