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even more traumatized
Originally uploaded by telfandrea.

Poor Henry. This picture perfectly captures his (long) adjustment to life in NYC. He's doing a little better this week. If the day is normal, Cate and I walk him in the morning and Telfer walks him in the evening. We live literally a block from Riverside Park with a beautiful promenade and a dog run. There are so many dogs here in the city...

Cate is doing great. She is sleeping completely through the night (7 to 7) and I am like a new person. She loves all the attention she gets on the street and makes new friends everywhere we go.

I am finally decompressing. It's so nice to have such a slow-down but strangely off-putting. I have been buried in novels, rereading the Morningside Heights trilogy (takes place in our neighborhood) when Cate is napping and walking all over the neighborhood when she's awake. I love it here. I love the walking, the grocery stores, hotdogs, the church we are attending, the bagels, the food delivery, and the conversations I hear in the street. I will especially love getting a babysitter(s) lined up a couple times a week so we can go to dinner...

Telfer's fellowship is going well. When you've been in the same place for eight years there is a definite period of adjustment when you go to a new institution. He's remarkably, admirably resilient.

NYC Cuteness

Cate's cuteness translates in NYC. As if we were afraid.

 

Pictures. 

Set 1: in a Cate-sized chair. The picture session ended like you expect. She slid off the chair but I caught her just in time. 

Set 2: sitting on our bed wearing a new dress from Grammy and Grandpa Chris. A little bit tired, but sweet tired. 

Set 3: Swinging for the first time in NYC. Enraptured with the experience! 

And speaking of swinging...this was just this afternoon.

Settled

We are here and settled in for the most part! The trip went smoothly - Cate and Henry both did marvelous on the plane. We stayed the first night in a seedy motel and moved into our apartment on Monday morning.

We settled in just before Telfer left for Southern California to attend the funeral of his beloved Papa. The weekend here in NYC has been good. I am still figuring out how one manages stairs, stroller, dog on a leash and keys all at once. Making serious headway. Henry finally showed some spunk at the dog park last night and Molly came over for takeout Thai and Tri-Cities wine. This morning Cate and I walked all over Morningside Heights and Columbia University. Beautiful. Goal for next week: taking the baby on the subway by myself and getting Internet in the apartment. I love my iPhone but it can't do everything...

The Night Before

So here we are in Olympia, together again (I was so happy to pick Telfer up from the airport last night - three weeks is really a long time). 

We are almost done figuring out the packing/luggage strategy for our travel day. Witness one aspect below:

 

I love my new iphone! So, here's the schedule:

Tomorrow we leave for the airport at 3:45 a.m. (yes, you read that correctly). Our flight leaves at 7:15 a.m. and arrives in NYC around 3:30 p.m. or so. Hopefully we get Henry in both the sherpa bag and in the cabin of the airplane (rather than the cargo hold). We'll get a taxi into the city and then stay one night in a hotel near our apartment. The moving truck and hired movers will arrive sometime on Monday morning and we'll move in. Yikes. Pray for us! We'll keep this updated...

Arrived

beautiful
Originally uploaded by telfandrea.

My new iPhone arrived yesterday. It's really a thing of beauty... Biggest draw: a videocamera.

Mom Jeans

Maybe you have all seen this already but Elizabeth showed it to me and I haven't stopped laughing. My biggest nightmare: flaunting mom jeans.  

In other news, Cate and Henry and I are headed to Olympia tomorrow. Telfer sold his car and the buyers will pick it up tomorrow. He'll drive a rental car for a week. We still have quite a few details to figure out for our actual move to NYC (car service, movers, henry on the plane) but we are doing pretty well. We don't like being apart this long but somehow we're halfway through already... 

And in nerdy book news, I finished updating all the books we are taking to NYC in LibraryThing. Only 208! I am proud of me! And a good chunk are Cate's...blame it the baby.

Detour

detour to cannon beach
Originally uploaded by telfandrea.

Elizabeth and I were trucking down I-5 when I had a little niggling thought: why not spend an extra night in Cannon Beach before driving on to Richland? Fabulous idea. We had such a good time. 

Favorite part: watching Henry run on the beach.

my puppy
Originally uploaded by telfandrea.

Cate's Car Seat

leaving redlands
Originally uploaded by telfandrea.

Mama, is this my permanent home now?

Alive

my girl
Originally uploaded by telfandrea.

Don't worry about us...

We have finally finished Phase One of the Griffith Move 2009 - packing up our house in Redlands. The process was more than a little heartbreaking for me...I loved my house and could imagine living in it until we headed to the nursing home. What can you do? 

Moving details: We had a PODS delivered in our back alley lot (pictures on the flickr link) where we stacked our belongings (can you say BOOKS?) that we won't need for a year. And then a semi-trailer was delivered to the front of our house to load our NYC-bound belongings. The truck is somewhere in middle America by now, on its way to a warehouse in New Jersey until we actually get to NYC.

People keep asking if we hired movers. Telfer's response: who needs movers when you have Andrea? Telfer packed maybe three boxes...maybe? And not because he was watching the NBA playoffs. He has been swamped at work and his chief resident responsibilities which left me to tie up a lot of our loose ends. Everything was just a little bit overwhelming (hence the lack of posts). Thank the Lord for the exersaucer!

We are now one week into Phase II: Homelessness. Thankfully, Elizabeth flew down to Ontario to drive up to Washington with me (and Cate and Henry). How did I think I could drive 1400 miles with a dog and a baby by myself? She was just a little bit invaluable. We even took an unscheduled detour to Cannon Beach for one night...so fun.

Telfer is finishing up his residency at Loma Linda and staying with friends and housesitting while Cate and Henry and I are enjoyably dividing our time between Tri-Cities and Olympia. Two more weeks until NYC... I am excited of course but mostly so relieved that the packing and the moving and the stress is over.

Packing up

sitting up!
Originally uploaded by telfandrea.

A rare post from Telfer: We are still here and alive! The past few months have gone by in a blur and it seems all nights and weekends have been busy and filled up weeks in advance. We had the pleasure of a visit and Disneyland trip from/with Andrea's sister Alyssa, along with her husband Nate and their three girls Eden, Cora, and Neva. It was so much fun and Cate got her first mickey and loved "its a small world" (and "pirates" for that matter!). Last weekend we got to take a trip to Monterey for the annual CSA meeting (california society of anesthesiologists) and we had such a good time in part due to fond memories of going there for techie library conferences for Andrea in years past. This weekend is yard sale time and next weekend its time to move out! I'm not really pulling my weight (haven't packed a box yet) but I am helping when I get home with moving boxes around and outside etc - it is quite the endeavor as those of you who have recently moved can attest.