So, Nate, Ben, Emma, Jerusha and I took a two week trip to California, just to enjoy being "home", and it was another great experience.  Another long flight to CA, but this time much more than 2 days of rest before flying back. 

I am not going to write a ton - I will let the pictures speak for themselves.  Hope you all enjoy the new Flickr Gallery of photos.  These were taken with my half-broken camera (thanks to a CERTAIN someone who dropped it…)

So, the summer is almost here, the weather is warming up…and the boys HATE it.  The heat gets to them.  They spit up constantly when they are warm.  And to note - when you feed them special formula (Alimentum), it means they sweat out that special formula.  And quite frankly - it smells much worse coming out than going in.  Nonetheless, the boys are ready for summer.  They are ready for more outdoors, more pool trips, a few beach trips, and lots of sun (except Natey…who is the palest baby ever).

Ben is ready - calm, cool and collected…

And Natey?  HELL YEAH!

So, we took another trip…this time low-key, no airports or planes involved, and drove down (1hr) to Newport for Saturday and Saturday night, and Sunday in Bristol. We got a chance to finally give everyone what they have been waiting and hoping and coaxing and urging and complaining and whining for - a large number of pictures of us and the boys.

There were lots of "firsts" this weekend:

1. My first weekend in Newport, touring the various mansions and walking on Cliff Walk and seeing downtown Newport and getting a new pair of sunglasses
2. The boys’ first bathing suits
3. The boys’ first time in a pool (that floated like a lead balloon - the water was just too cold and they shivered nonstop. On the other hand - they love pools…)
4. Jerusha’s first….ummm….her first….wellll…ok, I got nothing

On that note, I will leave you with the below photo set from Flickr, with all the new pictures uploaded. As always, the slideshow is ‘clickable’ and will take you to Flickr website and all the photos.

So, we did it - we took everyone - Jerusha, Emma, Kevin, and the boys (at 8 weeks old) on a plane, and traveled all the way to San Francisco, CA from Boston. Needless to say, we had cringed in the days leading up to the flight for sheer fear of the nightmare scene we would make in the airport, at security, on the airplane, at the airport, renting a car, in the new house, returning a car, in the airport, at security, on the airplane, at the airport, and getting our car. Well - all of that fear and worrying was all for naught - we got very lucky and owe a great deal of thanks to both United employees and United passengers. Why, you ask?

On the way out, United baggage services worked the magic in the system so that our 5 bags (blame Jerusha) could all be checked for 3 seats. Well - United policies have changed and had it not been for a great and sympathetic employee, and my airline status, it would have cost $400 to check our bags (2 overweight, 2 extra). Then, the gate agents were good enough to help us out again further by ensuring that we had 1 free seat next to us. For your reference, we had middle, aisle, aisle seats. Why not aisle, middle, window? Well, turns out there are only 4 air masks per row on every airplane, so you cannot have 2 "Baby In Lap" in the same row on a sold, out flight. I thought that was interesting. Anyway, boys slept great, we got into town, got our bags, I rented a car, and everything went extremeley well, with only minor whining, but it wasn’t from the boys…

On the way back, United had booked 3 middle seats, and we found a passenger who gave up their window seat to take Jerusha’s middle so that Jerusha and Emma could sit together. Then, the person next to me gave up his aisle seat so that I could be there in case I needed to get up/down or just needed more room to stretch out. Very nice people. We gave them free drink coupons that I got for making 1K status.

The time in CA was great. Weather was perfectly WAY TOO HOT (yes, it reached 100 degrees for us there) on the first day, but settled down to the normal "85 and no clouds" weather we are used to. We got to go to the pool, attend a park festival, walk around a lot, ride bikes, and all the great outdoorsy stuff. We also got to sleep in our own beds - Emma in hers, the boys in their individual cribs, and Jerusha and I in what is now lovingly referred to as "Jerusha’s bed with a small sliver saved for Kevin". I posted pics, as everyone has been asking for quite a while. These are from the whole month of May, so there are some randoms, plus some pics from CA.

It’s nice to wake up in the morning and see your kids….but when you are away, its also nice to have such a loving fiancee that she takes pictures every morning and sends them to you…..and finally, it is 100% absurd that a picture message sent from a Verizon phone at 7am on Wednesday arrives at 3am on Thursday to a Sprint phone.  I know what everyone is thinking….clearly it MUST be the Verizon side of the network.  

Nonetheless, the picture came, the boys look adorable, and it makes me smile to see them.  If only the expert photographer would take a picture of herself once in a while - I miss her like crazy, too.