This was a weekend we have been looking forward to for quite a while. Everyone was flying or driving in to the Day family homestead. We have been battling colds and coughs all week so we decided to start out on Friday rather than Thursday night. The weather was decent and we were excited about the trip and seeing everyone. We made a few stops on the way up to break up the trip for Liam.  We counted the Pike Drive-In as a locationless cache and then could not find another south of Williamsport. Liam also learned EiEiO to Old MacDonald on the way up.

When we arrived around we were greeted with warm hugs from Dad and Dawn. We relaxed and visited and enjoyed watching Liam play. Mom was working so she was in a little bit later. We enjoyed some awesome Roast Beef crock potted and relaxed in the living room making a few plans for the next day. Dawn is such a wonderful Aunt to Liam. Liam grew very attached to her this weekend. He followed her around to play all the little games Dawn made up and he squealed with delight over them!

On Saturday there were lots of plans and many things to do. Dad had a large group of seven coming over to the Roe Barn area from Windy Ridge for some bird hunting. Russ was still getting over being sick and decided not to help out with the birds but Dawn was super gung-ho and helped Dad out and went out later with him as he guided. It was a great father daughter day.

Dad and Russ helped Erin core apples as she was baking pies in the morning for everyone. With a little assistance from Mom Day the Pumpkin and Apple pies turned out wonderful. Erin is turning out to be a great pie baker just like her mom!

Liam, Erin, Russ, and Mom went into town for some errands. We stopped by to look the new Wellsboro High School. Erin thought it looked great and Russ thought it looked like a barn. At Dunhams, Gramma got Liam some new PJs  and a little Owl that hooted since this was a new word Liam had learned the night before. He is picking a few new ones up a day now. When we arrived home Gramma watched Liam as Russ and Erin went to hike and find a local geocache at Ives Run named Stephen House Cache right on the creek. We enjoyed the walk and talked about a future new arrival and how we should tell the family since we would all be gathered in the same place. We then stopped by and discovered our Mucky Vistas cache was not lost but just in need of repair.

We all gathered back up at the house and got a couple of phone calls. One was Cousin Marc checking in to let us know Catherine and their new son Seth (just born on Thursday) were doing well and were probably getting out of the hospital Sunday!

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Congratulations to Mark and Catherine, God Bless!

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The other news was not so great. Brian called from the Philadelphia Airport. Jo and his flight had left early to Elmira so they would be heading out on the 8:30 flight. They were lucky there was another flight out. Needless to say we felt bad for them as a long day stretched longer for them. Like all good Day's and Day in-laws do we console ourselves with food. Mom made a great ham and we had Erin's Pumpkin and Apple pies for dessert.

We sat back and watched an evening of Brit Wit and awaited the arrival of Brian and Jo. They made great time rolling in the driveway a little before 11. We all visited in the kitchen for a bit but Erin and I were pretty tired so we bid goodnight.

 

Sunday morning was anticipation for the arrival of Kate, Rich, Obie, and Tatania. I must say I was impressed as they left the Philly area at Oh Dark Thirty to make it up a little after nine.

 

Everyone pitched in to make or get ready for breakfast. Mom, Dad, and Erin were busy on the grills to make a feast of a breakfast. It is a true family debate now who makes the best pancakes Dad or Erin but Dad's were awesome this morning. As we sat down Erin said

"Russ and I have an announcement to make.". Erin gave me a chance to do the honors but I wanted her to let the family know we are expecting our second child. God has blessed us with granting us this chance so soon after deciding this is what we wanted to do. God also blessed us with the reaction and love we felt from everyone! It means so much to us and gives us a lot of strength and confidence in what we have so much joy over. We love you all so much and you mean so much to us and our lives!

 

After Breakfast we took a lot of special photographs. We were all good sports and the joking and frivolity was at its witty height as it always is.

The time flew by way to quickly this beautiful warm sunny Sunday. it was a special few hours of warm laughter and the love of family.

 

Alas the Cole's needed to get on the road. We stopped by a replaced the cache at the Muck and Russ put for once put the Jeep on a good pace while Liam and Erin slept. We stopped for a nice dinner at the Cracker Barrel and arrived home about 8:30 and visited a little with our friend and petsitter Anita and then hit the hay. Halloween is tomorrow and Liam must get ready with his Pirating! ARGGH Matey!

