our staycation, part 2: the city

After our lovely day-long beach vacation, we went to visit some friends in the city. Adrian went camping with his former roommate and longtime friend, while Lyndon and I stayed with InDeeds and the baby. She keeps telling me how much there is to do in her city, but I didn't quite believe her until I experienced it for myself. Unfortunately, my camera died on the second day of our weekend adventure, so my pictures may leave something to be desired.

First we went to Storyville . . .

Lyndon had all kinds of fun playing with Legos and trains. We really need to get him some . . .

He also, despite the pouty face, loved sitting in this little chair. I'm pretty sure it was designed for stuffed animals, since it was a tight fit even for him, but he loved it. And no, that's not our teddy bear. That particular ratty (but endearing) toy belongs to Storyville. (Yes, I had to repress a shudder as I watched him snuggle his face into its germ-covered belly, but I could either test his immune system or break his heart. Guess which one I chose.)

 

"Legos and trains aren't just for boys!" says Papillon.

"Neither are awesome rocking boats!"

Then, we visited the duck pond. The ducks (especially the drakes) were apparently starving and not afraid to show it. We got attacked more than once, to the point where I had to beat one off with my shoe. (True story.) Between the vicious ducks and Lyndon's desire to leap into the pond, it was a busy trip.

The females were a little less gung-ho. A little.

Lyndon, however, was plenty gung-ho. He splashed and stomped pretty much the whole time we were there. (Love those Crocs.)

Oh, duck pond. How I wish we had one.

There was SO much to do in the city, so much to see. It was all free and open to the public-- unlike here, where the children's museum costs $12 per person and you have to put your name on a waiting list to attend library storytime-- and, as much as I don't want to live in the city, I have to admit, it has its advantages.

our staycation, part 1: the beach

For those of you who don't know, Adrian recently changed careers (and couldn't be happier about it). As of June 21th, he was officially done teaching middle school, and, as of June 27th, he was an employee of our alma mater. For those of you motivated enough to do the math, this means that, instead of having the whole summer off, he had 6 days (one of which was half taken up with the orientation for his new position). We also knew that he wouldn't be eligible for ANY time off until this winter at the earliest. So, very quickly, our vacation mindset changed.

We decided to embark on a "staycation". We set out to discover the joys of sticking (relatively) close to home, and it was a resounding success!

Day 1: We visited the beach, which is only a little over an hour away from our house, yet we don't go much on the weekends due to massive traffic jams and huge crowds. But a Tuesday in June?! Sign us up!

The surf was a little rough the day we went, especially when we first arrived.

Lyndon was mesmerized.

Then we got down to the very serious business of playing in the sand.

Kisses on the beach! Awww.

This is pretty rough for Delaware.

Lookin' snazzy. 6-9 month shirt and 18 month shorts. MckMama isn't the only one who mixes sizes willy-nilly.

Observing the waves from a safe distance with Daddy, until . . .

. . . Daddy helped him take the plunge. And he loved it! The water was pretty chilly, so I definitely didn't expect him to giggle hysterically and ask to do it again . . . and again . . . and again. He even enjoyed getting splashed up to his waist when the big waves came in!

Staycation, Day 1 was a ton of fun!

anniversary trip, part 2

This post is about something I like to call The Chair.

This chair.

This lovely red number belonged to my dad when he was a kid. My parents have pictures of him in it. They also have pictures of me in it. And, what do you know, for Lyndon, it was love at first sight.

He climbed in and out of it for two days straight, figured out how to turn himself around in it and make it rock.

I can't tell you how weird and wonderful it was to see him enjoy the very same chair at his grandparents' house that I enjoyed at mine. This thing is special. I'm glad he realizes it.

anniversary trip, part 1

We spent last weekend with my parents, down at their very farm-like home. There were big trees, cool breezes, and wide open spaces, a welcome change from suburbia. Since our anniversary was the previous Thursday, they took us out to a lovely dinner along the Chesapeake Bay.

There was a wedding going on right outside our window; we watched the whole thing from our table. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures (I thought it would be a little weird), but it was very fun to watch. The groomsmen wore color-coordinated Hawaiian shirts that matched the wild, tropical colors of the bridesmaid's dresses. It looked like someone uprooted a Bahama beach wedding and transplanted it to Maryland.

