Baby Milestone!

What a week of discovery for Evan! Several weeks ago, he accidentally went from his belly to the sitting position. And Evan hasn't done it again... until Monday, Dan went to get him from the crib, and he was sitting. Now Evan loves to go from his belly to sit... except there is always a motive. For example, his Winnie the Pooh talking book was out of reach on his belly... so he sat up, CRAWLED, sat back done and played with the book!!! What a great feeling to see and experience... he didn't repeat is for daddy, but watch out world here comes Evan!!

Off to continue the venture of baby proofing the house.... what a task for someone who has a lot of knick knacks and various other souvenirs :)

Tomorrow is the Big E!!!!

Girls' Night Out

The funniest thing happened on Friday afternoon... I received a call from the local radio station informing I won the "Girls' Night Out" contest. I vaguely remember entering. But I won dinner (excluding alcohol) and tickets to a show for myself and 3 friends! So Saturday Jen, Becky, Cathy and myself went to dinner at Kream in downtown New London (across the street from the Garde Arts Theater). We were the only customers there at 6pm on a Saturday, but we certainly didn't care b/c it was FREE!!

The atmosphere was nice for a martini bar. The food selection was limited but everything was delicious!!! And there was a special for Saturday nights.... buy one drink, get the next for $1!! So we took advantage of that... and yes they have good martinis (chocolate, tiramisu, mint chocolate chip, capacinnitini, and key lime--those were the ones we tasted).

Then off to the see "Girls' Night Out: The Musical".

Girls Night: The Musical follows five friends as they re-live their past, celebrate the present, and look to the future during a wild and outrageous girls night out at a karaoke bar. From the pen of Where the Heart Is writer Louise Roche, this production showcases a few recognizable characters…Carol the party girl, blunt Anita who tells it like it is, Liza and her "issues," boring Kate the designated driver, and Sharon the not-so-angelic angel who just can’t resist tagging along. Girls Night: The Musical is bursting with energy and packed with classic tunes.

Recently adapted for the US premier tour, Roche’s emotive and witty script cuts straight to the heart of anyone who spent their teen years dancing with their girlfriends. Sharon is a feisty disco gal who died years ago in a moped accident and now returns as an angel to oversee the antics of her ageing friends. And what a bunch of misfits they are; all recognizable caricatures of femininity. It soon becomes evident that there is much more to these ladies than first impressions. Amidst the laughs and songs, some profound observations are made about all kinds of issues. Presented on a single disco-style set, the girls replay their lives in flashbacks, in-between giving stirring renditions of seventies favorites, from "I'm Every Woman" and "I Will Survive" to "We are Family," "Girls Just Want to Have Fun," and "At Seventeen." Girls Night: The Musical is an unmissable slice of sizzling entertainment for anyone who really knows how to have fun. The Buckingham Advertiser calls it, “A must-see for women everywhere!”

We had a blast!! We all were able to relate and put ourselves or our old crew into one of the characters. And the audience certainly did get involved... singing and dancing on their feet...

If you get a chance to see this show... GO!!! It really is a tribute to women and the bonds of friendship!!

Our house... in the middle of our street.....

Have you ever felt like your house was falling apart? We are rapidly approaching 2 years living in this house... and every year we try to invest $$ by improving an aspect of the house (sometimes the "improvement" becomes required unexpectedly). In our first year, we replaced the roof, cleared some brush/trees, landscaped flower gardens. This past year, we replaced the main circuit breaker (unexpectedly required) and fix the flawed design of the fireplace and it's not existent flu. I had my first veggie garden that yielded so many tomatoes I didn't know what to do.

So what is next.... well...we have to fix a window that apparently cracked in the past year. It's a family room window which was sealed for the winter and the shades were always drawn... so when we raised the shades recently, we saw a crack window. I suspect that during this past winter as the city was blasting the rock ledge to build the new school, it literally "rocked" our foundation.

As the rising costs of energy climbs, we are looking for ways to improve our heating/cooling.... and conserve heat. With electrical heat, we look to do as much as we can. Luckily we have newer windows (except in the kitchen) but the heating design of the house leaves a lot of heat to escape... especially when we forget to turn the heat down at night or when we leave for work... so our next project... look into a digital thermostat ....i even went out and bought one (after extensive research)... we read the directions. The options were for 3 wires or 4 wires or 5 wires types of systems. And I bought the one that is accommodating many systems. However, when we started, we discovered there are "7" wires for our system... so this DIY project has moved on to... "hire a professional"...

