A walk with my sister-in-law and nephew at a nature conservancy where we saw a bog.
Doubleday Field - home of the invention of baseball.
Ryan and Andrew with Ted Williams, Ryan's favorite Red Sox player at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY.
Me and the Babe, my favorite Yankees player.
Andrew and my nephew Sam feeding the chickens at the Farmer's Musuem in Cooperstown.
My niece Sonja and Andrew at the Visitor's Center on the farm owned by SUNY Oneonta where my brother is a professor of biology.
My dad, younger brother Matthias, and step mom Sybille (she is a professor at his college, Dana, thus, she was also in graduation attire), at Matthias' graduation from college in Nebraska.
My brother and his girlfriend Zuzana.
My grandparents, my brothers, my sister-in-law and the kiddos!****
We spent our vacation this year primarily spending time with my family. We flew out to Albany, NY a week ago Saturday to visit my older brother and his family. They have just relocated to Otego, NY near Oneonta, NY where my brother is beginning his tenure as a professor of biology at SUNY (State University of New York) Oneonta. He spends time teaching and continuing to do research, primarily at the lake near Cooperstown, NY. We loved seeing their new house and the area where they lived. It was very picturesque. Rolling green hills, perfect red barns and black and white cows like right out of a painting. They have a large lot and live in a very nice rural area. You could watch the neighbors Alpacas out their front picture window. It was great to catch up with my brother, his wife and their two kids. My sister-in-law is studying Chinese medicine and acupuncture. Her school work is really rigorous. Basically, it is like Medical School, but not in vein of traditional Western medicine. My niece Sonja is 7 and doing well at school and my nephew Sam is 4 and was a big hit with Andrew. Andrew continues to ask about Sam every day. Because they live so far away and we are all so busy we just don't see each other enough, but the trip was nice.
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Of course, there is always some hiccup in any vacation with us, and we all got sick toward the end of our time in NY. Andrew and I went to the Doctor upon our return and we continue to take our antibiotics.
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Then we had a one day turn around before driving to NE for Memorial Day weekend to see my younger brother graduate from college. He had a double major of History and International Studies. He graduated with honors and also received a special Community Enrichment award for beginning Nebraskans for Peace on his campus and an annual Peace Fest. But, don't ask him what his plans are now, he is going to take some time and figure that out...I think he's allowed. It was great to see a lot of family over the weekend and the weather in NE was really warm. Andrew had a great time playing really hard with his cousins. We also visited my mom and her parents and they were really happy to see Andrew again, even if just briefly.
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We had a great time over our family vacation, but home feels good too and we all slept really well last night:)
5 comments:
Cooperstown looks like fun. So are you a yankees fan and Ryan Red Sox?
Was this Andrew's first time on a plane? How did he do?
Yes, Ryan is a Red Sox fan and I am a Yankees fan. World Series time can be very trying on our marriage:)
Andrew had been on a plane for three previous trips, one of which was to Sweden when he was 11 mos. old. But, this time was much more challenging we didn't have to buy him a seat, so we didn't. Now we think that was a mistake. He is just too big and too active to sit on our laps, next time I think will be better when he has his own seat.
So why did you have to buy him a seat to Sweden? We are goign to Haiti in July and I was not planning on buying Rowan a seat. Is it required for international travel?
I'd love to hear any tips you have on long flights with a toddler.
No we didn't buy a seat for Sweden. So far, he has never had his own seat. I just think that he was much more willing to sit on our laps (and wasn't so big) at 11 mos. versus now. He will be two next month which is when they require you to buy a seat and now we see why two is the cutoff. I think at 23 mos. he needed his own seat.
The good part about international travel though is that the flights are usually not full and you get an extra seat anyway. We were offered to move for an extra seat on the way out to Sweden and Ryan declined it (bad move). We accepted the move on the way home and had a seat for Andrew.
My only other tips for long flights with toddlers are to bring new exciting toys and be prepared to really pay attention to them. As long as we were engaging Andrew in something he was fine, but once we got tired and started slacking he became really restless. The other bonus on international flights is that there is more room to move around. I would let Andrew go up and down the aisles for a while, no one cared about it.
Looks like you had a good time even though you were sick!
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