The food, of course, was fantastic, and when Lyndon got antsy towards the end, we took him exploring.

The current (very swanky) restaurant and hotel where we ate is built right next to an old railway station that used to take people from the cities down for a day at the beach. It's now a museum.

This whole scene was very surreal for me, seeing my husband and son wander around this place. I studied this spot as part of a history project in high school, snapped photos here for my senior photography class, and acted in a musical for the county's 350th anniversary that paid homage to this train and rehearsed right up the street. It was a true merging of old and new: the shiny hotel with the worn green benches, my little Lyndon with my past adventures.

our awesome weekend, part 2

Some thoughts from this weekend...

The pastor at the shoutin' Presbyterian church (oh, the irony) we attended on Sunday preached on unity, and, despite diaper blowouts and hungry babies, we managed to get the gist of his message. (I think it helped that there were two of us.)

He spent a lot of time telling us what unity should not look like. He said that we should not pursue spiritual unity simply because unity feels good (and is all the rage), attempting to unify ourselves with those who disagree with us on important doctrinal issues. For example, a group in my college town wanted all the churches, temples, worship centers, etc., along with their pastors, preachers, elders, and rabbis to come together and form a unified "faith community". Biblically, that's a bad idea. If I believe that Jesus is the only way to Heaven, and you believe that He isn't, then I shouldn't just shut up for the sake of unity, because I would be watching you go to Hell, and that's not very loving, now is it? (Neither should I beat you over the head with my Bible. Again, not very loving.)

This does not mean that I can't understand, respect, or befriend those who believe radically different things from me, just that I can't be unified with these people. As Mark Driscoll is fond of saying, "we're not going to wear matching sweatshirts and ride a tandem bike". My best and closest friends are always going to be those with whom I agree on big, important issues (like why we're here, who God is, what has value in this life, etc.). As long as those fall into place, we can disagree about all kinds of things and still have a close, unified relationship.

This weekend was an exercise in this kind of relationship. The friend I stayed with and I disagree about infant baptism, the miraculous gifts of the Spirit, church government, attachment parenting, on-demand feeding... and that's the short list. I'm sure we could come up with a lot more if you gave us some time. Yet, I can and did experience unity and fellowship this weekend, made possible because we agree on the most important thing: the gospel. We agree about who Jesus is and who we are. And, really, that's all that's necessary for unity.

our awesome weekend, part 1

Lyndon and I got to hang out with a friend from college and her little girl this weekend. The boys (Adrian and my friend's husband) went camping, and the four of us stayed at their place. It was a fantastic weekend, but, alas, I forgot to bring my camera to most of it. We went to an open-air concert a few blocks away from their house (sadly, no pictures!), scored some Goodwill bargains, and visited the most raucous Presbyterian church I've ever seen.

The boys, meanwhile, hiked over 7 miles in 2 days, climbed a mountain, fell asleep on the beach, and made a Catholic pilgrimage (again, no pictures!). And no, they're not Catholic.

Let me just say how much fun it was to "play college" again. Yes, this time we had babies. But we got a chance to experience life together-- eating, laughing, talking, staying up late-- just the way we used to. We made tea and swapped advice, this time about parenting and marriage. It was lovely, and I hope to do it more often.

And then we took a group picture... or, rather, attempted to take a group picture...

Take 1...

 Take 2...

Take 398...

Finally, everyone held still long enough! (and we turned on the flash)

It was a lovely weekend. :-)

the beach: in summary

Well, we came home yesterday from our big beach trip, amid 4th of July traffic, motion sickness, and diaper blowouts. When we opened the door to our house, we discovered that our cats had both puked and peed on our carpet, and that there was not a scrap of food in the pantry or fridge.

Welcome home, right?

And, since then, I have been asked about half a dozen times, how was your vacation? And, despite the cheery pictures, I've had to answer, okay. Not great or terrific, but okay.

You see, in my opinion, our vacation wasn't any of those wonderful superlatives. I thought, at first, that I was just being my pessimistic self, seeing only the bad and assuming the good didn't exist. But Adrian agrees with me. We didn't have a great time last week.

