Field work with boy

Quinn has been asking for months to go out in the field with me.  I finally decided to give him the opportunity and took him out for a day of MAPS (Mapping Avian Productivity and Survivorship) banding at Cabrillo National Monument.  This is field work at its absolute cushiest...sitting under a tree overlooking the ocean banding birds, driving to the nets.  We set up 10 12-foot long mist nets, which we check every 30-40 minutes.  Birds are removed and taken back to a central location where we collect information about their species, age, sex and molt.  We fit them with a numbered metal band and release them.  To my surprise Q even jumped out of bed at 445 am filled with anticipation for the coming day. 

Here we are in front of the lighthouse after setting up the nets at sunrise

Heading out on our first net run of the morning

Just some silliness while we were waiting to go check nets again

Not a bad view!

Q approaches a net to see if we have any birds

Looks like we struck out at this one (this was a pretty slow day!)

Finally we captured somebody.  This was a California Thrasher.  Q was able to release it for us after we fitting him with a band.

More down time...checking out the whale skeleton and checking at the overlook for any whale sightings (we were not lucky enough to see one that day). 

And sometimes we catch things besides birds in our nets.  Here is a cicada that was captured in a net for Q to check out.  :)

Although it wasn't the most exciting day out there, Quinn did get to help out with some banding.  We caught several different species including an Anna's Hummingbird, California Thrasher, California Towhee, Spotted Towhee, Dark-eyed Junco, and probably a few others that I'm not remembering at the moment.  He was able to talk about his experience at preschool the following day.  :)

5 Months Already?

It's hard to believe that our little chunk is already 5 months old.  She's so much fun these days while making sure to keep us on our toes and not letting us get comfortable in any kind of routine.  Our baby who, for months slept from 8pm until 5 or 6 am appears to be gone and replaced by one who wakes up at all hours of the night and screams until she gets what she wants (which is usually to nurse).  But nighttime (and naptime) aside she's really a fun and happy girl.  She smiles at almost everyone she sees and will still let pretty much anyone hold her.  She's developing some skills (rolling in both directions, and currently working on sitting up solo) and also working on adding some new rolls of chub to the already impressive collection.  She and Q continue to get along well and we remain hopeful that this good sibling relationship will be in place until she starts messing with his stuff.  :)  We have not yet started solids, but she does enjoy her liquids and has recently developed a taste for fine beer.  Happy July!

Rolling rolling rolling

She did it a few times a couple of weeks ago, but I didn't see it.  Now she's on a roll...



and giggling

3 Months Old

And finally, we celebrate Anna's 3 month birthday!  Our girl is a big one.  She currently weighs between 15 and 16 pounds and is wearing mostly 6-9 (or even 6-12) month clothes!  She's been sleeping great at night.  She typically goes down around 8 and wakes up briefly around 5 to eat before going back to sleep until 7/8.  I went back to work part-time two weeks ago, so A is slowly adjusting to being in daycare.  She's not really rolling over yet...has done it a few times, but doesn't seem interested in doing it again.  :)

Paso Robles and Jeff's Triathalon

A long road trip with a baby who suddenly hates the car = a very long road trip.  I had to sit squished between car seats in the back in an attempt to soothe said baby.  We did manage to have a few good goof-off moments.  

The villa we stayed in.  It was a huge 2700 SF straw bale house on the top of the hill over-looking the vineyards of Paso Robles

Anna had one nice, relaxing, happy day :)

Spectators.  

Very thankful that Jim Caretta stopped by to catch the race on his way to count grey whales.  I'm not sure I would have managed the trip to the race without his help!  Thanks Jim!!

Jeff had a great race.  I didn't take many photos, because I was in video mode.  He came in 19th in his age group (out of almost 100).  This was his first olympic distance triathlon.  

After the race we stopped briefly in Ventura, where Jeff was scheduled for a few days of training.  Had some fun playing with my waterproof camera case.  Q's first time in the water in a year...he still remembers how to swim.  :)

The original plan was for me to drop Jeff off in Ventura, drive the rest of the way home (3-4 horus) with Q and A and he'd take the train.  After experiencing Anna on this trip (many bouts of SCREAMING in the car) we changed plans and left him the car while we took the train home.  Train travel is the way to go!!

Sibling Love

I love watching these two interact!  A clearly adores her big brother and I think he feels the same way about her.  It is so sweet to catch them in action!  

April Trip to Cincinnati

 In April, when Anna was 2 months old, I took her to Cincinnati to meet the rest of the family.  

She traveled well...she either slept or was awake and happy for most of the flight time.  :)

Anna loved getting to spend some QT with her Nana!  

  

We got the chance to spend some time with "not-so-big" Willie.  He was our cat from around 2003 until we moved to San Diego in January 2000.  Since then he's lived with Mom and Dad.  He's probably pretty old at this point (got him as an adult cat).  He's recently gone blind and is having other health problems, so I was very happy to get to spend some time with him while he's still with us.  

For Easter we went to Jeannie and Frank's house for brunch.  They had an amazing spread and it was fun to watch their daughter, Lia, and June collect easter eggs in the yard.

Really this trip was about spending time with family.  So we got in as much of that as we could.  Even Gogo held Anna!  

Cincinnati in the Spring is beautiful!  We enjoyed an afternoon at the Krohn Conservatory where they were having their annual butterfly show.  This year it featured the butterflies of Costa Rica.  It was awesome!  

Colleen and I also took a quick trip to the zoo on one of our last days.  The tulips were stunning!  We did see a few animals also, but the tulips really stole the show!

On our final night in town we had dinner with Andy, Colleen and June.  Loved getting to spend so much time with these guys.  They are such a fun family!  

Here we attempted a photoshoot of June and Anna wearing the same dress.  Unfortunately we timed it right when Anna was ready to go down for a nap.  :)