For Baby L's first birthday, we had the pleasure of making a trip to visit my family on the East Coast. My sister lives with her husband in Boston and my father & step mom live in Connecticut, so we were able to enjoy some beautiful late-summer weather in New England. As an added bonus, G'd folks flew up from Houston to join us for Baby L's birthday party!
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| Family portraits for Baby L's birthday! |
Baby L's birthday "party" was really a 4-day affair filled with balloons, presents, new clothes, cupcakes, ice cream, Dad's Vietnamese cooking, mooncakes, and Nintendo Switch.
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| Birthday girl! |
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| Baby girl with her GDad |
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| Birthday girl loves her new presents |
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| Auntie came with us to introduce Baby L to mom for the first time |
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| Baby L wishes that she could have a Nintendo Switch like daddy and uncle! |
After the birthday festivities, we headed out for a road trip to Maine! We weren't sure how Baby L would do since historically, she is not a fan of long car rides and she did better than we thought (though not great). We ultimately wanted to go to Bar Harbor & Cadillac Mountain, but since it is 8 hours from Mystic, we broke it up into 4-hour driving days with overnight stops in Portland on the way there and Saco Bay on the way back.
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| Baby L LOVED the windy gusts at the top of Cadillac Mountain! |
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| Playtime at the hotel in Saco Bay just before checkout |
We ate tons of lobster while in Maine - and Baby L has definitely developed a taste for expensive seafood! After our the last night of our road trip in Saco Bay, Granny and Gdad headed back to Houston while we went back to Dad's house in Connecticut. We spent the last week of our trip hanging out at the house, doing some last minute USA shopping, and generally relaxing before going back to Dubai. We think Baby L has some sensitivity to disposable diapers (we primarily use cloth at home), and so we were also fighting a post-road trip diaper rash by letting her run around naked on the deck behind Dad's house.
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| This little wolverine was ready for the game! Until she fell asleep before kickoff - she didn't miss much in our season opening loss to Notre Dame. |
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| My babies, sleeping in well past sunrise |
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| One last trip to visit Mom |
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| Baby's birthday balloon, still afloat 10 days later! |
And just like that, our East Coast vacation was over - it was time to pack up our boxes and bags for the long journey back to Dubai. Baby L was a champ on the flight - she slept for long stretches on the flight, and was (for the most part) not too cranky. However, after the 3 long trips we took with her this year, we've decided that next year, we are going to limit flying to regional destinations and everyone else can come visit us!
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| Baby L just wants to push the buttons! |