And then on Wednesday morning Dan was feverishly getting ready to start his day. Since I leave so early in the morning, Dan is in charge of getting Evan ready for the day and take him to daycare. But as Dan was getting himself ready, he heard a "THUD!!!"... and his description was "it sounded like a bird crashing into a picture window".... so logically, Dan went into the living room and checked out the picture window... sure enough, he saw this.....

If you click on the image to enlarge, you'll SEE the outline of the bird in flight. I took the liberty of not only photographing it, enhancing the outline to make it more visible. As Dan loaded up the car, he did check to see the fate of the bird.... and the birdie was alive... not in the best of shape. So Dan decided to let nature take its course. At lunch, Dan came home and check the bird thinking it'll either be dead or dragged away by the predatory cats that wander through our yard. And to his surprise, the bird was still there and more lively. And Dan took a step forward, the bird rallied all his energy to scoot into the bushes... up against the brick faced house. And that is the last we saw of the bird.

So I now question.... didn't the bird SEE the dirty window? We hadn't cleaned it since we moved in.... and now, how do we remove the guts. I suspect I'll be climbing up the ladder to scrubbed off the feathers left behind. But I sure hope the pressure washer or hose will work on it.

So now it's been 2 years of living in house... and sometimes I do miss living in a condo ... and having someone else take care of the outside.... wait.. I have Dan ;)

Summer's Over

Summer is unofficially over and as usual it flew by. I think I got the most out of my summer. I got to use the pool's condo for the first time in.... seven years. As a family, we went to the annual Loberfest, vacations (Maine & Maryland), lunch at beach for chili dogs, got to use our deck for BBQs, and of course the very healthy veggie garden...


All in all, I enjoyed my summer... and I enjoyed not working on Fridays' anymore. Definitely gives me more time with Evan. We are now looking forward to the Fall in New England: the Big E, pumpkin carving, apple picking, fairs, leaves changing colors and of course... FOOTBALL!!!

Goodbye summer... see you next year...

It's been a busy couple of weeks!!

It's been a busy couple of weeks for Bouges'.

Ocean City: It's a good thing that I didn't have high expectations going into the trip... just looking forward to spending time with the family, away from work, watching Evan learn from his new experiences and of course the beach. Well, 3 out of 4 isn't bad. The weather was dreary, cloudy and drizzle like every day except for Friday and the Saturday we left MD. So we did get to put Evan in the water and he got to play in the sand. But the bad weather got us to do other stuff like mini-golf and laser tag. And we also got to spend time with family and friends and get to know each other better. I even found some time to read my book. But as with most vacations, the fun had to end and we had to leave (on the day it was 100 degrees out).

And vacationing with a baby definitely changes a trip... especially one you've been on so many times... single. But it was amazing to see him grow... we took some photos, but definitely not enough... we were so busy with taking care of Evan that we didn't get to take many photos....

But our trip home was extended as we stayed at relatives in NJ Saturday night... convenient because Sunday was the Christening of my cousin's daughter in NJ. Staying at my Uncle Seth & Auntie Brenda's house gave them an excellent chance to get to know Evan. A 1-2 hour visit can only tell you so much.... but an overnight stay, tells you more :) The Christening was nice and typical as all the babies were crying at one point in time, but it was wonderful to see them.

Monday brought a whirlwind day. Sigrid and family (7 in total) came to CT for a short visit on their way to Boston. Her in laws wanted to see to CT, so I had to find something that represented CT in just 4-5 hours of activity. Hard to site see with 2 babies... major delays occur... but the gang spent time at the beach and got to visit the Nautical Museum (first nuclear sub) and Olde Mystic Village. They left at 5:30am the next morning as they continued their tour of New England in Boston. But it was nice to have family stay here and great to spend time with Samiah. She didn't get to interact much with Evan but in 6 months or 2 years, they'll be playing together and having fun.

And on the Baby News front: Evan is now cutting his 2 upper front teeth. Back on May 16th, we saw that first tooth (lower middle) cut through with it's neighboring tooth not far behind. Then about a month or so ago, we saw the next pair come in and it was painful for the house... Evan's our little vampire as he has his canine teeth (fangs) and not top middle teeth. But yesterday our suspicions were right... he's cutting his 2 front teeth right now. This may explain his crankiness or his clinginess but we also think he's starting the "separation anxiety".

Well, I didn't start the blog with a "wha hoo"..... so Evan didn't win the Q-Test baby in SECT. But that's OK but we all know he is... The winner received more than 29,000 votes... sure she's cute but I think someone spammed in the votes... 29,000!!!!

OK.... time to sleep.... but what will this long weekend bring... hopefully some fun.... and home improvement!!