happy 9 months, Macon!

Yesterday, Macon had his 9-month check up. He weighed in at 22 lbs., 8oz and stretched out to 28.25" in length (both measurements in the 80th percentile), and his head dominated at 18.5" which is the 90th percentile.

Today is his official 9-month birthday and he celebrated in style with breakfast and some exersaucer time.

If you look closely, you can see 3 or 4 top teeth starting to emerge.

And Jed's outfit is an Eric original, ca. 1975.

news from the yard

Jed and I cleaned out most of our "garden" this afternoon, and Jed thought a tomato cage was a great fireman's mask.

And who should we find under one of the trash cans we use for yard waste? That's a black widow spider, apparently on her last legs, thankfully.

irene videos

I don't have an update on the trailer, but Aunt Judy weathered the storm in Greenville with power outages and downed limbs, and I'm assuming no news is good news with regards to my cousins in northeastern NC and New York City.

Here are two You Tube videos of the area were we go to the beach. The first half of the first one is pretty close to the trailer; the second half is on the soundside. The second video is farther south, in Kill Devil Hills, but I added it because of its cool-factor: who knew you could fly a camera with a radio controlled airplane??



Second look update for the airplane view video: if you know what you're looking for, you can catch the trailer park to the north, usually toward the top right or right side of the screen. It's the mass of white between the beach road and bypass.

storm report

Thankfully, we have almost nothing to report. We lost power for about two hours this morning and a medium-sized limb fell from our neighbor's tree and landed on the sidewalk in front of our house, but that's about the sum of it. We had rain squalls off and on all day, and it's still abnormally windy, but the clouds are starting to clear and we've seen glimpses of a sunset. Otherwise, we're eagerly awaiting updates from family and friends down east.

beach baby, beach baby

To begin, let me answer a question that I've fielded a couple of times since we've been home: How was the surf? Well, see for yourself.

Wednesday morning

Wednesday evening

We arrived last Friday and Jed and Eric headed straight for the beach. Macon had to wait until Saturday morning for his first taste.

the boys at Bodie Island Lighthouse

Mama at the lighthouse in 1978

At the lighthouse, we took a boardwalk to a freshwater pond where ospreys, egrets, and two types of terns gobbled up tasty fish treats.

back to the beach

On Monday, Grandpa, Jed, and Mama visited the Wright Brothers Memorial. It took Jed a while to recognize this as an airplane, but seeing a couple of bi-planes over the beach helped.

In 1977, Mama made a similar pilgrimage with Grandma and Grandpa.

Jed didn't actually like the beach, it's just that at the pool, which he loved, we had to be in the water with him so we don't have any pictures.

visiting the aquarium

Jed kept talking about sharks (aka yarks), and on the way in when I asked him how they swim, Jed demonstrated.

yark!

mimicking a fish Jed called "the sad fish"

watching for otters with Grandma

Whose mouth is bigger?

And one final trip over the dunes on Wednesday evening.
Maybe there will be an inlet here by Monday.

walking with Grandma while keeping a safe distance from the ocean

Good luck this weekend, Kitty Hawk! Godspeed, old trailer!

earthquakes! hurricanes! run for cover!

For the first 18 or 19 years of my life, and intermittently since then, I've gone with my parents to Kitty Hawk in the summer. Today was the first time that I left as part of an evacuation. Frankly, I was a little disappointed: I expected a Coast Guard helicopter rescue, but it turns out that "evacuate" is just a fancy word for "go home." I simply loaded the Armada, got out the sexton, pushed away from the dock, and headed west.

Eager to miss any potential traffic jams along U.S. 64 (who wants to stop for a feeding or diaper change in the middle of a swamp?), we rolled out at 8:15, had a leisurely diaper/bottle stop in the more refined confines of downtown Tarboro, and dropped anchor in Raleigh for lunch.

Although our departure was very smooth, and to look around as we left, you'd never know a storm was approaching, it was fitting that we left under evacuation orders. With the hurricane threat looming all week, the earthquake added a little end-of-days flare. Eric's building rocked and rolled and Daddy described it as two washing machines running. Mama was walking outside and didn't notice it, and I was driving Jed around for a nap and missed it, too. I've never wanted to experience a earthquake, but I'll admit that I'm pretty annoyed to have missed it. I even found the Virginian-Pilot's headline, DID YOU FEEL IT?, rather taunting.

So we're home. And we're ready for the pending end-times with plenty of gas, duct tape, cash, water, and, thanks to our neighbor McLeod (also a disgruntled quake-miss-er), plenty of beef jerky and ammo. In the meantime, hopefully I can get some more pictures posted before Irene wrecks Raleigh.

the David boys are anti-sand

while we are out

We're off to the beach tomorrow, so look for new pictures next weekend. In the meantime, I hope you'll enjoy a few recent and not-so-recent shots.

Macon

Jed

Macon

Jed
Macon

Jed

Jed today, with mouth still open.

And we're off!
We rented an enormous suv for the beach so that everyone can fit in one car while we're there. It's an Armada, and I find myself somewhat embarrassed to be driving a vehicle named after a losing naval fleet, but whatever . . .
Jed loves it, so hang ten!

How big is this truck, Jed?