What a Birthday

Today, I celebrated my birthday and it was a good one. Last night, we went to my favorite barbeque place, Q. It is a good place to take Bridget. It is a large open room where you can watch the cooking being done, with occasional flames shooting up, good times.... this morning Bridget got up at her customary crack of dawn, literally, 5 a.m...Megan made her fantastic pancakes from scratch, funny moment when Bridget realized she had sticky fingers, kept saying "sticky" and cracked herself up for five full minute belly laugh, saying "sticky"... she is so cute and cuddly... I took her to the park as per usual on the weekend, she cheers when we arrive and loves to see other kids, there is so much there, slides, swings, tunnel, sandpit, etc., I feel like a bodyguard foll lowing her around, making sure she doesn't jump off anything too high, she took a gentle header at the end of one slide ride... we had lunch and took a great nap, Bridget sleeping nearly two hours, yeah!!!... we met grandma and poppy at a local Irish restaurant, they gave me the recent Colonel Roosevelt book and a nice card, my dad giving me the highest compliment of being a "gentleman and scholar". Bridget ate up her veggies and some steak and took in all the stimuli (only downside having lots of TVs on, tuned to football). She loved looking at all the people. The best part was live Irish music provided by two musicians who were terrific. Bridget got up and was mesmerized by them, then she started dancing and was joined by two other "big girls", perhaps 4 and 6 years old. It was adorable to watch her dance along to the music of her people, she is so social, we'll have our hands full years from now. She called me over and my heart melted as it always does with her... she even sang me her happy birthday song before falling asleep... it doesn't get any better. I am very blessed with Megan and Bridget.

Wedding Wonder

This past weekend we went up to Hull, Massachusetts to attend our good friend Cecilia's wedding. We timed it perfectly heading up Friday afternoon during nap time and Bridget slept most of the way there. We took her to the rehearsal dinner Friday night for a little while. She was taking it all in, people got a kick out of her. Then we went back to the hotel and put her to bed, Meg returned to the party and I konked out on the bed...as is our custom, we got up at 5 a.m, why not get an early jump on the day and played, went out for a walk, out to breakfast (arriving before the place even opened) and explored the hotel... Bridget saw some of the ceremony, but I had to take her out when she started asking questions (what is this?)... I went to the first two hours of the reception and Meg watched her (we were originally going to leave her with our friends' two young boys and their sitter, but it turned out that he got really sick)...I took Bridget out to dinner to Starz, a diner type place meg and I used to go to on occasion in Hingham. They have good food, lots of people, very reasonable, great place for her. She ate really well, not always a given in a restaurant. We then went for a walk in the dark on the boardwalk along the water, asking questions all along the way. ..there must have been a big game because we saw a schoolbus filled with cheering kids, along with a fire truck and police car with sirens flashing, other cars honking... Bridget is still asking about this schoolbus and firetruck.. it is fascinating to watch her try to make sense of the world, by finding patterns.... meg took up after me.. Bridget slept pretty well and we went to Starz, and World's End, a gorgeous park on the water in Hingham. Bridget was adorable in her full blue coat and pink bunny hat, got lots of comments... she didn't sleep on the way home, but didn't make a fuss, what a trooper.