"To The Employed"

Over the weekend we had a BBQ for friends and family to celebrate the holiday.  Our good friends Ellen and Brian joined us with their two kids, spaced one year and 12 days apart, in tow.  Ellen is one of my oldest and dearest friends.  We met in highschool, hit the clubs together, were going to write a book together, in each other's weddings, the list goes on and on.  She showed up to the BBQ looking fantastic after having Nora just a month ago and handed me a basket.  This basket titled, 'Welcome Back to Work "Basket of Needs' literally made my jaw drop.  I'm not sure where she came up with the idea or had the time to put it together, but it literally almost made me cry.  Not just for the gesture, but the reminder how truly great friends are. 

 In this basket is almost every item I might need on Day 1.  Here are a few of them with their notes:  (Edit- okay, all of them)

Nivea A kiss of smoothnes - "When you need to smooth things over"
Suave Advanced Therapy - "When you've washed too many sippy cups
Lindts Truffles - "Chocolate is better than ____"
Miracle Bubbles - "When you're bored"
Sweet Dreams Herb Tea - "When you wish you could go tell someone to F*** themselves.
Tylenol - "When nothing else works"
Campbell's Soup - "When you feel under the weather"
Puff's Plus - "For the good times and the better"
Runts - "For When you are pregnant again"
Trail Mix - "When you need a natural pick me up"
Trident Gum - "If you forget to brush your teeth or drink too much coffee"
Hand sanitizer - "To Keep you Healthy"
Dunkin Donuts Coffee - "Are you kidding me?"
Fashion Citation note pad - "When you really want to say it, but can't"
Her phone number framed - "When you need a friend"


Seriously the funniest, most thoughtful and adorable gift I've received in a long time.  Thank you Ellen for being such a great friend and reminding me, once again, how blessed I am.  Blessed to have such wonderful family, friends, and an opportunity to work.

Happy Memorial Day!

I had the pleasure of meeting with my Aunt Dee Dee on Saturday to sift through my grandfather's belongings.  He passed away 5 years ago this on April 1st and boxes of papers, memorabilia, and treasures sat untouched in my Dad's barn.

I had my eye peeled for a baseball score card from the 40's - I found it and so much more.  You see, both my grandfather, like so many others, served in the military.  My paternal grandfather spent 4 years in the Navy and then retired from the Coast Guard after 20 years of service. Appropriately, I had the opportunity to see all his newspaper clippings from the war, war bonds, ration coupons, ticket stubs from a game at the Honolulu Stadium, girly programs :-), old bullets, a piece of a German bomb, pictures of family and friends, war medals and honors, his navy uniform, and so much more.  It was very humbling.

His photo ID and WWII medal - I wore this on my bouquet on our wedding day

As we celebrate Memorial Day, we celebrate those who died during military service, I remember my grandfather who spent 25 years serving our country.

Oh, and that baseball card?  I found it!  It was from Comisky Park in 1945.  It's not clear what game it is and partially scored, but oh so cool.  We also found his clickers from his proud umpiring days.

The front score card is from 1945 and the background is from 1987.

Military and baseball - can't get more American than that :-)

Happy Memorial Day!

Getting Called up to the Majors

One title.  Two stories :-)

Abby experienced her first baseball game by attending the Portland Sea Dogs game on Friday night.  She lasted through five innings and I had to hand it to her, it was almost 2 hours past her bed time.  Her schedule had been a little wonky the past week because we had spent evenings at my parent's house making over my Mom's bedroom.  So, fittingly, we kept the later bedtime for one more might.  We're lucky we left when we did because moments later, the game was stopped due to a fog delay.  It was rolling in when we were there, and right after we left you couldn't see the pitcher from the plate.  Got to love Maine!

She loved looking at all the fun things at the park - the field, the trash monsters, entertainment on the field, Sea Dog, and Sea Dog Blueberry ale.   Wait, the last one was for my pure enjoyment.  The marketing smarties at the ball park created a beer garden with local taps.  Brilliant.  And the cost of two beers was almost the cost of one at Fenway!  Even better.

