We are going to laugh about this someday, right?

Well Bob is one week into his externship in Holyoke and the externship part of it seems to be going well. I was a little concerned when we arrived in Holyoke. I was expecting a cute little old town, and instead was greeted with the remnants of an old industrial town. It doesn't help that Bob's apartment is on the more ghetto end of town. When we walked into the apartment I was even more surprised. It was kind of gross. I don't think the guys who lived there before (which were classmates of Bob's) ever cleaned. I was expecting a cleaned out apartment, but there was junk all over, and like 4 mouse traps per room (luckily with no mice on them). The bathrooms were disgusting, to the point that Bob didn't want me to see them because he knew I would never use it if I did. What makes it even more gross was the fact that the nasty rings in the tub and toilet cleaned up really easily. The previous tenants had been living in filth by choice (or laziness), not because it was permanently like that. Bob and Henry (his classmate who is living with him) did a lot of cleaning, and the place is much better now. They are even getting the carpets cleaned. I still have yet to use the shower. I just make sure Ezra and I come home before we get too stinky.  The town seems a little better now too, since we've seen some of the better parts of it.

Ezra and I went out with them Sunday night, and left first thing Tuesday morning. Then we came back on Thursday evening so that Ezra and I wouldn't drive out and back in the same day. On Thursday night Ezra was sleeping on a mattress on the floor in our room, and was actually sleeping well (the other two nights we were there I ended up sleeping with him). At 3:30 in the morning Bob and I are woken up by Ezra screaming. Bob went to Ezra's rescue while I turned on the light and shut the door. Somehow he had gotten from his bed into a cubby thing in Bob's room that just happened to have a sticky mouse trap in it. The poor little guy had a big scratch on his forehead and a sticky mouse trap stuck in his hair. I held him down while Bob pulled it off his head, and Ezra screamed. I wish we would have had a pair of scissors. It was horrible, and I felt so bad. Bob was mad that he hadn't thrown the mousetrap away in his earlier cleanings. Luckily Ezra calmed down quickly and was back asleep within 5 minutes or so. He had crazy hair all the next day because there was still sticky in it, and Bob called him rat head the whole day. When we got home that night we stuck a little Goo Gone in his hair and it came right out. I thought I would never find the situation anywhere near funny when it happened, but I have to admit that now that it is all over with, it seems much less traumatic. Sorry that there are no pictures, you may have guessed that it wasn't a priority.

Palmyra and Niagara Falls, NY

Bob and I forgot our camera when we were camping in Vermont over the 4th of July weekend, so if I ever get some pictures from the other people I will get around to posting about it. Instead we will  move on to our last big outing.

We were supposed to leave Thursday morning to head to Palmyra but Bob needed to see a patient that morning so we pushed our departure time to noon. Good thing too. I was not packed at all and Ezra slept in until 9:30 (which means that I slept in until 9:30) which was the only good part of the day. Ezra was being whiney and attached to me all morning which didn't make it easy to get ready. Not long after we got up Ezra had diarrhea. Luckily I was aware that he was pooping and we got him changed without incident or mess. I turned on a movie for him and started my packing. He came crying to me a few minutes later with diarrhea all over him. I stuck him in the bathtub and tried to clean him off while he screamed about it. After I got him cleaned up and dressed I went to assess the damages. There was diarrhea all over one of the couch pillows he had been laying on and the living room rug. I tried to clean off the pillow, but just ended up throwing it away, got the rug all clean and then headed back to the bathroom to bleach the bathtub. Thanks to all the excitement we didn't leave to pick up Bob until noon.

Bob wasn't done preparing the denture he was doing so Ezra and I waited in the car for about an hour during which time we dealt with another bout of diarrhea. Bob finally finished, but the lab was closed for lunch so we had to wait until 2 for it to reopen. Bob came out, got us lunch, took a turn changing a poopy diaper, and headed back in. At about 2:20 Bob called to say that he had dropped something and that we might as well just go home! So after two hours of waiting in the car outside of his school we headed home. Ezra pooped again on the way home and fell asleep. So I had to wake him up, change him and then put him down for a nap. Bob called to say he was done at 3:20 so I just had to wake Ezra up so we could really get on the road. We left Boston at 4pm.

Luckily on our 7 hour car ride Ezra only had diarrhea once, just before we stopped for dinner. Because of our late start we scrunched Niagara Falls and Palmyra all into Friday. It ended up working out just fine though. Ezra only had one poopy diaper that day, and it was while we were at breakfast, so not too much drama.