And it's our own fault. I went to the beach expecting to do certain things and go certain places together, both as a family and as a couple. Adrian went expecting to relax and take a break from normal life. Neither of us got what we wanted, because we neglected to consider not only the desires of our other half, but also the demands of our little guy. We realized that, deep down, we were both thinking about this trip selfishly. We both wanted to do what we wanted, when we wanted, and that ship sailed the day we became parents.

Now, I'm not saying that children are a terrible burden and I wish we'd never had one. We love our little guy as much as is humanly possible and get a tremendous amount of joy out of raising him, but it's an undeniable fact that if mom and dad want peace and quiet, and a baby wants something else, the baby wins. Parenthood is a neverending job, which seems like an obvious point until you stop and think about it. Never. Ending.

This past week, we were forced to stop and think about what our new job descriptions mean. We talked about what we expect from vacations in the future. We lowered our expectations a bit. And we agreed to stop being so darn selfish!

This year's vacation could have been the most fun it's ever been. We're a family. We have a little smile-machine to enjoy. But we spent so much time arguing, blaming, and accusing that we missed out. I'm glad that we had this experience, because it forced us to talk about some things we'd been ignoring. I just wish we  somehow could have gotten all the unpleasantries out of the way before our vacation. Then we could have had a great (instead of an okay) time enjoying the beach and each other.

the beach: day 6

9:03am-- at the lighthouse

the beach: day 5

1:23pm-- Beach 101: Intro. to Sand

the beach: day 4

4:53pm-- rain

the beach: day 3

5:13pm-- new girlfriends

the beach: day 2

12:45pm-- family time

the beach: day 1

12:35 pm-- first look at the ocean

This time tomorrow . . .

This time tomorrow, we'll be here . . .

Feel free to be jealous. :-)

Chocolate, Midnight, and Amish Ice Hockey

Well, I'm finally posting about the Marriage Conference . . . and now some of the details are a little foggy, so bear with me as I reminisce . . .

We got lost on our way up, to the tune of about an hour's extra travel time. Part of it was Google's fault, and part of it was human error. Adrian felt terrible about it . . . but we still arrived 1 1/2 hours before the first session started, with enough time to check in (free chocolate bars!) , get our stuff together, and grab dinner. ($9.00 panini sandwiches in the hotel's coffee shop; I wish I could say that that was the last time we ate there.)

The next day should have started with breakfast at Skyline Diner (20 minutes away), but we had a bit of an early-morning problem . . . so the next day started with breakfast at Friendly's (20 seconds away).

It was a great time, so I really couldn't have asked for more, and Adrian handled the last-minute change of his best-laid plans like a pro.

As a matter of fact, meals like this were probably my favorite part of the conference. Yes, the messages were amazing, and getting away for a weekend was great, but it was so wonderful to be able to hang out with all these couples without the constant interruption of children. After the last session on Saturday night, a bunch of us went to the hotel's sports bar and talked until midnight. I feel as if Adrian and I benefited as much from our interaction with all the wise, godly couples around us as we did from the messages.

On the way home, as we were remarking about how great it would be to live on a farm in the Pennsylvania countryside, we saw this:

Can you tell what's going on here? Let me give you another view:

Yes, this is a crowd of Amish boys skating on a frozen pond, a homey and quaint little scene. But look closer . . . these Amish people are playing hockey. They've set up goals, and they have pucks and sticks. It just made us want to live in the country more. *sigh*

First Post

Hello there everyone in virtual-land! We haven't had a blog since high school, and we thought it was about time. The little-over-a-year-old Peterson family is due for some big changes and big events in the next few years, and we wanted to keep everyone informed. And I (Meredith) wanted an outlet for this fabulous addiction to writing that college instilled in me in the past few years.

So, here we are! We have one more day left in our Outer Banks paradise before heading home to face the real world once again. It's been blissful here, waking up to the rhythmic sound of waves, and staying there, just listening, for as long as we want. But, as usual with enjoyable things, relaxation has a dark side. It's so easy to throw off all Christian responsibility along with our work schedules and normal sleeping patterns. We think we can stop fighting our sinful natures or neglect to meet with God. And we suffer for it. But we also learn from it... as we have this week. Rest is good and necessary. But it's not complete rest unless it's accompanied by spiritual refreshment, which is only found in God, not on a beach or next to a pool.

Although beaches and pools are nice...