Abby is getting called up to the majors next weekend when we take her to her first Red Sox game.  Although during her nap time, luckily it's a day game.  She'll most likely sleep on the way down, but we'll plan on walking the concourses, maybe visit home plate, have the ergo ready and lots of books to keep her busy.

On another note, a friend of my brothers, who has been pitching in AAA this year, was called up to the majors this week.  Pitching for Detroit, he was called in to relief during the Red Sox game.  It was pretty cool to listen to Remy and Orsillo talk about Charlie Furbush in a positive fashion and even get some good Maine shout outs!  What a great Friday!!!  Way to go Abby and Charlie!!!

JULIAN H. GONZALEZ/DFP

 

 

July 5th, 2011

What's this you ask?  Well, it just so happens it's my next day of WORK.  That's right!  After 31 applications, 15 interviews, and buckets of patience, I was offered a seasonal supervisor assignment at LL Bean.  This is seasonal to permanent, so I'll be crossing fingers they like me enough to keep me on after January.  I start July 5th and will be working first shift in the Portland Call Center.  The hours are pretty flexible, the discount grand, and I have been ok'd for time off in August for our trip to the Cape.  Phewww!!  Bring on the employee store!!

Although I'm very excited about the opportunity, I will miss Abby while she's at day care.  She's been super cute lately.  Laughing adorably and really understanding what we say.  She can't say a whole lot, but she sure does understand it all!

one going on sixteen

In fact, while I was on the phone today (10 minutes) with my future boss, she had managed to get ON the breakfast bar, open the cabinet, take out a wine glass, uncover the crock pot of chili, and put bits of beans in the wine glass.  I can't make this up.  Thank GOD she didn't hurt herself.  This girl is trouble with a capital "T"!  I suppose if I had actually been paying attention doing my job, this wouldn't have happened.  Oh the joys......

Rainy Days

With only two days down and 3 or more to go, we're getting a little restless.  Abby helped me clean the house yesterday and had a ball with the vacuum.  I may have to start giving her an allowance soon.  We even took a chance and got out in the garden for a few minutes to put cages on our peonies so they won't sprawl all over the ground. 

 Abby, I promise spring in Maine is pretty awesome.  Mother nature is just playing with us. 

Our Gardens are Plentiful

Moving in 7 months ago, we've seen brown plant life, snow, and more snow.  This spring has been exciting because not only is everything lush and green, the gardens give us a new present almost daily.  It's exciting to see everything come up even though we don't know what the heck it is.  Well, I suppose that's not entirely true. We hired a local landscape designer to help us identify our lovely perennials.  Carol, from Taming the Wild, popped over on a sunny afternoon and spent an hour with us.  She oohed and aahed at all the different plants and flowers and indicated we have a fortune invested already in the beds.  She also mentioned the previous gardener may have been a lazy gardener based upon what was in there.  Now, don't get me wrong, I like to garden, but this was music to my ears.  Carol let us know that we probably shouldn't have chopped down the hydrangea bushes, but they should regrow and bloom next year.  Oops. 

Besides a plethora of PG hydrangeas, hostas, and peonies we also have lots of day lillies, sedum, black-eyed susans, flox, bleeding hearts, rose bushes, and a gorgeous weeping Japanese cherry tree.  There are so many other species intertwined with these listed and I can't wait for each to bloom to see their colors and beauty.

Abby is excited to see the flowers too!

she was "helping"

Bleeding hearts

weeping Japanese cherry tree

One of the challenges with plentiful perennial beds is the plentiful weeding and mulching that takes place.  Thus far we have put in 22 man hours and 30 bags of mulch.  We are about 80% done and am hoping the last five bags of mulch will be sufficient.  I commented to Tim this afternoon, while it drizzled, that gardening was kind of nice - quiet, the rain like music on my rain coat, and the fog horn faintly letting us know she was their.  Yes, we were hard at work even in the rain.  We're ALMOST done and with the forecast with rain through Saturday we were hoping to finish up today.  Almost done... our neighbors thought we were crazy and asked us if we knew it was raining.  Jokester. 

Before

After

It's truly amazing what a nice clean line and a bit of mulch can do to the eye.  Thank God the snow is gone and, like our lives, the gardens keep our hands at work and are plentiful.