View from the top of the falls! This was the least Medusa looking picture of my hair!

We saved this souvenir poncho for Ezra because he looked so cute in it.

I'm sure it won't surprise you to learn that it ended 

up with diarrhea clothes in it and got thrown away.

Ezra hated when we got close to the falls because it dumps a lot of water on you.

But he loved playing with this pipe that was dripping water. 

He played with it the whole way back.

That is the Rainbow bridge in the background, and this is about as close as we got to Canada.

Ezra's favorite part of being in Palmyra was the rocks. That is the Smith Family barn in the back.

Ezra and I in the Sacred Grove. It wasn't the most spiritual time with an energetic one year old.

It is impossible to to feel the spirit there though.

We stopped by the Palmyra Temple.

This from the very beginning when the whole cast comes out on the stage. That's a big cast.

They had some pretty good special effects. I think these were volcanoes erupting.

Christ appearing in the Americas.

All in all we had a really great time, we were bummed that we didn't get to see the monument at Hill Cumorah because they apparently close it at 6, but we did a lot and enjoyed the pageant. This is another vacation I would definitely recommend. Minus the diarrhea of course.

In other news...

I just wanted to do a little fun post in the midst of all our outings. When Ezra was being reassessed for physical therapy they asked me if he imitated domestic activities. I will show you a few pictures and you can decide if he passed or not.

Apparently talking on the phone is a domestic skill.

I don't know if this counts as imitating because I don't recall

ever standing in my frying pan while cooking.

Ezra with "Cookie" (Chrissy) his physical therapist on their last visit.

I also finished my first ever quilt made entirely by me. I picked a pretty complicated pattern, which mostly meant that it was time consuming. That at least is my excuse for getting it to Eli when he was over 4 months old and in the height of summer. I think Ezra will miss pointing out the airplanes, cars, stars and hearts on it. It was far from perfect, but I am happy with the result. I just need a break from such a big project for a while, for which Bob is happy.

Also I took Ezra along for a Young Women activity where we were volunteering at a local farm. We ended up pulling weeds in the pumpkin patch and Ezra even helped a little. He mostly sat in the dirt and ate rocks. He even got his own water bottle, so you can only imagine what a mess he was, and you will have to since I got no pictures of it. This picture ought to help those of you lacking imagination.

To be fair this was after we rinsed his shoes and my feet. 

Good thing kids are washable.

We also had our first tomato ripen, and Ezra promptly ate it after it was picked.

In case you were wondering, Ezra has been living in diapers due to the heat.

He only gets dressed if we go somewhere. Lucky!

And last but not least we went to the beach in South Boston with Allison and Emily. There were dead jellyfish (harmless) all over the beach, but we had fun anyways. At one point I heard a little boy say to his dad "I don't think we should play here, there are jellyfish everywhere and I could get electrocuted." As they headed down the beach a little further I heard him say "Yuck this one has been cut into pieces." That would be Ezra and Emily with their shovels. They thought it was so fun to hack at them and try to step on them. At least they had fun and we stayed cool despite record breaking heat.

You can see a plane coming if for a landing if you look close. 

We were fairly close to the airport and got to see a lot of them coming in.

Newport, RI

For the last Saturday in June we took another day trip, this time to New Port. We had been there before with Anne and Craig, but were too late to get to tour a mansion. On this trip we made that the first thing we did. We toured The Breakers, which was owned by the Vanderbilts. As I am sure you can imagine it was incredibly elaborate with gold all over the ceilings and walls, and one room even had platinum on the walls and ceiling. (Sorry but there are no pictures of the inside because we weren't allowed to take any.) I just can't imagine wasting my money like that, but I guess I have never had billions to do so with.

Ezra quickly tired of the inside, but he loved their landscaping.

If you click on the picture you can see Bob chasing Ezra around.

Wouldn't you love a lawn that went all the way to the ocean like this?

The picture is taken about halfway down the lawn.

Ezra took a break in the shade, plopped down on the tree, and enjoyed some tomatoes.

We went for a little drive and found these HUGE kites. 

This isn't all of them, but that snake one was SO BIG.

Last time I stood on this rock I was barely visibly pregnant with Ezra.

See Below.

We went with the Blankenbergs again and had a good time. We hit up a Red Robin on our way home and discovered that they now have bottomless rootbeer floats. What a perfect ending to such a great day!