 

Not a very eventful weekend. Some just are meant to be that way. The biggest event is head colds wiped us all out at the same time. Liam is still coughing. Russ and Erin were both down with colds.

 

On Friday night we did get to go to dinner to Applebess. That mambo Italiano commercial finally got to us.

 

On Saturday we all got up sick and didn't venture past the couch for most of the day. We felt bad that we said we might be able to help Dave paint for his play but by the time we heard the message and the way we felt it just wasn't going to happen.

 

We watched movies from morning into the afternoon. We saw Amityville Horror and Changing Lanes after Liam was up from his nap.  

We finally got the gumption to go out and get some air late in the afternoon. Erin wanted to check out the new Old Navy but it wasn;t opened yet so we ended up down at Foot Locker as we all needed new sneakers. Russ got some Reeboks, Erin KSwiss and the baby got his first Chuck Taylor high tops.

On Sunday we watched teh Skins plow the 49ers and while Russ watched the NASCAR race Erin took Liam to the playground. It was a quiet uneventful weekend full of sneezing and tissues.

Super busy weekend.  We packed a lot in! 

 

Friday evening, we zipped up to Prince Frederick after work for a Geocaching event.  It was about a 45 minute drive, and it was fun, because we brought one of my co-workers along to give Geocacing a try.  This event was special because it centered around solving a story-puzzle cache.  A particular cacher wrote an elaborate story filled with directions and clues on how to solve this multi-staged hunt... to top it off... it was designed to do at night!  He used reflectors to lead the way, but honestly, we were glad he was along too, just to act as a guide when we really got stumped.  About 20 of us had a fantastic time.  Liam always enjoys the extra attention he gets from his caching consorts, and our newbie ringer had a good time diving into the sport too.  The only downer of the evening was when one of our fellow cachers lost his NEW contact lens in the undergrowth.  No, we didn't find it, but he decided that caching with goggles on might be a good idea from now on.

  

Saturday was a beautiful day.  The air was crisp, but the sun was warm.  We took Liam to gymnastics and he had a great time as usual.  He simply loves the ball pit, and has started to pick up some of the motions that go with the rhymes we do at circle time.  It's really cute, and he delights in getting his hands and feet stamped at the end of the class.  After gymnastics, we got a few groceries and swung by the "Spirit" Halloween store to find a good Pirate hat for Liam.  Once home, we began cleaning and planning for the Halloween Playgroup that we were hosting on Sunday.  Soon it was time to fix a little dinner before I left to pick up our friend, Sue and attend my first "Slumber Party."  If you know what a Slumber Party is... well, it's a lot of fun.  It's NOT the kind of party you'd have when you were 14, but more adult oriented so to speak. It kind of works like a Pampered Chef party, but a little more discreet.  I won't mention if I made any purchases or not.

Sunday we shared a nice pancake breakfast together before getting into Party mode.  Additionally, I started work on two pies.  I made a really good Pumpkin one, and attempted an Apple so I could try out my new corer/peeler/slicer gadget I got from Pampered Chef.  Sadly, though it tasted ok, I think I should have added about 3 more apples.  The pie plates that I have (also from PChef) are so deep, that it takes a LOT to fill 'em up!   

 

At 3:00 the party/playgroup began.  We had about half a dozen guests and the kids had a dandy time playing in the back yard.  We got a chance to sit around and chat about our usual topics - potty training was one of primary interest this time - and then went inside for some pie and cider.  It provided some really nice photo opportunities, and the kids are just starting to learn to play together.  Liam was ever so protective of his toys, bubbly wand, and mommy,  but he got a little better as the time passed.  Falling out of the hammock and recovering in Mommy's lap for about 10 minutes chilled him out a little too.  Over the past week Liam has learned the power of "NO," however he's also learned the power of "PLEASE" too, so we're on the way to better communication and - hopefully - better violence prevention!

  

Friday Erin cleaned house and got groceries with Liam. Russ helped Dave Hoffman paint the set for an upcoming play of the Patuxent Playhouse up in Prince Frederick. Dave is their set designer and on their Board of Directors.

 

On Saturday we took Liam to gymnastics and a great time. Liam was a little more tired than usual but made it through. Afterwards Erin and I went to the Sleep Inn for a little overnight getaway to celebrate our 3rd Anniversary. We enjoyed the Jacquzzi and Pool and had a great fodue picnic in our room. It was a fun night.

On Sunday we stopped by Target on the way home and found some containers for Liams toys downstairs. Erin worked on that on Sunday. We had steaks and watched TV.

