Well the unofficial end of Summer has arrived. I have a backlog of pictures from the past couple weeks and I'm just going to put most of them up in one post. They are from the air show, the weekend at the Cape for Ryan and Kristy's wedding, a trip to the mountains and more. To see what we've been up to
click right here or on one of the pictures above or below.
There's also some from a hiking trip Ryan and I went on a couple weeks ago and I forgot to put up. If you want to see the pics from more of our adventures in Maine you can
click here or on the picture below.
Our other big news is that Jen had her 20 week ultrasound. Exeter thought they saw something that needed to be looked at further so we were sent off to Dartmouth-Hitchcock where, with a better ultrasound machine, they found that it was nothing. We were a bit worried for a few days but in the end we are now more certain everything is fine than we would have been before that trip and we got the 4D pictures that usually cost a lot of money for free. You'd think Exeter could get the better machine too rather than worry people and send them off to another hospital needlessly but all's well that ends well i guess. I didn't want to know what we were having but Jen did so we had them put the answer in an envelope so we could open it if we wanted to. Jen couldn't wait so Brooke opened it the next morning and and in case you haven't heard Brooke is going to have a sister. The following pictures are the Ultrasound, the 4D picture and a picture of Brooke when she was a day old. I think they look alike, you can see for yourself. Anyways we're just thrilled that she's healthy. Well that's all for now. If the weather's good next week we want to take Brooke camping one more time with just the three of us so there should be lots of pictures from that trip if it happens so check back soon.
For one last time just the three of us went on a little mini Vacation. It was more like a long weekend, except we almost never get weekends off together, so we took a little time mid-week to go camping with Brooke so she could have us all to herself one more time and so Jen could squeeze in one more camping and hiking trip before she has to take a break for a little while. We ended up with two perfect September days up in Acadia. The nights were cold and snugly, I think it got down into the upper 40's, but the days were sunny and upper 60's so we couldn't have asked for a lot more than that. 
The first day Brooke walked about 2 miles of nature trails along a harbor,through the woods, down to tide pools and some beaches. The next day we decided to see how she and Jen would do on an actual hike. They both did great, Brooke made it about 3/4 of a mile while climbing about 300 vertical feet before she decided it was time to ride in her piggy-backpack as she called it, but did great climbing up the rocks and ledges to that point. Jen made it the whole 1.1 miles to the top of 522 foot high Gorham Mountain, and back of course, even opting for the more adventurous route on the way down. The mountain itself is a rocky little peak right next to the ocean (the one farthest left in the picture below) so there are great views along the way and from the top even though it's one of the smaller mountains in the park.
That pretty much filled the two days up but we had a good time as usual. Now it's getting too cold to take the whole family and Jen's getting to the point where it's probably not such a great idea to go hiking any more so the next time we go Brooke is going to have to share us with her baby sister. Next spring she can help us introduce her to the outdoors and Acadia. For now pictures of this trip are right here if you want to see them. 