Cooperstown, NY and the Baseball Hall of Fame

For Ben's Father's Day trip, we went to Cooperstown, NY and saw the baseball Hall of Fame. I put a sampling of pictures here, but Ben posted more on Facebook. The first night we had a WONDERFUL time strolling down main street in Cooperstown. Cecilia loved the shop displays, and we ate at the Doubleday Cafe (good name, not quite good food).

The Cardinals were in 1st place in the standings. Yeah!

On the theme of loving to sit in things, Celia loved this Dino ride. We didn't have any quarters, so she just sat in it. She didn't care, though.

After dinner, we had some awesome ice cream sitting on a bench outside. It was one of those moments that was so perfect you just revel in it.

The next day we went right to the baseball Hall of Fame. We arrived around 10 am and walked through the whole thing, although we didn't spend as much time with the exhibits as we would have sans 1 year old. It was so enjoyable, though, and Celia couldn't get enough of the exhibits.

Ben teaching Celia to flip like the wizard!

She spent so much time walking, running, and being stimulated by things that she actually fell asleep in the archives. Sorry Stan the Man - she missed it.

Once again - Celia loves to sit in things. This chair was a big hit! We may have to get one.

She didn't quite get the concept of the head in the hole picture.

Celia on the car ride home - what a day!

Ben is a Published Author

We got word late last week that Ben's paper entitled, "Assessing Concentration Dependence of FCC Metal Alloy Diffusion Coefficients Using Kinetic Monte Carlo" will be published in the Journal of Phase Equilibria and Diffusion in the near future. He'll be lead author, too! It was a lot of work, and the final acceptance is hard-earned. Congratulations to Ben!

Pooh-Bear

This is Pooh-Bear. It was Ben's when he was a little boy. Kathy has saved it all these years, and she brought it out recently so that Cecilia could play with it too. She loves Pooh-Bear and gives him lots of kisses. It turns out that Ben has missed Pooh-Bear all of these years and is a little jealous. While Cecilia was napping, Ben took Pooh-Bear back. Mommy got it back for Cecilia later.

Our 2 year anniversary

We celebrated our 2 year anniversary today. It came in with a pop - not a bang. Last night, as Ben and I sat in exhaustion with the baby in bed, I sat pumping and grading papers and Ben was sick on the recliner and waiting to take his next dose of medicine before going to bed. Ben looked over at me and asked, "Is marriage as glamorous as you thought it would be?" I have to say to him, "Marriage is better than I thought it would be!" It's not always pretty, but we have a pretty great life. A few humorous comments are in the video below.



We've been so busy lately, that we didn't realize that it was our anniversary until mid-morning after I taught my class. Someone texted us a congratulations and we looked at each other and said, "Oh yeah!" We'd been talking about our anniversary on Tuesday, but we've been so busy that Tuesday snuck up no us! As a result, there were no cards, flowers, candy, or treats. However, we went to lunch to commemorate the day. We are going to Omaha this weekend for a whole night together alone, which is our real anniversary gift to each other. Yeah! Ben's been sick since the weekend, so it wasn't too eventful. Cecilia is really coming out of her shell, and she went after my food during the meal! It's the first time she's shown real interest in what we're eating. Saying "no" just made her want it more :).

When we got home, Celia and I took a nap and Ben relaxed. When Celia woke up, Ben watched her so I could get an extra hour to make-up for burning the midnight oil working this weekend and Monday night. Then I went to teach, and when I got back we headed straight to Ben's softball game, and it was bittersweet. It was sad because it will probably be the last game he'll ever play with that team. It was exciting because they won the Fall Ball Championship! Ben wasn't feeling up to snuff since he was sick - but after a rocky start he made some incredible plays in the field. He also batted in some runs and scored a couple of times. It was a little cold and started spitting, but we made it through and put a tired baby right to bed.

Because Ben was sick, we couldn't even give each other a kiss for our anniversary. However, I look forward to many, many, many years of anniversaries and kisses. Love, I am so happy I married you. Thank you for our daughter and all the hopes, joys, trials, and tribulations that make up our life. Thank you for the past 2 years, and I can't wait for the years to come. Happy anniversary!

Ben's Birthday Celebration in St. Louis

For Ben's 30th Birthday, we went to a Cardinals game in St. Louis with his parents, brothers, and their wives. It was also Cecilia's first time in Busch stadium. We left for Missouri after my class on Friday and got to Cape Girardeau in the evening. That night, Ben went on a ride-along with his brother Nick who is a Cape Girardeau police officer. He saw the evening shift of a police officer first hand, and had many interesting stories about the people he saw. Evidently, there were a lot of intoxicated people Nick had to deal with and he used the siren a few times, which was a real thrill.

Saturday, the family drove up to STL for the big game. We stayed in the Crowne Plaza downtown, which was very nice. By the time we got into St. Louis and checked into the hotel, it was already after 3. We wanted to get to the park when it opened, so we walked to the stadium right away. There was a 20 minute or so wait to get in and then we ate in the park. Park food is not very nutrative, so everyone was still very hungry after the game - and a little sick feeling. So, we needed real food afterwards.

It was picture day, so people came out on the field and the players walked around to give people photo ops. We were going to do that, but it was really just waiting in another long line and none of us - Cecilia included - felt like doing that. I did walk down a few rows and get some pictures. The players weren't supposed to take pictures WITH fans, but Pujols started pulling people out of the crowd to take pictures with them. An announcer asked him about it and he said, "Why not? It's picture day!" in that cute accent of his. You could tell he was a real leader on the team, because one he started taking some pictures with fans everyone else did, too. We also got a picture of Molina with his arm around Pujols. See the sidebar for a link to all the pictures.

It was a great game and we got to see Holliday hit a HR. The Cards beat the Nationals 9 to 4, and Ben kept a scorecard of the game so that I could look that up :). We really love keeping stats at a game, it must be the engineer in us.

After the game we went back to the hotel room and Ben got his birthday cake. It was chocolate with cream cheese frosting. Becky baked the cake and I frosted and decorated it while Ben was on his ride-along with Nick the night before. It said "Happy 30th Birthday Ben" and my attempt at a STL cardinal. It also had 30 trick candles. Ben blew most of them out and then put out he rest with his fingers. We ordered a meal from Maurizio's Cafe Cecilia went to bed before midnight. The poor thing was all worn out. The boys stayed up late and then we all slept well.

Sunday we went to Union Station and did some shopping and had a meal. Ben got a STL decal for the car and I go some fudge. After that last bit of time for the family, we loaded up for the trek home. Cecilia was tired of driving and being away from home, so the trip wasn't as easy as we'd hoped. We all slept well when we got home. What a weekend!

See the link on the sidebar for pictures.