 

On Monday we had lunch with our geocaching buddy Gary Ashmore (simulatmore) at Arby's. He was the First to Find prize winner of our two new caches Indian Symbols and A Breed Apart. Indian Symbols came about from a card Dawn had sent us and we both thought it would make a neat cache. After that we FINALLY found our nemesis cache Ascension Gardens for our 341st find. We had DNFeed it early. We forgot to check for the clue. Even with the clue we had trouble as we missinterpreted the clue. Tonight we'll watch some TV and get ready for a short work week.

 

Short weekend! On Friday night we collected our geocaching contents and double checked all our gear and played with Liam. We also got a few shots of the doggies.

 

Saturday we took Liam to Gymnastics. Boy he is getting good at climbing. All the little ones are getting the routine down now. They are so anxious to go play when they get there. They also know that they go sit on the balance beam after circle time to get their stamps. Liam loved his this time as they were ducks on his hands and feet.

 

After Gymanastics it was off to do a lot of geocaching. We ran to the house first to pick up a few forgotten supplies. Our first stop after this was to hide a new puzzle cache called Jumble-laya which is a word puzzle based on some anagrams Aunt Joan had sent in an email a while back. We then ran over to Chancellor's Run park and removed one of very first caches put out 1/1/03 called Dog Gone Cache. We removed it to open up the park to other hiders. Ironically a new hide there was approved today! We then headed to St. Mary's Watershed Park which is the classic park in the county. We were removing one of our three hides there to open up some hiding space. We removed Callaway Bug Resort as Travel Bugs were getting bogged down in the cache and not traded out quick enough. We took the last two Travel Bugs and will trade them soon. It was about lunch time so Bear Creek was calling our name and Erin got her usual pulled pork and me the pulled beef. I found out diet root beer doesn't taste too bad.

After we left Bear Creek Erin started talking about locationless caches and how they were going away to waymarking a new site next year. Locationless caches are usually ones where you need to find something and prove that you found it. We drove by a barber pole and she said there is one so we pulled over and got it. She started mentioning others and a Cigar Store Indian jumped out at me as I sat staring at one at Bear Creek while we ate. We decided we would return for that one. We went down to St. Inigoes to trade out caches as Crab Pot another of our first hides was on a newly designated No Trespassing zone. Erin ran across the soybean field to get this one as I watched Liam and scouted a new hiding spot for Crabe Pot Deux. After enjoying the afternoon here for a little bit we stopped back by Bear Creek to see the Inidan again.

We were now finally ready to have the best part of the day, the hikes. We tried to find a way to get to part 3 of Woodysix8's five part Scrabble Scramble too. It seemed to be in the St. Andrews Landfill which was weird and seemed not right by a hint on the cache page. We bagged it and went to St. Marys River Park. We entered it and hiked deep in until Russ foudn a great spot for Indian Symbols. Ironically this was a post card that Dawn, Erin's sister had sent us. Erin and I both at different times looked at the card and thought now there is a cache in that card somehow. Russ researched it into a working puzzle with Erin's help.  The spot did not fit to the puzzle that the cache will have but Erin's A Breed Apart geocache did. We placed it and hiked even deeper into the park ever watchful of our parking spot, A Breed Apart hide and the Tavern on the other side of the park off of Old Indian Bridge Road. We finally came out behind the Landfill and we were closing in on what we thought was Woody's Part 3. It zeroed out in a rock pile. After about twenty minutes searching and doubting we were searching in the righht place we beat a retreat and called Woody for a Yea/Nay about the spot. We went hiking back into the park and pretty soon found another good spot for the Indian Symbols cache. While hiding Woody called and he confirmed we were not looking in the right spot. I told him I bet the math was backwards when I did it. We hiked back out and decided to get Woody's before heading home after I recorrected the math back at the truck. These two new caches may be awhile before they are on-line. They will need to be DNR approved and teh Ranger is on vacation until October 17th.

We went to Woodys real hiding spot and got it as light was starting to wane. We had been here before as another cache is less than .10 away. Must not be a problem for parts of a cache to be near another geocache. We called ahead on the cell for pizza and took our weary bones home. Everyone was tired. We did paperwork that night for gc.com and the DNR and that was about it.

On Sunday we stayed around the house. Erin took the baby up to the playground in the afternoon as Russ swapped channels between Talledega and the Redskins game.