Playground Pleasantries

Abby absolutely loves the playground!  Adores it.  Now that it is warmer out, we go almost every day.  She is quite daring on the slides and I have to remind her to go DOWN the slide and UP the stairs.  Abby rotates quite frequently from the swings, slides, captaining the boat, driving the car, see-sawing it, and climbing the bars.  Usually a few extra minutes on the swing is necessary.  She high fives on the up swing and laughs with delight on the down swing. 

 We've had trouble finding good locations with enough equipment for the vertically challenged.  Abby can't quite reach some of the stuff at the elementary school playgrounds and some don't have bucket seats.  Wouldn't you know Fort Williams, just a few miles from us, has one of the best playgrounds around! The view can't be beat either - Portland Head light, the Atlantic Ocean, and skyline of Portland.

Getting to the playground his week might be a challenge with the looming weather conditions.  We'll have to somehow create our own indoor playground for both our sakes.  Wish us luck!

Happy Mother's Day!

I love today.....I usually do, even before I came a Mom.......

The Proctors woke up around 7 and while Abby and I snuggled, Tim prepared coffee in bed.  He also surprised me with a super gift.  I've been saying that I am going to get a new bag to celebrate a new job.  Well, since that hasn't happened yet, I was shocked to open a new Coach tote.  Seriously am loving this guy right now.....he was gone for a week and it seemed like an eternity!  I'm so glad he's back!!

We didn't have much time as we planned on cooking an amazing breakfast at my Mom's.  Breakfast of french toast, eggs, and bacon.  Love!  The fam spent two hours in Mom's garden.  Weeded, planted, mulched, and bordered her annual bed.  It really came out awesome.

We came home around noon and did lots of yard work at our house.  Tim mowed the lawn for the first time in his life.  Yes, first time. My deal for today was that he did everything around the house. Laundry, dishes, etc.  I got my wish and I even offered to fold the diaper load.  Heavenly!  Dinner was at Fuji one of my favorite sushi restaurants in Portland. 

I'm not sure how I got so lucky, but this has been a GREAT weekend!  Lots of fun, sun, family, and yard work!  

I hope you all enjoyed your own Mother's Day whether you celebrated with your Mom, as a Mom, or thinking of your Mom. 

In the Box - Out of the Box

Abby's newest stage is putting items in something, taking them out, putting them back in, etc.  It's actually quite amusing the tricks she has up her sleeve for this new task.  Hmm, let's see.  Blocks go in the tote, out of the tote, and back in.  Clothes go in the hamper, back in the drawer, in the trash can - whatever, it's sort of a hamper, right?  Teddy goes in the toilet, on the floor, back in the toilet.  I hate to tell you Abby, I don't think Teddy really likes taking a bath in the toilet.  Grapes go in the pot holder, on the floor, back in the cup.  :-/  I'm glad I caught this one, can you imagine sticking your hand in a pot holder to find moldy grapes?  ewww.

Teddy is currently airing out in the wide open window.

Belated Easter Picture

Finally a picture!  There may be more coming - stay tuned! 

Four Generations of Legere's

Abby's cousins

Welcome Spring!

The Proctor family is welcoming spring full force!  While Tim is out in California on a business trip, Abby and I are filling our days with outside activities.  She's helping me pick up sticks in the yard, lots of visits to the playground, and blowing bubbles. She LOVES being outside. 

I went to an adorable baby shower for my cousin-in-law and was surrounding by lots of pink and the colors of spring.  The mama-to-be was glowing, the food wonderful, and conversation grand.  I just love being with my family.  While I helped celebrate, Abby spend some quality time with Uncle Chris.  Not only did he hang with her while I was gone, but he also took her the playground when we got home. I had two hours to putz in our amazing perennial gardens.  Thanks, Uncle Chris!!

Following our afternoon of playing, we had an impromptu dinner with both uncles and girlfriends.  Another example of why moving back to Maine was so important to us.  This May day I reflect on where we were one year ago and that was gearing up for the big move.

Here are  few shots of Abby from the weekend.  Eventually I'll get Easter pics up, when I can hunt someone down who took one :-)

Just love her!